One Of Star Trek's Worst Episodes Was Written By One Of TV's Most Beloved Puppeteers

In the "Star Trek" episode "The Lights of Zetar" (January 31, 1969), the U.S.S. Enterprise encounters a mysterious blob of lights — perhaps a traveling cosmic storm of some kind — while en route to Memory Alpha. The storm is able to infiltrate the interior of the Enterprise, and comes to infect the brain of one Lieutenant Mira Romaine (Jan Shutan), knocking her unconscious. When she comes to, Lieutenant Romanie claims to have had a vision of death and destruction; she knows that Memory Alpha will be destroyed and the staff working there killed. Her premonition turns out to be correct. 

It will eventually be revealed that the storm is, in fact, a cluster of psychic lifeforms that is attacking the Enterprise, perhaps unwittingly. Captain Kirk (William Shatner) tries firing weapons at the cluster, but it only seems to hurt Lieutenant Romaine. Dr. McCoy (DeForest Kelley) notes that Romaine's brainwave patterns are the same as the cluster, and that they likely intend to take possession of her body. While devising a plan to ride Romanie's body of the invading psychic lights, the lifeforms manage to take control of her voice and announce that they are the non-corporeal survivors of a long-dead planet called Zetar. Using a pressure chamber, however, the lifeforms are driven from Romanie's body. She recovers immediately and is put back to work. 

"The Lights of Zetar" is one of the least remarkable episodes of "Star Trek," and its generic story often has Trekkies declaring it to be one of the show's worst episodes. The concept of a non-corporeal life-form had already been explored on "Star Trek," and nothing novel was done with it here. The effects of the titular lights amount to a psychedelic '60s light show, and aren't very scary. No one has this episode listed as their favorite. 

The most notable thing about "The Lights of Zetar" is that it was written by the husband-wife duo of Jeremy Tarcher and Shari Lewis. Shari Lewis was, of course, the creator and longtime puppeteer of the beloved kid show character Lamb Chop. 

Shari Lewis' performing career stretches back to the 1950s where she plied her natural talents for storytelling, ventriloquism, singing, and craft instructions. She won an on-air talent show in 1953, which led directly into the gig hosting the children's show "Kartoon Klub." Lewis was such a hit that the show was retitled "Shariland" in 1956. She also began grabbing guest spots on hit programs like "Captain Kangaroo" and "Hi Mom." It was on the latter that she introduced a mildly sassy, naive lamb-shaped sock puppet named Lamb Chop. Lamb Chop became a powerhouse in children's television, and Lewis would continue to puppet Lamb Chop (and other sock-based animal character) for decades. 

From there, Lewis was a ubiquitous presence on kids TV. "The Shari Lewis Show" ran from 1968 all the way through 1975, which was, in turn, followed by "The Shari Show." In 1992, she launched "Lamb Chop's Play-Along." Shari Lewis was a prolific author of children's books, having penned over 60 of them in her career. There are many people of a certain generation who value Shari Lewis the same way one might admire Fred Rogers. She was clam, funny, nurturing, and talented. Lewis, however, was mature, and wasn't afraid to work blue every once in a while. She once performed with Lamb Chop after Lamb Chop had had a few too many. She passed in 1998, and the world lost a glorious human being. 

A new documentary about Lewis called "Shari and Lamb Chop" is currently playing in select theaters, and it's definitely worth exploring. If you know her, you love her. If you don't know her, prepare to become obsessed. 

Lewis' involvement with "Star Trek," it turns out, was a favor from producer Fred Freiberger. It seems that she was a fan of the show — "The Lights of Zetar" comes from the show's third season — and offered to write and star in an episode. She conceived of "Zetar" with her husband, also a longtime collaborator, writing for a series that was well out of her expected wheelhouse. Lewis wanted to play the Lieutenant Romanie character, but the casting directors turned her down in favor of Shutan. This was all covered on the special features on the "Zetar" VHS cassettes from the 1980s. 

The story goes that Lewis pitched the "Zetar" idea to Freiberger, but he rejected it, saying that a very similar episode had just been scripted. Lewis, determined to work on the Final Frontier, wrote a second script, and pitched that as well. By the time she has finished script #2, however, Freiberg said that the production schedule had changed, the "similar" episode had been scrapped, and he would very much like to buy script #1. 

The Romanie character was presented as a love interest for Scotty (James Doohan), the ship's engineer who ordinarily doesn't get his own love stories. Lewis felt that Captain Kirk already had too many love stories, and deliberately gave Scotty a "get the girl" moment. It was very generous of her to think of Scotty, and Doohan likely was grateful to be given something to do other than shout about the Enterprise's engines. 

As stated above, "The Lights of Zetar" isn't one of the most respected episodes of "Star Trek," often feeling generic and contrived. But that may be because it was, at its heart, a fan script. Shari Lewis, not known for sci-fi, still felt she had an ear for "Star Trek" dialogue, and for heady, sci-fi concepts. "Zetar" wasn't wholly successful, but fans of Shari Lewis can admire that "Star Trek" at least gave her a chance.