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46			    THE DEADLY YEARS
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WRITER: David P. Harmon

GUESTS: Charles Drake
	Sarah Marshall
	Beverly Washburn
	Felix Locker
	Carolyn Nelson
	Laura Wood

AIRED:  December 8, 1967

HACK-MAN rating: .650
Usenet rating:   .683

QUOTES:
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 - "I'm not a magician, I'm just an old country doctor." --McCoy
 - "If I live long enough, I'm going to run out of samples." --Chekov


			    THE DEADLY YEARS

PLOT:
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Kirk is relieved of command when he and  other officers  contract a disease
from a  passing comet  that induces  senility and  death by  old age within
days.  The planet Gamma Hydra 4 passed through the tail of a comet.  Chekov
doesn't age like the rest; they try to explain  this because  he was scared
and got his adrenaline flowing.   Some diplomat  who's never  come close to
commanding a  starship  (Commodore  Stocker)  is  put in  charge instead of
Chekov, and decides  to take  a shortcut  through the  Romulan Neutral Zone
like a dork.  Kirk bluffs about corbomite to Star  Fleet Command  in a code
he knows the Romulans have cracked, saying that it  will make  this area of
space uninhabitable for two solar years.   The  Romulans back  off and Kirk
gets out of there.

FACTS:
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 - Starbase 10 has better medical facilities than the Enterprise.
 - McCoy refers to Spock's age as "the high side of 100".
 - Kirk had a fling with Dr. Janice Wallice.
 - Kirk was 34, but now is 65-72.
 - They use  a needle  on Chekov  (I thought needles  had been  replaced by
   hypos).
 - Stardate 3478.2-3579.4 ???

OPINIONS:
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Can be hard to follow the plot on the first viewing,  but not  all that bad
an episode once it sinks in.