Star Trek: 15 Most Hilariously Unthreatening Alien Races
14. Balok "The Corbomite Manuever" TOS
The name of Balok's species isn't identified in this episode, other than being a representative of the First Federation, which is a real myopic stretch of the imagination. Should the United Federation of Planets take offense to the First Federation's name? But the real hint that this is an alien you shouldn't worry about is that he hides behind a giant mannequin alter ego in order to test the true nature of humanity of the crew of the Enterprise. Aside from Balok's two-faced nature, there are two things wrong with this species. First of all, the mannequin doesn't even look real: it's supposed to look alive, but how can the Enterprise crew be fooled by this thing that doesn't even look at them properly? It's exaggerated, mechanical motion and it looks like the love-child of E.T. and some misanthropic sex-doll. Secondly, when Balok reveals himself, he's actually some kid with a tea-cozy strapped to his head with really badly-formed dental work. Furthermore, the question that bugged my adolescent mind was how could this tiny individual ever hope to fool us into thinking that he controlled the entire Fesarius from an incredibly small yet well-cushioned murphy bed? It just boggled my mind. Plus, he dressed like a little girl.
John Kirk is a Teacher-Librarian and currently a History/English Teacher with the Toronto District School Board.
But mostly, John teaches Geek.
Comics, Sci-Fi (Notably Star Trek), Fantasy and Role-Playing and table-top games all make up part of John’s repertoire, There is a whole generation of nerds-in-embryo who rely on him to make sense of it all, to teach that with great power comes great responsibility, that the force will be with us always and that a towel IS the most useful thing to have in one’s possession.
When John isn’t in the classroom, he can be found in his basement writing comic reviews for www.popmythology.com and features for Roddenberry Entertainment's www.1701news.com.
