Star Trek – The Original Series, Vol. 3, Episodes 6 & 7: The Man Trap/ The Naked Time
Dec/095
Amazon.com
Volume 3 in this terrific DVD library of original Star Trek programs includes “The Man Trap,” the first broadcast episode of the Gene Roddenberry series. Though it was not the first story produced for the show, the process was still new enough that contracted writers were obliged to fill in various blanks, develop some of the key characters, and smoothly introduce some of the Trek technology we’ve come to take for granted. Writer George Clayton Johnson conceived a story in which an old flame of Dr. McCoy’s (DeForest Kelley), a woman named Dr. Nancy Carter (Jeanny Bealy), is in need of medical supplies on a planet where she and her husband (Alfred Ryder) are the only humans. “Nancy,” however, turns out to be a shape-shifting creature that sucks the salt from the bodies of humanoids. Once it’s loose aboard the Enterprise, the “salt vampire” can look like anyone in its pursuit of nourishment.
With McCoy having such a pivotal part in the narrative, Johnson worked with the series’ story editor and episode director (Marc Daniels) on fleshing out his underdeveloped character. There were other issues to think about: this premiere show introduced the Enterprise’s transporter technology as well as Star Trek’s realistic take on scary extraterrestrials. Everyone involved survived the episode, and while it played only to a meager television audience, Trek was off and running for three-plus decades.
Also on this DVD is episode 4, “The Naked Time,” in which an alien disease that strips inhibitions from individuals affects the Enterprise crew. Sulu (George Takei) frees the swashbuckler in his soul, Kirk (William Shatner) battles his demons, and a young lieutenant, Riley (Bruce Hyde), serenades the entire starship and steers her toward certain doom. Still early in the proceedings, this episode introduced a psychological aspect that would become a cornerstone for the storytelling on all four Trek series. –Tom Keogh
Star Trek – The Original Series, Vol. 3, Episodes 6 & 7: The Man Trap/ The Naked Time
Star Trek – The Original Series, Vol. 3, Episodes 6 & 7: The Man Trap/ The Naked Time
Dec/095
Amazon.com
Volume 3 in this terrific DVD library of original Star Trek programs includes “The Man Trap,” the first broadcast episode of the Gene Roddenberry series. Though it was not the first story produced for the show, the process was still new enough that contracted writers were obliged to fill in various blanks, develop some of the key characters, and smoothly introduce some of the Trek technology we’ve come to take for granted. Writer George Clayton Johnson conceived a story in which an old flame of Dr. McCoy’s (DeForest Kelley), a woman named Dr. Nancy Carter (Jeanny Bealy), is in need of medical supplies on a planet where she and her husband (Alfred Ryder) are the only humans. “Nancy,” however, turns out to be a shape-shifting creature that sucks the salt from the bodies of humanoids. Once it’s loose aboard the Enterprise, the “salt vampire” can look like anyone in its pursuit of nourishment.
With McCoy having such a pivotal part in the narrative, Johnson worked with the series’ story editor and episode director (Marc Daniels) on fleshing out his underdeveloped character. There were other issues to think about: this premiere show introduced the Enterprise’s transporter technology as well as Star Trek’s realistic take on scary extraterrestrials. Everyone involved survived the episode, and while it played only to a meager television audience, Trek was off and running for three-plus decades.
Also on this DVD is episode 4, “The Naked Time,” in which an alien disease that strips inhibitions from individuals affects the Enterprise crew. Sulu (George Takei) frees the swashbuckler in his soul, Kirk (William Shatner) battles his demons, and a young lieutenant, Riley (Bruce Hyde), serenades the entire starship and steers her toward certain doom. Still early in the proceedings, this episode introduced a psychological aspect that would become a cornerstone for the storytelling on all four Trek series. –Tom Keogh
Star Trek – The Original Series, Vol. 3, Episodes 6 & 7: The Man Trap/ The Naked Time
Star Trek – The Original Series, Vol. 5, Episodes 10 & 11: What Are Little Girls Made Of?/ Dagger of the Mind
Dec/095
Description
“What are Little Girls Made Of?” Ep. 10 – Kirk and company are horrified to learn that famed scientist, Dr. Roger Korby has developed the ultimate android in hopes of populating the universe with them. “Dagger of the Mind,” Ep. 11 – Kirk must beam down to a penal colony after a doctor escapes to the U.S.S. Enterprise, hinting at the horrors commited against the colony’s patients.Amazon.com
Volume 5 from the DVD collection of original Star Trek programs includes “What Are Little Girls Made Of?” Written by Robert Bloch (author of the novel Psycho, the basis of Hitchcock’s film), the episode finds Captain Kirk (William Shatner) and nurse Christine Chapel (Majel Barrett) beaming down to planet Exo III, where Christine is to be reunited with her fiancé, Dr. Roger Korby (Michael Strong). The meeting is less than joyful, however, when it becomes clear that Korby has been developing androids that he intends to spread throughout the galaxy–using the Enterprise as his delivery vehicle. This was certainly the first significant performance for Majel Barrett in the Trek family; longtime fans know she went on to play Lwaxana Troi on The Next Generation (and Mrs. Gene Roddenberry in real life). An entertaining episode all around, with the notion of an android Kirk somehow amusing. (Maybe it was the android who sang on that notorious Shatner album.) Fans of ’60s TV will also enjoy the performance of Ted Cassidy (the original Lurch from TV’s The Addams Family) as the giant android, Ruk.
Also on this DVD is “Dagger of the Mind,” another mad-doctor drama. This time, Kirk delivers supplies to a penal colony on Tantalus V, where he meets the renowned Dr. Tristan Adams. Adams has been working on the development of a neural neutralizer to control and manipulate dangerous patients. When Kirk threatens to expose him as a dangerous megalomaniac, Adams uses the technology on the unfortunate captain. This tense piece set in a madhouse atmosphere makes for a riveting episode, with a few unhinged performances adding to the fun.–Tom Keogh
Star Trek – The Original Series, Vol. 5, Episodes 10 & 11: What Are Little Girls Made Of?/ Dagger of the Mind
Dec/095
Description
“What are Little Girls Made Of?” Ep. 10 – Kirk and company are horrified to learn that famed scientist, Dr. Roger Korby has developed the ultimate android in hopes of populating the universe with them. “Dagger of the Mind,” Ep. 11 – Kirk must beam down to a penal colony after a doctor escapes to the U.S.S. Enterprise, hinting at the horrors commited against the colony’s patients.Amazon.com
Volume 5 from the DVD collection of original Star Trek programs includes “What Are Little Girls Made Of?” Written by Robert Bloch (author of the novel Psycho, the basis of Hitchcock’s film), the episode finds Captain Kirk (William Shatner) and nurse Christine Chapel (Majel Barrett) beaming down to planet Exo III, where Christine is to be reunited with her fiancé, Dr. Roger Korby (Michael Strong). The meeting is less than joyful, however, when it becomes clear that Korby has been developing androids that he intends to spread throughout the galaxy–using the Enterprise as his delivery vehicle. This was certainly the first significant performance for Majel Barrett in the Trek family; longtime fans know she went on to play Lwaxana Troi on The Next Generation (and Mrs. Gene Roddenberry in real life). An entertaining episode all around, with the notion of an android Kirk somehow amusing. (Maybe it was the android who sang on that notorious Shatner album.) Fans of ’60s TV will also enjoy the performance of Ted Cassidy (the original Lurch from TV’s The Addams Family) as the giant android, Ruk.
Also on this DVD is “Dagger of the Mind,” another mad-doctor drama. This time, Kirk delivers supplies to a penal colony on Tantalus V, where he meets the renowned Dr. Tristan Adams. Adams has been working on the development of a neural neutralizer to control and manipulate dangerous patients. When Kirk threatens to expose him as a dangerous megalomaniac, Adams uses the technology on the unfortunate captain. This tense piece set in a madhouse atmosphere makes for a riveting episode, with a few unhinged performances adding to the fun.–Tom Keogh
Star Trek – The Original Series, Vol. 3, Episodes 6 & 7: The Man Trap/ The Naked Time
Dec/095
Amazon.com
Volume 3 in this terrific DVD library of original Star Trek programs includes “The Man Trap,” the first broadcast episode of the Gene Roddenberry series. Though it was not the first story produced for the show, the process was still new enough that contracted writers were obliged to fill in various blanks, develop some of the key characters, and smoothly introduce some of the Trek technology we’ve come to take for granted. Writer George Clayton Johnson conceived a story in which an old flame of Dr. McCoy’s (DeForest Kelley), a woman named Dr. Nancy Carter (Jeanny Bealy), is in need of medical supplies on a planet where she and her husband (Alfred Ryder) are the only humans. “Nancy,” however, turns out to be a shape-shifting creature that sucks the salt from the bodies of humanoids. Once it’s loose aboard the Enterprise, the “salt vampire” can look like anyone in its pursuit of nourishment.
With McCoy having such a pivotal part in the narrative, Johnson worked with the series’ story editor and episode director (Marc Daniels) on fleshing out his underdeveloped character. There were other issues to think about: this premiere show introduced the Enterprise’s transporter technology as well as Star Trek’s realistic take on scary extraterrestrials. Everyone involved survived the episode, and while it played only to a meager television audience, Trek was off and running for three-plus decades.
Also on this DVD is episode 4, “The Naked Time,” in which an alien disease that strips inhibitions from individuals affects the Enterprise crew. Sulu (George Takei) frees the swashbuckler in his soul, Kirk (William Shatner) battles his demons, and a young lieutenant, Riley (Bruce Hyde), serenades the entire starship and steers her toward certain doom. Still early in the proceedings, this episode introduced a psychological aspect that would become a cornerstone for the storytelling on all four Trek series. –Tom Keogh
Star Trek – The Original Series, Vol. 3, Episodes 6 & 7: The Man Trap/ The Naked Time
Star Trek – The Original Series, Vol. 13, Episodes 25 & 26: This Side of Paradise/ The Devil in the Dark
Dec/095
Amazon.com
The Vulcan-born first officer of The Enterprise, Mr. Spock (Leonard Nimoy), generally smiles about as often as Greta Garbo. But in “This Side of Paradise,” Spock not only smiles but laughs, dangles from a tree, kisses a good-looking blonde woman, and gets into a fight with his best friend. It all starts when Spock, Captain Kirk (William Shatner), Dr. McCoy (DeForest Kelley), Sulu (George Takei), and a couple of crew members beam down to Omicron Ceti III to find out what happened to a group of scientists who built a research colony on the planet. What they discover is a little spooky. The colonists claim they’ve created a true paradise where everyone is part of a collective mind bent on positivity. Kirk, naturally, argues that paradise robs people of their need to suffer and crawl toward progress.
Meanwhile, Spock is zapped by an exotic flower that is the real source of all this community goodwill, and he instantly gets happy, acting like a kid, renewing a romance with a comely biologist (an angelic Jill Ireland), and giving the sputtering Kirk an earful of entertaining insubordination. Story editor D.C. Fontana’s script contains some obvious parallels between a chemically induced “paradise” and a drug-induced high in the 1960s. But the real draw here is Spock’s uncharacteristic joy and the drama behind Kirk’s shattering decision to break his friend’s heart.
“Devil in the Dark” opens with an emergency on Janus VI, a planet rich in raw materials crucial to the running of Federation operations. There’s a lot of money to be made by the mining contractor involved, but a swift, unseen monster is roaming the snaky tunnels of Janus’s interior, turning miners into acid-drenched goo. It’s up to the Enterprise crew to find the alien culprit and defuse the lynch-mob mentality spreading among the paranoid working stiffs there. Captain Kirk (William Shatner), Mr. Spock (Leonard Nimoy), and Dr. McCoy (DeForest Kelley) beam down to initiate the detective work, leading Spock to quickly conclude that the thousands of silicone balls mysteriously strewn about the planet’s deepest level might have something to do with the reasons behind the atrocities.
Written by series guru Gene L. Coon and directed by mainstay Joseph Pevney (who alternated directorial chores with Marc Daniels during the show’s second season), “The Devil in the Dark” is a breathlessly paced episode reflecting a delightful variety of cross-genre influences–Westerns, creature-features, gritty noir. Add one of the most effective and moving instances of the Enterprise’s search for new life on Star Trek (plus McCoy’s infamous complaint, “I’m a doctor, not a bricklayer!”), and this is a memorable program indeed. –Tom Keogh
Star Trek – The Original Series, Vol. 3, Episodes 6 & 7: The Man Trap/ The Naked Time
Dec/095
Amazon.com
Volume 3 in this terrific DVD library of original Star Trek programs includes “The Man Trap,” the first broadcast episode of the Gene Roddenberry series. Though it was not the first story produced for the show, the process was still new enough that contracted writers were obliged to fill in various blanks, develop some of the key characters, and smoothly introduce some of the Trek technology we’ve come to take for granted. Writer George Clayton Johnson conceived a story in which an old flame of Dr. McCoy’s (DeForest Kelley), a woman named Dr. Nancy Carter (Jeanny Bealy), is in need of medical supplies on a planet where she and her husband (Alfred Ryder) are the only humans. “Nancy,” however, turns out to be a shape-shifting creature that sucks the salt from the bodies of humanoids. Once it’s loose aboard the Enterprise, the “salt vampire” can look like anyone in its pursuit of nourishment.
With McCoy having such a pivotal part in the narrative, Johnson worked with the series’ story editor and episode director (Marc Daniels) on fleshing out his underdeveloped character. There were other issues to think about: this premiere show introduced the Enterprise’s transporter technology as well as Star Trek’s realistic take on scary extraterrestrials. Everyone involved survived the episode, and while it played only to a meager television audience, Trek was off and running for three-plus decades.
Also on this DVD is episode 4, “The Naked Time,” in which an alien disease that strips inhibitions from individuals affects the Enterprise crew. Sulu (George Takei) frees the swashbuckler in his soul, Kirk (William Shatner) battles his demons, and a young lieutenant, Riley (Bruce Hyde), serenades the entire starship and steers her toward certain doom. Still early in the proceedings, this episode introduced a psychological aspect that would become a cornerstone for the storytelling on all four Trek series. –Tom Keogh
Star Trek – The Original Series, Vol. 3, Episodes 6 & 7: The Man Trap/ The Naked Time
Star Trek – The Original Series, Vol. 24, Episodes 47 & 48: Obsession/ The Immunity Syndrome
Dec/095
Description
“Obsession,” Ep. 47 – A “vampire” cloud, which Kirk failed to destroy 11 years ago, has returned to stalk the crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise. “The Immunity Syndrome,” Ep. 48 – Kirk, Spock, and McCoy frantically try to devise some means of stopping a gigantic single-celled creature that has destroyed an entire solar system.
Star Trek – The Original Series, Vol. 24, Episodes 47 & 48: Obsession/ The Immunity Syndrome
Star Trek – The Original Series, Vol. 24, Episodes 47 & 48: Obsession/ The Immunity Syndrome
Dec/095
Description
“Obsession,” Ep. 47 – A “vampire” cloud, which Kirk failed to destroy 11 years ago, has returned to stalk the crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise. “The Immunity Syndrome,” Ep. 48 – Kirk, Spock, and McCoy frantically try to devise some means of stopping a gigantic single-celled creature that has destroyed an entire solar system.
Star Trek – The Original Series, Vol. 24, Episodes 47 & 48: Obsession/ The Immunity Syndrome
Star Trek – The Original Series, Vol. 33, Episodes 65 & 66: For The World Is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky/ Day Of The Dove
Dec/095
Description
“For the World is Hollow And I Have Touched The Sky,” Ep. 65 – Oracle, an unrelenting computer, has control of the Yonada planet, which is really a spaceship. Kirk and crew must free up control or all Yondans will die. “Day of the Dove,” Ep. 66 – The only episode with a female Klingon has the aliens battling Kirk’s crew aboard the U.S.S. Enterprise. Who is controlling this fight where even fatal wounds heal instantly?