Star Trek
Star Trek was an influential science fiction television series created by Gene Roddenberry that followed the adventures of the crew of the starship U.S.S. Enterprise. The show began with the production of the 1964 pilot "The Cage". "The Cage" featured Jeffrey Hunter as Enterprise captain Christopher Pike. The pilot was rejected by NBC executives as being too cerebral. In order to demonstrate the action-adventure potential of the series, another pilot entitled "Where No Man Has Gone Before" was produced. Replacing Jeffrey Hunter as Enterprise captain was William Shatner who starred as Captain James T. Kirk. The new pilot also starred Leonard Nimoy as Mr. Spock who was the only character to return from the original pilot after NBC's rejection of "The Cage". Response to the second, action-oriented, pilot was good and NBC gave the go ahead to the series.
The series premiered on NBC on Thursday, September 8, 1966 in the 8:30-9:30 PM timeslot with the episode "The Man Trap". Critical response to the series was mixed and rating were lower than expected. In its second season, reoccurring guest star DeForest Kelley was added to the series' starring cast and the show was moved to Friday at 8:30. A decline in the ratings, however, prompted NBC to attempt to cancel the series after its second season, but a letter writing campaign by die hard fans of the show saved it from cancellation. An additional season of episodes were produced, but ratings continued to decline most likely due to the quality of the third season episodes and a bad 10:00 PM Friday night time slot. Despite another letter writing campaign, the series was finally cancelled after its third season. The last new episode "Turnabout Intruder" was shown on June 3, 1969.
After its three year run Star Trek began running syndication where it was discovered by legion of new fans and became a phenomenon. The show inspired six features films, an animated series, and four additional spin-off television shows. Other spin-off's include novels, comic books, merchandise and an enormous amount of fan-fiction based on the series. Despite its short network run, Star Trek has become one of the most successful shows in television history.
Aside from its three main stars, Star Trek featured a large cast of reoccurring guest stars that includes James Doohan, Nichelle Nichols, George Takei, Walter Koenig, Majel Barrett, and Grace Lee Whitney. Other notable guest stars include Diana Muldaur, Gary Lockwood, Ricardo Montalban, Sally Kellerman, Julie Newmar, Frank Gorshin, John Colicos, Roger C. Carmel, William Campbell, Ted Cassidy, Michael Ansara and Elisha Cook, Jr. Notable writers for the series include Gene Roddenberry, Gene L. Coon, George Clayton Johnson, Jerry Sohl, Jerome Bixby, Robert Bloch, Theodore Sturgeon, Harlan Ellison, David Gerrold, and D.C. Fontana.
Leonard Nimoy | Mister Spock | |
William Shatner | Captain James T. Kirk | |
DeForest Kelley | Dr. McCoy | |
Eddie Paskey | Lieutenant Leslie | |
Bill Blackburn | Lieutenant Hadley | |
Nichelle Nichols | Uhura | |
James Doohan | Scott | |
Walter Koenig | Chekov | |
Frank da Vinci | Lt. Brent | |
Roger Holloway | Lt. Lemli | |
George Takei | Sulu | |
Jeannie Malone | Yeoman | |
Majel Barrett | Nurse Chapel | |
John Winston | Transporter Chief | |
Frieda Rentie | Enterprise Lieutenant | |
Paul Baxley | Patrol Leader | |
John Blower | Crewman Swenson | |
Jay D. Jones | Mirt | |
Bob Orrison | Patrol Villager | |
Walker Edmiston | Space Central | |
Bob Johnson | Ground Control | |
Bobby Bass | Android | |
Bart La Rue | Announcer | |
Gary Wright | Vulcan Litter Bearer | |
Marlys Burdette | Krako's Girl |
In the throes of his Pon Farr mating period, Spock must return to Vulcan to meet his intended future wife, betrothed from childhood.
A powerful being claiming to be the Greek god Apollo appears and demands that the crew of the Enterprise disembark onto his planet to worship him.
A powerful artificially intelligent Earth probe, with a murderously twisted imperative, comes aboard the Enterprise and mistakes Capt. Kirk for its creator.
A transporter accident places Captain Kirk's landing party in an alternate universe, where the Enterprise is in the service of a barbarically brutal empire.
Primitive inhabitants of Gamma Trianguli VI worship a god who orders them to kill visitors from the Enterprise.
The USS Enterprise encounters the wrecked USS Constellation and its distraught commodore who's determined to stop the giant planet-destroying robot ship that killed his crew.
Very alien visitors to our galaxy attempt to connect with human consciousness but miss, winding up tapping into the regions of human nightmares instead.
Harry Mudd returns with a plot to take over the Enterprise by stranding the crew on a planet populated by androids under his command.
While returning to the Enterprise aboard the shuttlecraft, Kirk, Spock, McCoy and a seriously ill Federation diplomat find themselves kidnapped by an energized cloud.
The Enterprise hosts a number of quarrelling diplomats, including Spock's father, but someone on board has murder in mind.
The Federation clashes with the Klingon Empire over mining rights to Capella IV. A sudden coup between its warrior-minded inhabitants forces Kirk's party to flee with the now dead leader's pregnant wife.
A landing party from the Enterprise is exposed to strange form of radiation which rapidly ages them.
Capt. Kirk obsessively hunts for a mysterious cloud creature he encountered in his youth.
Kirk and the Enterprise computer become detectives after Scotty is accused of murdering women on a pleasure planet.
To protect a space station with a vital grain shipment, Kirk and the crew must deal with Federation bureaucrats, a Klingon battle cruiser and a peddler who sells furry, purring, voracious little creatures as pets.
Kirk, Uhura and Chekov are trapped on a planet where abducted aliens are enslaved and trained to perform as gladiators for the amusement of bored, faceless aliens.
The crew of the Enterprise struggles to cope with a planet of imitative people who have modeled their society on 1920s gangsters.
The Enterprise encounters a gigantic energy draining space organism that threatens the galaxy.
Peaceful, primitive peoples get caught up in the struggle between superpowers, with Kirk unhappily trying to restore the balance of power disrupted by the Klingons.
The Enterprise is guided to a distant, long-dead world where survivors of an extremely ancient race - existing only as disembodied energy - desiring the bodies of Kirk, Spock and astro-biologist Ann Mulhall so that they may live again.
Looking for a missing Federation cultural observer, Kirk and Spock find themselves on a planet whose culture has been completely patterned after Nazi Germany.
Galactic alien scouts capture the Enterprise for a return voyage and a prelude to invasion. Kirk's one advantage - they're not used to their adopted human form.
Responding to a distress signal, Kirk finds Captain Tracey of the U.S.S. Exeter violating the prime directive and interfering with a war between the Yangs and the Kohms to find the secret of their longevity.
Kirk and a sub-skeleton crew are ordered to test out an advanced artificially intelligent control system - the M-5 Multitronic system, which could potentially render them all redundant.
The Enterprise crew investigates the disappearance of a ship's crew on a planet that is a modern version of the Roman Empire.
While back in time observing Earth in 1968, the Enterprise crew encounters the mysterious Gary Seven who has his own agenda on the planet.