******STARSHIP-SIZED SPOILERS!****** When Star Trek the Original Series (TOS) aired its second season episode “The Ultimate Computer” in March of 1968, factories and automobile assembly lines in the US were introducing new generations of machines controlled by bulky, room-sized computers that threatened the jobs of many workers. It was in that climate that Star Trek…
Tag: William Shatner
Why “Star Trek: The Motion Picture” (1979) is the greatest love story of the Star Trek movies…
******STARSHIP-SIZED SPOILERS!****** After seeing “Star Trek: The Motion Picture” (TMP) theatrically in the late 1970s at age 13, the last thing I would’ve labeled it was a love story. There are no cute-meets of characters spilling coffee on each other in turbolifts. We don’t even see Captain Kirk romance a single green-haired alien woman. In…
Star Trek TOS: “The Corbomite Maneuver” (1966) put the series on course…
******FESARIUS-SIZED SPOILERS!****** As a kid watching Star Trek out of broadcast order in reruns during the 1970s and 1980s, I could always tell earlier episodes by their ‘growing pains’; uniforms without black collars, different paint/layout scheme for the ship’s interiors, Spock’s makeup tweaks, various terminology differences (“United Earth Space Probe Agency,” “Vulcanian” ), etc. First…
“Star Trek III: The Search for Spock” is the latest Star Trek movie to get the coffee table book treatment…
******STARSHIP-SIZED SPOILERS!****** One of my favorite activities in my free time is book shopping. Back in the day, when we had many used bookstores in my area, I would love to spend an afternoon leisurely perusing through titles, looking for my next read. Rarely did I go into a bookstore knowing exactly what I was…
Star Trek TOS: “The Savage Curtain”; Abraham Lincoln beams up for a slightly goofy, yet memorable episode…
******STARSHIP-SIZED SPOILERS!****** Here in the United States at the time of this writing, I’m not exactly in the ‘President’s Day’ spirit this month. However, this site is about sci-fi/fantasy/horror and nostalgia, not modern politics. Way back in March of 1969, Star Trek aired “The Savage Curtain,” an episode cowritten by no less than creator/ex-showrunner Gene…
Through “The Time Tunnel” and into “Deep Space Nine”; James Darren (1936-2024)….
One aspect of growing older I’ll never get used to is seeing so many names and faces I grew up with passing away. This morning, I’d read about the passing of actor James Darren (1936-2024), who died in his sleep last night (September 2nd), from apparent issues relating to an inoperable heart condition. He is…
Where Nomad had gone before: Star Trek TOS’ “The Changeling” (1967)…
******STARSHIP-SIZED SPOILERS!****** An ancient Earth space probe, radically upgraded and repurposed by alien technology, now seeks to eliminate Earth’s ‘infestation’ of irrational ‘biological units.’ What sounds like the short synopsis of 1979’s “Star Trek: The Motion Picture” (ST: TMP) also happens to be the plot of a 1967 episode of Star Trek: The Original Series…
Astronaut-artist Ed Dwight Jr., 90, finally gets his space shot, 63 years later…
The Right Stuff Denied Last weekend, something truly amazing happened. An event which did get some press, but not enough. Granted, in an age when when devastating wars, an intense US election season cycle, and other ongoing issues are dominating the news, a 90-year old African-American man taking a suborbital tourist spaceflight seems like a nice…
The unlikely episode that launched Star Trek: “The Man Trap” (1966)…
*****STARSHIP-SIZED SPOILERS!***** When fans today think of the ‘first’ Star Trek episode, they tend to (not incorrectly) think of the pilot episodes “The Cage” and “Where No Man Has Gone Before,” but neither of those pilots were broadcast first. In fact, “The Cage” wasn’t broadcast in full until 1986 (the same year I bought it…
Star Trek TOS: “Space Seed” (1967) yields a greater crop than what is sown…
*****STARSHIP-SIZED SPOILERS!***** This column might get me in some trouble. While I certainly appreciate the legacy of the Star Trek’s Original Series episode “Space Seed,” which gave the Trek multiverse its power-mad villain Khan Noonien Singh, it is a clumsily-executed episode whose current reputation relies greatly on its legacy (namely 1982’s exceptional sequel, “Star…
Star Trek TOS: “All Our Yesterdays” offers a star-crossed romance for Spock…
*****SUPERNOVA-SIZED SPOILERS!***** The third and final season of the original “Star Trek” (1966-9) (TOS) is often unfairly maligned in fandom for its drop in quality from the previous two. Yes, it’s true that creator/producer Gene Roddenberry took his hands off the wheel, along with a revolving door of producer/writers, including Gene Coon and John Meredyth…
Star Trek: The Original Series; examining “Metamorphosis,” 55 years later…
*****55-YEAR OLD STARSHIP-SIZED SPOILERS!***** The Star Trek Original Series (TOS) episode “Metamorphosis” was first broadcast via the NBC network on November 10th, 1967. This was a heady time for the sophomore series, with creator Gene Roddenberry producing, along with some terrific writing talent attached to the show, including script editor Dorothy Fontana (1939-2019), and prolific…