Star Trek is the first show in the Star Trek franchise. After the release of multiple spinoff series and movies, it has been retroactively called Star Trek: The Original Series to differentiate it from the franchise as a whole.
The origin of the show came when Gene Roddenberry was looking to write hard-hitting political and moral commentary and could not do so with the regular dramas of the time. He deduced that by creating a science fiction show borrowing heavily from the film Forbidden Planet, he could slip in such commentary disguised as metaphors for the various current events. As such he pitched Star Trek to the networks as a merging of the two most popular genres of the time, science fiction anthologies and Westerns.note
While troublesome to produce, the show was a major Trope Maker, especially in Science Fiction (each of the three main characters has a trope named after them, and that's just for starters!). The cast was a dynamic mix of ethnicities and cultures, and while the focus was nearly always on Kirk, Spock and McCoy, they still had a Russian, an Asian and a black African woman in positions of responsibility, authority and respect, despite recent, brewing or ongoing conflicts concerning people of those ethnicities in Real Life. According to the cast members, near everyone in Hollywood wanted to be a part of Star Trek because of the steps forward it was making. In particular, George Takei said that almost every Asian actor wanted to be Sulu because they wouldn't be required to use an Asian accent or engage in Asian martial arts, instead breaking cultural stigma by being a practitioner of European fencing.note This also resulted in attracting multiple high-profile guest stars and guest writers, including Harlan Ellison, Theodore Sturgeon and Richard Matheson. Plots varied widely in quality from episode to episode and from season to season, depending upon who was writing and/or directing. An episode chosen at random can be anything from high camp to geopolitical allegory to genuinely intelligent drama, and is likely to be at least two out of those three.
In some ways the show was way ahead of its time; in other ways, it is a product of its time. The women usually (but not always) appeared in the roles of assistants and secretaries, wearing go-go boots and miniskirts.note While the visual design of the show was ambitious, the actual production quality has not aged well.
The show did have some developmental history before it came to air. The original Trek pilot featured Captain Pike played by Jeffrey Hunter, and Majel Barrett as his first officer. The pilot was praised by the network as great science fiction, but was considered "too cerebral" for the target audience and not as action-packed as the network wanted to market it. This resulted in a near entire-cast replacement for a second pilot episode, except for Spock. In fact, Doctor McCoy didn't appear until after the second pilot was filmed. However, that first pilot has remained as part of the franchise canon and did not go to waste—Roddenberry used a lot of it for the series' only two-parter, "The Menagerie," which proved a Hugo science fiction award winner, and the pilot has been included in various releases of the series. Captain Pike himself was recast in Star Trek (2009) by Bruce Greenwood, and played by Anson Mount in the second season of Star Trek: Discovery (with Rebecca Romijn as Number One, Ethan Peck as Spock, and the Enterprise herself), wherein afterwards Pike received his own show called Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, coming full circle.
While the show was considered popular with general audiencesnote , the Nielsen ratings branded it a flop. Star Trek barely managed three seasons before being officially canceled, with a close call on the second season. Within a few weeks of its cancellation was the monumental first Moon Landing, and as a result the subsequent reruns of Star Trek were more popular than the original run. Television was also changing at the time, starting to account for demographics along with overall ratings, and found that Star Trek had snagged the most coveted 18–35 male group that nearly every show was aiming for. Star Trek conventions were jammed with thousands of dedicated fans, and seeing the potential for a revisit led into production for a new TV series. The first attempt was Star Trek: The Animated Series in 1973, which suffered from Filmation's cheap production values, but more than compensated by having most of the original writers and cast, producing a great series that earned the franchise's first Emmy Award. Later in the decade, in the hope of creating a Paramount television network, a new Star Trek series was developed, dubbed Star Trek: Phase II. After Paramount's owner ditched the network plan, the intended pilot was reworked into the first Star Trek feature film, Star Trek: The Motion Picture, in 1979, after the monumental success of Star Wars. This led to an ongoing film series, the success of which led to the Sequel Series in 1987, Star Trek: The Next Generation, and another 18 straight years of Star Trek on television.
If you're in the US, you can watch all of the episodes on the Paramount+ streaming service. This show also has a tool for gathering and voting on Favorite Episodes
. And over here we have a Recap page.
The subtitle "The Original Series" is a Retronym used solely for commercial clarification once Star Trek: The Next Generation came out. It has always been referred to as Star Trek in its own opening sequence.
Shatner returned to Paramount Television (which succeeded Desilu Studios as the show's production company during the second season) in 1975 for the series Barbary Coast, which was not nearly as successful as Star Trek, lasting only one season. Nimoy also continued with PTV after Star Trek ended, joining the cast of Mission: Impossible, which also began under Desilu.
Common plots:
- Something will threaten the ship and wreak havoc with the crew, either by harming them directly, manipulating laws of physics/reality or screwing with people's minds.
- Kirk leads a landing party to a planet with a single major defining element in their culture. Commonly, it will be a society that perfectly mirrors one from Earth's history.note Their hosts rudely steal their communicators and phasers, usually because they just can't bear to let them leave. Lots of running around and fistfights ensue. Expect at least one Red Shirt to bite the dust. At the end, Kirk gives a speech to point out what's wrong with the planet's culture. Alternatively, the people on the planet will be a worshipping a "god" who turns out to be a computer that controls every aspect of its citizens’ lives. Kirk will then destroy it to emancipate them, acknowledging that while their new life may become equally dangerous, freedom is a right that should never be sacrificed.
Character profiles and roles in the script:
- James Tiberius Kirk (William Shatner): The Captain, a space-age Horatio Hornblower with a strong, complex personality. A veteran of war, and hundreds of planetary explorations and space emergencies, he's fully and deeply aware of his responsibilities, and has a tendency to push himself beyond his limits.
He's gained an unfair reputation as a Military Maverick and Ethical Slut who sleeps with Green-Skinned Space Babes.note - Spock (Leonard Nimoy): The ship's exec and Science Officer, in charge of all scientific departments. His Human-Vulcan heritage was intended as an emphasis that we are out in space and alien people are common. While he is very emotionally reserved as a matter of Vulcan cultural tradition, in truth, he is as human as much as he is Vulcan. As a child, he was bullied for his mixed heritage, causing him to occasionally act in rejection of his human half (Thus, calling him "cold-blooded" or "unfeeling" will result in him thanking you for the "compliment"). But he is not as cold as he seems.
- Leonard "Bones" McCoy (DeForest Kelley): Chief Medical Officer, The Heart, and The Watson. The least "military" person on the ship. Given a Promotion to Opening Titles in the second season.
- Montgomery "Scotty" Scott (James Doohan): The Chief Engineer from Scotland, both a reliable officer and daring in battle.
- Nyota Uhura (Nichelle Nichols): From the United States of Africa, she's an expert in all ship's systems related to communication. Today she's considered a Twofer Token Minority. Serving as the Communications Officer and occasional helmswoman, she was essentially a glorified telephone operator.note Nonetheless, at the time, this was almost unthinkable authority to place in the hands of a woman or a minority, so when Nichols considered leaving the show she was talked out of it by none other than Martin Luther King Jr.
- Hikaru Sulu (George Takei): A compulsive hobbyist (botany, gun collecting, fencing) and a Fan of the Past. The ship's helmsman, again an almost unthinkable position then for a minority, especially an Asian.
- Pavel Chekov (Walter Koenig): Added in the second season, a young ensign with a Monkees-esque hairstyle and
a bad Russian accent who serves as the Enterprise's weapons officer. His tendency to joke - the most common being to falsely attribute everything good in the universe to "Mother Russia" - was a Running Gag. - Christine Chapel (Majel Barrett): Ship's nurse in Mad Love with Spock. Given The Cameo in a couple of the films.
- Yeoman Janice Rand (Grace Lee Whitney): Ms. Fanservice with a Beehive Hairdo. The original Bridge Bunny literally — early reviews of the series called her a "Playboy Bunny–type waitress." She was supposed to be one of numerous yeomen, a "succession of young actresses, always lovely". The yeomen served Kirk as an executive secretary, valet and military aide and were supposed to be treated as completely equal with men of the same rank. Rand and Kirk had Unresolved Sexual Tension until she fell victim to Chuck Cunningham Syndrome.note Given The Cameo in a few of the films.
- Harcourt Fenton "Harry" Mudd (Roger C. Carmel): The Trickster, Con Man, and all-around scoundrel, Mudd was the focus of two episodes, and another in the animated series.
- Cyrano Jones: A more affable, less competent Trickster than Harry, who likewise reappears in an episode of the animated series.
- Khan Noonien Singh: An Affably Evil Human Popsicle and Designer Baby Übermensch who was once an Evil Overlord. Though he only appeared in one episode, he later became The Unfettered of the second movie.
- Lieutenants Leslie and Kyle: The two most prominent Red Shirt characters. The former appeared in the background of most episodes and even managed to come Back from the Dead, and is known as "King of the Redshirts"; the latter was the only Redshirt to have a steady job (transporter chief) and frequent dialogue, making him the closest thing the series had to a Mauve Shirt. He even appeared in one movie and the animated series.
