Star Trek
Original Series (TOS)
Star Trek Original Series, the era of Kirk and the 2nd Enterprise that many tried to follow. First watched during 1966 to 1969. It had a rocky start and nearly didn't get off the ground, but to the relief of all the now trekky fans we are glad that it did.
One thing to me that sets Star Trek well away from other TV programmes is its not entertainment, but something that creates thoughts in ones own mind about the current state of the human race, both socialy and politcally. Wouldn't it be nice if in our near future there would be no racism, sexism or the need for personal greed, it would be nice that the world all pull together as one and made this world a much better place to live.
Just take a look at three of the main characters you had Spock whose was logical about everything and always criticized, then you had Dr. McCoy, who was very emotional about everything that happened. The one person who was the balance of the two was Kirk himself, both emotional and logical in everything he did.
A little history lesson: Star Trek was first submitted to NBC in the 11th March 1964, the original outline was a ship name the USS Yorktown in the future.
The first pilot episode entitle 'The Cage' was given a budget of $630,000 in September 1964 and it was here that the ship was renamed the Enterprise (would Star Trek still be here today, if the ship had still be called Yorktown?). The plot was rejected by NBC and they also demanded cast changes, which included the removal of Majel Barrett as Number One and also Spock. It didn't stop here they ordered a 2nd pilot to be created which was entitled 'Where No Man Has Gone Before' (see sexism was very rife back then), and went into production on the 15th July 1965. One luckly thing did happen and that was Gene fought to keep Spock and he was promoted to 1st Officer and Captain Kirk (William Shatner) was introduced to take over Captain Christopher Pike (Jeffrey Hunter).
Next came 'The Man Trap' which appeared on the 8th September 1966, but suffered very poor ratings, I think the problem was that it was aired at the same time as other very popular shows like 'Bewitched' and 'My Three Sons', give it a fighting chance I would have said. The show was almost cancelled in December 1966 because of poor ratings (thank god it wasn't I hear you all cry), but thanks to two Sci-Fi writers Frank Herbet and Harlan Ellison it remain on air and though it received 5 Emmy nominations it was sent to a Friday night slot in March 1967.
Thought-out the 2nd and 3rd season it was still suffering from poor ratings and on the 3rd June 1969 the final episode 'Turnabout Intruder' was shown and the NBC cancel the show.
Star Trek nearly made it back in 1977, by Paramount and it was going to be called Star Trek: Phase II, but it was abandoned after Star Wars was released. Instead the crew went on to make several films starting with 'Star Trek: The Motion Picture', a bit of a lame name, surely they could have thought of something much better than that.
So in general to me it looks like people in the entertainment world at NBC in our past had very narrow views about the future and couldn't grasps what Gene was trying to get across, I bet looking back they are kicking themselves now, it has one of the largest group of fans and followers than just about any other TV program and is still shown in many countries today.
People who followed this were named the Trekkies
