lincoln enterprises star trek

Geek , Geek Ephemera , Trek

A look back at lincoln enterprises: gene roddenberry’s star trek store, november 9, 2019.

I was quite fortunate to chat with the great Bjo Trimble last month. Trimble, if you don’t know, worked with her husband John to save Star Trek in 1968. The letter writing campaign they spearheaded convinced NBC and Paramount to produce a third season, thus ensuring the show would be syndicated. And the rest, as they say, is history.

We chatted about many things, but the main thing I was interested in talking about was Lincoln Enterprises. Lincoln Enterprises was the first “semi-official” Star Trek mail-order store. It was semi-official, in that it was owned by Gene Roddenberry himself, who had created the original show. Roddenberry originally called the company “Star Trek Enterprises” but since it was an independent from Paramount, Roddenberry changed the name (probably after getting a call from a lawyer) He was always a fan of Abraham Lincoln, so that is the name he picked. Ironically, the name changed back to Star Trek Enterprises in some ads in the late 80s.

I wanted to ask Bjo about it because she and John ran the mail order company for Roddenberry in the early 70s. Bjo didn’t have much to say about it, but I did ask if she had any of the old catalogs. “No, I’m old, I need to get rid of stuff.” Eventually, Majel Barrett took over the company from the Trimbles (many say Roddenberry did so after he got divorced from his first wife, to prevent his ex from getting half of the company). The Trimbles were, effectively, fired. I didn’t ask about that part, but Bjo had previously discussed how this went in a 2012 interview (referenced from Fanlore.com ).

Gene really wanted the business for Majel. And Majel didn’t know bupkis about running a mail order. She came in and took over, and wanted everything her way. And, if you knew Majel, you know that that’s true. She came in and wanted to completely reorganize everything. For instance, tribbles would have been a good idea, but she wanted to add Spock ears to them, and give them long eyelashes and make them chirp. And we said, ‘No, they won’t sell.’ Well, she ordered them anyway and I don’t know what happened to the poor little things, but they didn’t sell. And she would get things like a Star Trek insignia in brilliant rhinestones. We hadn’t worked there more than a year when we were fired… We were heartbroken. John and I had been looking at this, hopefully, that it would have been our career, for the next couple of decades, anyway. But, obviously, that didn’t happen. And, once we left that office, we weren’t allowed to go back in to pick up any of our personal stuff. Gene was doing it for Majel, but he was the one that fired us. We didn’t kowtow to him, and that bothered him. He said to me once, ‘You know, Bjo, I’d hire you to be on the Star Trek staff, but producers want yes people, they don’t need no-you-definitely-can’t-do-that people.’ He knew he was going to get that kind of ripple from me.

There’s also numerous rumors online that the film frames from the original series Lincoln Enterprises sold were not Roddenberry’s property, but taken from the editing rooms at Desilu. Whether he “stole” these (and scripts, as well), who knows? I wasn’t there. I do know that they were definitely sold and listed in the catalogs for years… And a friend of mine bought some at the official Trek convention a few years back, paying a lot more than the original price.

I used to order a LOT of Trek stuff from Lincoln Enterprises… posters, pins, and costume patterns – in fact, I still have the Star Trek movie costume my aunt Peggy made for me when I was 18 (and it still fits!). Most of the products in the catalogs were (of course) Trek related, though for a while they were also selling Kung Fu products (for some reason).

As a collector of Star Trek Ephemera, I’ve been buying old copies of these catalogs off of eBay, and recently tweeted some images from some of the early catalogs. Here’s a sample…

This catalog is from 1973ish… the company was at the time called Star Trek Enterprise (before Paramount had a word or two). And has a letter for fans. pic.twitter.com/SCj9aLcyYu — Joseph Dickerson (@JosephDickerson) October 16, 2019
Next: the Insignia! And authentic #StarTrek film frames!!! pic.twitter.com/zUv3LHVKWw — Joseph Dickerson (@JosephDickerson) October 16, 2019
Nimoy reportedly was against the IDIC amulet being introduced into the show, thinking it was only to make cheap jewelry to sell the fans. And he was right! $7.50! pic.twitter.com/h5U1anggUS — Joseph Dickerson (@JosephDickerson) October 16, 2019

Eventually Lincoln Enterprises closed shop, only to be again revived as an online retailer by Gene’s son Rod in the 2000s (Roddenberry.com). That shop, too, closed up at the end of 2018.

Here’s a gallery of images from the original catalogs – hope you enjoy it.

lincoln enterprises star trek
We haven’t expanded beyond the original intent, actually, but we’re about to. We used to carry just memorabilia. If it didn’t exist in the show, we just didn’t carry it. In other words we weren’t into the games and things like that. We work with the Writers Guild so we can sell scripts exactly as they are used in the show. They look the same, they are the same. Page for page they are the actual script. We used to have [original] film clips which, of course, we’ve run out of. They were just little film clip frames, but everyone liked them so much because they were a little piece of Star Trek. And that was our aim, to let everyone have a small piece of Star Trek. That was basically how we kept the show on the air.
I’d like to get more commercial with it. I’d like to go in for the dolls and the plates, the games and the electronic parts and so forth. In other words, not just memorabilia, but merchandise.... We've always produced the merchandise ourselves. When we handle the other stuff, we won’t be making the games, of course, the action figures, etc. Those we will buy from the wholesalers.
Since we have the only legal place in the world to buy Trek scripts I would say that they do want a lot of scripts. But everything varies. There’s a lot of jewelry and the pins and the communicators and stuff that is worn; there’s a lot of interest in patterns, for example. We sell patterns to the costumes so fans can make their own. There are places that make them, but they’re terribly expensive and we’ve always kept our prices down way, way, way low because Gene felt as though he wanted everyone to be able to have them. So we’ve kept it way down. We really haven’t geared ourselves in all these twenty-seven years toward a profit and we’d like to change that.
I just had a marvelous time doing [making the hats sold at the Seatrek 1993] [1] . I saw this great hat once. I liked it right away, and I asked how much it was. And, oh! It was far too much! I walked away from it. It took me two more times walking past it until I said I’ve got to have one. I was looking at it, and looking at it carefully, and I said, "I can make them cheaper than this, for heaven’s sake. Of course I can!" So I went downtown to all the wholesale houses and I bought the hats, I bought the ribbons, I bought the beads, and everything. Then I sat down to make one. Well, the first one I think took me about eight hours. It still takes about 2-1/2 hours. I’ve since found out that , no, you can’t make it cheaper than what I bought it for. There’s just no way. And, of course, when I pushed them off on my helper, she took one look at ‘em and said, "Not me, boy!" All those little coins that you see on them there, those have to be put on one by one, jump ring by jump ring, onto the loop on the braid. So I do it on airplanes, just from one place to another. I get ‘em done quite easily there as a matter of fact. They really didn’t have anything to do with Star Trek, but I managed to put an insignia on ‘em and so they became Star Trek hat.
  • ^ There is more about these hats in the 1994 Life Arts network interview with Majel Barrett, "A Conversation with Majel Barrett Roddenberry, Star Trek's Nurse Chapel (1994)" which can be found on YouTube. They are straw sun hats onto which Barrett was gluing a strip of braid at the rim and adding large dangling sequins or coins. As she explained, there's nothing to associate these hats with the show other than the pins that she put on for the cruise participants. She describes this and the Christmas balls she also made by hand about 16 minutes into the film.
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When did the First Lincoln Enterprises Catalog Appear?

Discussion in ' Star Trek - The Original & Animated Series ' started by nasaworm , May 11, 2020 .

nasaworm

nasaworm Cadet Newbie

When did the first Lincoln Enterprise catalog come out? In August 1967, AMT began negotiations to produce a kit of the show’s main enemy, the Klingons. On the opposite side of the box art, there was a notice located beneath “As Seen on NBC TV” that mentioned a “FREE OFFER” instructing buyers to “Look inside for details.” When you opened the box, the kit included the model, a simple sheet of decals and instructions. Some kits also may have included an ad for the Scholastic Science Program. All of the first Klingon model kits included a flyer promoting a FREE SPECIAL OFFER! The Free offer was a catalog that you could send for from Star Trek Enterprises, also known as Lincoln Enterprises run by Star Trek’s creator Gene Roddenberry, which allowed you to purchase scripts, bumper stickers, film clips and more from the series. Memory Alpha states that the first Lincoln Enterprises catalog came out in 1969 but it is clear from the AMT Klingon kit release that LE had catalogs available as early as 1968. Memory Alpha is a great jumping off resource but they sometimes get things wrong. For example, they have the wrong box art showing for the first release of the Klingon model kit I seem to recall that there were no FREE SPECIAL OFFER for LE catalogs when the first AMT Enterprise model kits began coming out in stores in April 1967. Does anyone else recall seeing an ad for them in the first Enterprise kits? Do you think my assertion is correct that the first widespread ads for the LE catalogs were those notices that appeared in the first Klingon kits in 1968?  

Replica Picard

Replica Picard Lieutenant Commander Red Shirt

I feel like this is the sort of very specific detail that only someone planning to use time travel to make changes would need to know. What are you planning? Also: I'm in.  

ChallengerHK

ChallengerHK Captain Captain

This is purely from memory, so take it with something of a grain of salt. As I recall, the company started during the middle of the show's production, as the evidenced from the information you identified in the model kit. Calling this a catalog would be debatable, as it had items for sale, but only what was available without much effort, things like copies of the scripts and film clips. These catalogs were produced like early zines, typed up on a typewriter and mimeographed. Later they started having things manufactured for the company, things like the patches and uniform accoutrements like the rank braids. Around this time, they started having professionally designed and printed catalogs available.  
What is defined as a "catalog" is tricky. I guess what I am looking for here is when LE first started to really promote themselves to the public outside of limited convention circles. It seems that the "Free Special Offer" ad promoted on the outside of the 1968 AMT Klingon model box was their first real attempt to reach out to consumers in an organized fashion by offering a "catalog." I also find the AMT box offer surprising in that LE was Roddenberry's own private effort and not really sanctioned by the network or studio but here they were printed right on the outside of the box.  
In that respect I would definitely call what you found in the model kit box reaching out to the public and beyond convention goers.  

alchemist

alchemist Captain Captain

I posted the answer to this question elsewhere, but here it is for anyone who's interested: Star Trek Enterprises catalogs "0," "1A," and "1B" came out between the end of April and the end of May, 1968. Catalog "1C," the 7/68 revision, came out in July, 1968.  

Maurice

Maurice Snagglepussed Admiral

And, in summary, it started as Star Trek Enterprises, then Roddeberry rebooted it as Lincoln Enterprises.  

Harvey

Harvey Admiral Admiral

Maurice said: ↑ And, in summary, it started as Star Trek Enterprises, then Roddeberry rebooted it as Lincoln Enterprises. Click to expand...
Harvey said: ↑ Although I think @alchemist has some information showing Lincoln Enterprises being incorporated before the series even started, which complicates that narrative. I'm going from memory here, so I may have the details wrong. Click to expand...

StarCruiser

StarCruiser Commodore Commodore

I would suspect Roddenberry formed "Lincoln Enterprises" for business reasons related to producing and writing for TV primarily. Many people do that to give themselves a bit of a shield from any odd legal action if they get into trouble... Later, he used it (alternating with "Star Trek Enterprises") to sell items for personal profit (which is fair, considering it's his work).  
alchemist said: ↑ Your memory continues to be excellent! I have Roddenberry's Lincoln Enterprises corporate seal embosser and it shows an incorporation date of April 6, 1962. Star Trek Enterprises changed to Lincoln Enterprises in 1971 or 1972. At the same time, with the release of their catalog #4, they expanded their offerings and began selling non-TOS merchandise from Kung Fu, Questor, Genesis II, Spectre , and Search . Click to expand...
StarCruiser said: ↑ I would suspect Roddenberry formed "Lincoln Enterprises" for business reasons related to producing and writing for TV primarily. Many people do that to give themselves a bit of a shield from any odd legal action if they get into trouble... Later, he used it (alternating with "Star Trek Enterprises") to sell items for personal profit (which is fair, considering it's his work). Click to expand...
alchemist said: ↑ I have Roddenberry's Lincoln Enterprises corporate seal embosser and it shows an incorporation date of April 6, 1962. Click to expand...
My understanding (can't recall where I read this) is that Lincoln Enterprises came from Roddenberry living on Lincoln Avenue/Road/Street. I think the name change was Roddenberry trying to hide what he was doing. There were some gray areas involved in selling things like the film clips and scripts.  

Christopher

Christopher Writer Admiral

ChallengerHK said: ↑ My understanding (can't recall where I read this) is that Lincoln Enterprises came from Roddenberry living on Lincoln Avenue/Road/Street. Click to expand...
Agreed. If I had a ton of time I'd write a book teasing out all of Roddenberry's...let's call them tall tales :-)  

ZapBrannigan

ZapBrannigan Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

Harvey said: ↑ My suspicion is that the change from "Star Trek Enterprises" to "Lincoln Enterprises" (the latter of which Majel Barrett once claimed was was a shell company Leonard Maizlish acquired from another client and subsequently gave to her ) had something to do with Gene's divorce and an attempt to hide assets from Eileen. It may be a coincidence, but the April 6, 1962 incorporation date is not long after Gene first met Majel. But, I'm definitely not a lawyer and don't know all the details, so for now this is just a shot in the dark. Click to expand...

Neopeius

Neopeius Admiral Admiral

Replica Picard said: ↑ I feel like this is the sort of very specific detail that only someone planning to use time travel to make changes would need to know. What are you planning? Also: I'm in. Click to expand...
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Memory Alpha

The Savage Curtain (episode)

  • View history
  • 1.2 Act One
  • 1.3 Act Two
  • 1.4 Act Three
  • 1.5 Act Four
  • 2 Log entries
  • 3 Memorable quotes
  • 4.1 Story and script
  • 4.2 Sets and props
  • 4.3 Casting
  • 4.4 Continuity
  • 4.5 Reception
  • 4.6 Remastered information
  • 4.7 Production timeline
  • 4.8 Soundtrack
  • 5 Syndication cuts
  • 6 Video and DVD releases
  • 7.1 Starring
  • 7.2 Also starring
  • 7.3 Guest star
  • 7.4 Co-starring
  • 7.5 Uncredited co-stars
  • 7.6 Stunt doubles
  • 7.7.1 Unreferenced materials
  • 7.8 External links

Summary [ ]

The USS Enterprise is conducting some last observation scans of a planet incapable of supporting life – the surface is molten lava and the atmosphere is poisonous. However, from his science station , Spock detects an enormous power generation coming from the supposedly uninhabitable planet . During the ensuing investigation, the ship undergoes a deep, swift scan from the surface of the planet, causing the lights on the bridge to flicker. Then an image of Abraham Lincoln sitting in an armchair appears on the viewscreen , stunning the bridge crew.

Act One [ ]

The stunned crew of the Enterprise takes in the image of "Lincoln". He asks to be beamed aboard when the Enterprise is directly above his location on the planet below, to allow the crew to confirm his Humanity. Captain Kirk orders full dress uniforms and for the crew to take the guest at face value, with Presidential honors, while his real nature is determined, much to the chagrin of Scott and Dr. McCoy . While waiting, Spock notes a small change happening on the planet. A landmass has appeared out of nowhere on the lifeless planet, inexplicably capable of supporting life.

In the transporter room , Scott locks the transporter on Lincoln. Spock notes that their target a moment earlier appeared " almost mineral, like living rock with heavy fore claws. " Dickerson has his security officers stand ready with their phasers on heavy stun. The lifeform is beamed aboard, with band music playing and Dickerson blowing a bosun's whistle . " The USS Enterprise is honored to have you aboard, Mr. President, " Kirk tells the 16th President of the United States .

Lincoln steps off the transporter platform and charms them by asking about the taped fanfare and noting his age. Doctor McCoy scans him with his tricorder and confirms to Kirk that he is indeed Human . After introducing Lincoln to Spock, Scott, and Dickerson, Lincoln immediately wants to answer Kirk's questions about him, as well as questions Lincoln himself would like answered. Kirk dismisses security and leads Lincoln away. After everyone but McCoy and Scott leave, McCoy and Scott wonder about the "living rock" reading.

Act Two [ ]

Yarnek

Yarnek, an Excalbian

Lincoln makes a brief tour of the ship, impressing Kirk with his charm. A conversation with Lieutenant Uhura illustrates that "Lincoln" knows terminology from the era of slavery and Lincoln escapes from a gaffe with the same grace. He then acknowledges to Spock a concept in Vulcan philosophy , and that there is a great Vulcan philosopher on the planet, but has no explanation for how he knows.

Kirk had a meeting in the briefing room to consider the situation, and leaves "Lincoln" with Uhura to go there. McCoy warns Kirk of the risks on discipline of Kirk being seen admiring an impostor. McCoy and Scott insist that the whole affair is a trap , however, Spock says it would be illogical given their power – they could just as easily destroy the ship, if that were their goal. Kirk declares that they have been offered contact with a new race – the reason for their mission out here– and that he will accept it. Kirk, Lincoln, and Spock are beamed down, but strangely the phasers and tricorder are not – being left behind on the transporter pads.

The surface resembles a canyon on Earth. Kirk now confronts Lincoln, but he insists there's nothing wrong. Then, another being in the form of Surak greets them, also believing to be himself. When Kirk tells them they won't go along with the charade, a nearby rock comes alive. Yarnek , one of the planet's rock-like inhabitants, called Excalbians , says they stage "plays" to learn more about alien philosophies . The current contest, their first experiment with Humans , is to compare good and evil – "good" being represented by the two Enterprise officers, Lincoln, and Surak , and "evil" represented by four archetypes: Kahless the Unforgettable (based on Kahless the Unforgettable , founder of the Klingon Empire ), Zora (based on Zora of Tiburon ), Genghis Khan (based on ancient Human conqueror Genghis Khan ), and Phillip Green (based on the charismatic but duplicitous 21st century genocidal Human military officer Colonel Green ). Kirk protests the manner of the invitation, to which Yarnek responds by enabling the Enterprise crew to watch the contest.

Act Three [ ]

McCoy, Scott and Chekov confirm the uselessness of their situation, but are allowed to watch the area.

Kirk refuses to participate, and, when Yarnek becomes solid and lifeless again, Green comes forward and appeals to Kirk that all eight were tricked, and that they should join forces against the Excalbians. Kirk reminds Green that he would attack enemies while their guard was down during negotiations. But the truce is insincere and Green's associates ambush during the parley, but are repulsed.

Kirk refuses to participate further, and the Excalbians re-enable communication with the Enterprise for just long enough to reveal that its matter / antimatter seal is failing, which will cause the ship to " blow itself to bits " in four hours . Yarnek says this can only be avoided by victory in the combat.

Kirk selects high ground for a defensible base, though noting there is no time for a defensive war. Surak proposes to become an emissary , the option that resolved the final war on Vulcan . Kirk protests that Vulcan logic will not sway their treacherous enemies on Excalbia, but Surak says that their belief in peace may be what the Excalbians are testing. Ultimately, Kirk says he cannot command Surak, who leaves for the enemy camp. He is captured and his cries and screams for help to Spock are heard.

Act Four [ ]

James T

" I can't let you risk it, Mr. President. " " I am no longer President. "

Kirk says they should rescue Surak: " He's in agony. " Spock says that Surak knew his risks and that a Vulcan " would not cry out so. " Lincoln proposes that they should do what the other side wants – " Not the way they want it, however. " He proposes a distraction by attacking in a noticeable manner. This will allow a stealth rescue from behind.

Kirk and Spock each carried many wooden spears. They reveal their approach, distracting Green's henchmen. Spock threw a spear but Khan dodged. Meanwhile, Lincoln silently crept around Green's henchmen to find and free Surak.

Khan lobbed a rock. Kirk dodged and threw a rock back. Spock threw wood spears, and Kirk joined that effort as a distraction. Lincoln crawls and finds Surak dead. He realizes that Kahless was imitating Surak's voice. Kahless starts to imitate Lincoln's voice. Green watched Lincoln, while Kirk and Spock stand ready to throw more spears, but see no target. Lincoln returns to the battlefield. He reveals that Surak died and warns them to stay away. Suddenly, Lincoln falls forward with a spear in his back – struck down from behind, like the real Lincoln was in 1865.

Despite Surak and Lincoln and dying, Kirk and Spock continue the attack, for the purpose of saving the Enterprise's crew. Now Green's henchmen outnumber them four-to-two. Green and Kahless charge at Kirk and Spock. Khan again throws a rock. Spock throws a spear but misses Khan, so Khan duels Spock. Zora attacks Kirk until he topples Zora. Kahless starts dueling Kirk. Zora crawls away from combat. Green watches (ready to help whichever needed aid, but Kahless keeps Kirk busy). Kirk kicks Kahless while they are dueling. Spock continues wrestling Khan. Finally, Kirk jabs his wood spear into the Klingon, who falls dead. Kirk then runs to save Spock by choking Khan. From behind Khan, Kirk lowers his spear over Khan's head and starts choking him. Khan turns and pulls free. Khan and Green flee. Kirk chases and tackles Green. Green wrestles Kirk and tries to stab Kirk using a pointed stick as a knife. Kirk jumped back, and grabbed Green's arm. Kirk bent his arm so the wood knife is behind Green's back and tackles Green onto the point – causing Green's own weapon to kill him. Zora and Khan have escaped, so "good" wins the battle.

Yarnek, who had been observing, says, " It would seem that evil runs off when forcibly confronted. " and that he sees no difference between good and evil. Kirk explains a difference: that he [Kirk] repeatedly resisted combat, and only battled when compelled by the threat to the Enterprise crew. In contrast, "evil" usually fights for a leader's personal gain. He asks Yarnek, "By what right" you trapped us and coerced us to fight. Yarnek replies, " The same right that brought you here: the need to know new things. " Ultimately, Kirk calls the Enterprise to beam himself and Spock up.

Excalbia, remastered

The Enterprise leaving orbit of Excalbia

Back aboard the Enterprise, Scott and Chekov report that the damage to the ship is reversing, for which they have no explanation. Kirk and Spock reflect on how real "Lincoln" and "Surak" seemed. Spock says it could not be otherwise, since the replicas were created " out of our own thoughts. " Kirk feels he understands the effort on Earth to achieve final peace – and all of their work still left to be done in the galaxy . Kirk has Sulu break orbit of Excalbia and the Enterprise heads off into space once more.

Log entries [ ]

  • Captain's log, USS Enterprise (NCC-1701), 2269

Memorable quotes [ ]

" Fascinating. " " I have been described in many ways, Mr. Spock, but never with that word. "

" President Lincoln, indeed! No doubt to be followed by Louis of France and Robert the Bruce! "

" What a charming Negress. Oh, forgive me, my dear. I know that in my time some used that term as a description of property. " " But why should I object to that term, sir? You see, in our century we've learned not to fear words. "

" Jim, I would be the last to advise you on your command image… " " I doubt that, Bones, but continue. "

" Lincoln died three centuries ago on a planet hundreds of light years away! " (Scott points) " More… that direction, engineer. " (Spock corrects)

" You're the science officer. Why aren't you – well, doin' whatever a science officer does at a time like this? "

" If they’re wrong and they do beam into a pool of lava. " " Then they're dead men. I could'na pull them back in time. "

" Despite the seeming contradictions, all is as it appears to be. I am Abraham Lincoln! " " Just as I am whom I appear to be. " " Surak! "

" May we together become greater than the sum of both of us. "

" You're somewhat different than the way history paints you, Colonel Green. " " History tends to exaggerate. "

" The face of war has never changed. "

" Your Surak is a brave man. " " Men of peace usually are, Captain. "

" There's no honorable way to kill, no gentle way to destroy. There is nothing good in war except its ending. "

" What gives you the right to hand out life and death? " " The same right that brought you here: the need to know new things. " " We came in peace. " " And you may go in peace. "

Background information [ ]

Story and script [ ].

  • This episode evolved from a story idea in Gene Roddenberry 's March 1964 series proposal, Star Trek is... , titled "Mr. Socrates". Roddenberry's inspiration for the staged fight scenario between Kirk, Spock and "vicious historical figures" came when he was writing a memo to NBC regarding Gene Coon 's script "The Last Gunfight" (later retitled " Spectre of the Gun "). ( These Are the Voyages: TOS Season Three , p. 592)
  • Roddenberry's original story outline dated 8 May 1968 featured Socrates visiting the Enterprise along with Abraham Lincoln, and then participating in the fight on the planet surface. In this version, Surak was called "Lvov" and the "good" team also featured the recreation of a "1970s flower power guru" named "Pon". The "evil" team consisted of "Mr. Green", a late- 20th century Earth dictator, Adolf Hitler and Attila the Hun among others. ( These Are the Voyages: TOS Season Three , pp. 592-594)
  • Similarly to " Bread and Circuses ", Roddenberry originally intended this episode to be in part a sour commentary on present-day network television. The Excalbians use their staged "dramas" of recreated figures confronting each other as a means of entertainment and education for their population, who all became dependent upon these "stage plays" as their sole means of gaining knowledge and entertain themselves. In Arthur Heinemann 's later script version and Fred Freiberger and Arthur Singer 's staff rewrites this angle was mostly abandoned, except for a few lines such as Yarnek claiming that " countless who live on that planet are watching ". ( These Are the Voyages: TOS Season Three , p. 594)
  • Yarnek is never named in dialogue, but is so named in the script and in the closing credits. Even in the closed captioning, he's merely identified when speaking off-screen as "Excalbian."

Sets and props [ ]

Original Colonel Green uniform

  • Colonel Green's outfit was later reused by Robin Williams as Mork's uniform in the late 1970s television series Mork and Mindy . [1]

Casting [ ]

  • The first choice for the role of Lincoln was none other than Mark Lenard , but prior commitments prohibited him from taking the part. As Lenard explained it, " I was doing a series at the time called Here Come the Brides in which I played Aaron Stemple, the resident bad guy/rich man. The Lincoln segment came up about Christmas time when we had a slight hiatus, and I thought I could work it in. I had already played two roles on Star Trek and they were well received. But it turned out we just couldn’t work it in. I think we went back to work on the other series too soon, and instead of having the six or seven days I would have needed to do the role, I only had three or four days. " [2]
  • Though credited on-screen for their appearances, both Nathan Jung (Genghis Khan) and Carol Daniels Dement (Zora) have no lines in this episode.

Continuity [ ]

  • This episode includes two further contributions to the ambiguous time period that the series is set in, establishing that "Lincoln died three centuries ago ," indicating a mid- 22nd century time period, while at the same time establishing, more ambiguously, that the 21st century was "centuries ago."
  • In all previous episodes time aboard the ship is measured in standard units (seconds, minutes, hours). When Lincoln asks Kirk if people "still measure time in minutes," Kirk replies that they can convert to them, implying that they, like the mile (also frequently used), were in fact old-style measurements .
  • This episode introduces several notable figures in the Star Trek universe that would be further explored in later incarnations of the franchise. They include the Human despot Colonel Green ( ENT : " Demons "), Kahless the Unforgettable ( TNG : " Rightful Heir ", et al.), and Surak ( ENT : " Awakening ", et al.).
  • The image of Lincoln sitting in his chair next to the Enterprise in space is glimpsed in ST : " Ephraim and Dot ".
  • Kahless is seen here in the Klingon style typical of TOS. It would seem to contradict the explanation given in " Divergence " for the change in physical appearance of the Klingons, since Kahless lived long before those events. However, since the image of Kahless was drawn from Kirk's and Spock's minds, not from "fact", this is not necessarily a contradiction.
  • The appearances of Kahless and Surak mark the final respective guest appearances of a Klingon and Vulcan in The Original Series .
  • This episode marks the final appearance of dress uniforms in the original series.
  • Uniquely, the security guards wear weapons belts constructed of white Velcro.
  • This episode marks the final appearance of Nichelle Nichols (Uhura) in the series. As a result, this is the final episode of the series to feature the entire ensemble cast of Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Scotty, Uhura, Sulu, and Chekov.
  • This is the second and final mention in a TOS episode that it may be possible to separate the nacelles from the ship, in this case by specifically jettisoning them.
  • The illusory version of Colonel Green is the final character to die on-screen in TOS's run, as the following episode, " All Our Yesterdays " has no deaths at all, and the only character deaths that occur in the final episode, " Turnabout Intruder ", happen off-screen before the episode begins.

Reception [ ]

  • As with the fan mail phenomenon that occurred after the broadcast of " Journey to Babel ", the airing of "The Savage Curtain" resulted in another flood of mail in response to the introduction of Surak. The fans were intrigued by Surak, and demanded to see more of him. ( The World of Star Trek ) However, Surak did not appear on-screen again until " Awakening ", over thirty-five years later, though he was referenced in numerous episodes and films in the intervening years.
  • In 2005, the episode was mentioned in a Time magazine article, "The True Lincoln" (the centerpiece of a "special issue" largely devoted to him), [3] contrasting the lionized, iconic Lincoln seen in the episode, common in the 1960s, with the more flawed, "Human" portrayals often found today.
  • In 2014, the episode again made its way into the news, after supermodel Bar Refaeli, on her Twitter account, repeated the "no honorable way to kill" line as an authentic Lincoln quote. [4]
  • Leonard Nimoy did not think highly of the episode when interviewed in 2012, saying " That didn't work very well, as I recall. It was an interesting attempt that did not really come to life like 'Four Score and seven years'. " [5]

Remastered information [ ]

The episode was remastered in 2008 featuring new shots of Excalbia.

The Enterprise enters orbit of Excalbia

Production timeline [ ]

  • Series proposal, " Star Trek is... ": 11 March 1964 – mentions similar story idea "Mr. Socrates"
  • Similar story premise, "Valley of the Giants" by Gene Roddenberry , early 1966
  • Story outline by Gene Roddenberry , 8 May 1968
  • Revised story outline, 9 May 1968
  • First draft teleplay by Gene Roddenberry , 11 September 1968
  • First draft teleplay by Arthur Heinemann , mid- November 1968
  • Second draft teleplay by Heinemann, 27 November 1968
  • Final draft teleplay by Arthur Singer , 6 December 1968
  • Additional page revisions by Fred Freiberger , 9 December 1968 , 10 December 1968 , 12 December 1968 , 13 December 1968
  • Day 1 – 11 December 1968 , Wednesday – Desilu Stage 9 : Int. Bridge
  • Day 2 – 12 December 1968 , Thursday – Desilu Stage 9 : Int. Transporter room , Briefing room
  • Day 3 – 13 December 1968 , Friday – Desilu Stage 9 : Int. Briefing room , Bridge
  • Day 4 – 16 December 1968 , Monday – Desilu Stage 10 : Ext. Planet surface
  • Day 5 – 17 December 1968 , Tuesday – Desilu Stage 10 : Ext. Planet surface ( Kirk 's base, Green 's base)
  • Day 6 – 18 December 1968 , Wednesday – Desilu Stage 10 : Ext. Planet surface ( Green 's base)
  • Day 7 – 19 December 1968 , Thursday – Desilu Stage 10 : Ext. Planet surface ( Green 's base, Boulders)
  • Original airdate: 7 March 1969
  • Rerun airdate: 1 July 1969
  • First UK airdate on BBC1 : 24 November 1971
  • First UK airdate on ITV : 19 August 1984

Soundtrack [ ]

The anthem that plays as President Lincoln is beamed aboard the Enterprise was composed by Desilu's music director, Wilbur Hatch . It is also the last original piece of music ever composed for the original series and is only heard in this one episode. (Starlog Magazine [ page number? • edit ] )

Syndication cuts [ ]

Although there were no official syndication cuts to this episode, many local television stations were known to trim segments of Yarnek's speech on the planet, where he is explaining the reason and rules for the conflict between good and evil. One particular line of dialogue, frequently omitted, is a segment where Yarnek pauses and then asks " Why do you hesitate? " when speaking to Kirk and Spock. ( The Star Trek Compendium )

Video and DVD releases [ ]

  • Original US Betamax release: 1988
  • UK VHS release (two-episode tapes, CIC Video ): Volume 40 , catalog number VHR 2436, 18 March 1991
  • US VHS release: 15 April 1994
  • UK re-release (three-episode tapes, CIC Video): Volume 3.8, 2 March 1998
  • Original US DVD release (single-disc): Volume 39, 11 December 2001
  • As part of the TOS Season 3 DVD collection
  • As part of the TOS-R Season 3 DVD collection

Links and references [ ]

Starring [ ].

  • William Shatner as James Kirk

Also starring [ ]

  • Leonard Nimoy as Mr. Spock
  • DeForest Kelley as Dr. McCoy

Guest star [ ]

  • Lee Bergere as Lincoln

Co-starring [ ]

  • Barry Atwater as Surak
  • Phillip Pine as Col. Green
  • James Doohan as Scott
  • George Takei as Sulu
  • Nichelle Nichols as Uhura
  • Walter Koenig as Chekov
  • Arell Blanton as Chief Security Guard Dickerson
  • Carol Daniels Dement as Zora (no lines)
  • Robert Herron as Kahless the Unforgettable
  • Nathan Jung as Genghis Khan (no lines)

Uncredited co-stars [ ]

  • William Blackburn as Hadley
  • Roger Holloway as Lemli
  • Bart La Rue as voice of Yarnek
  • Janos Prohaska as Yarnek
  • Security guard 1
  • Security guard 2

Stunt doubles [ ]

  • Unknown stunt performer as stunt double for William Shatner
  • Unknown stunt performer as stunt double for Leonard Nimoy
  • Unknown stunt performer as stunt double for Lee Bergere
  • Unknown stunt performer as stunt double for Barry Atwater

References [ ]

19th century ; 21st century ; 23rd century ; ability ; active duty ; age ; agony ; agreement (aka settlement ); alert status ; alien ; alternative ; American Civil War ; American history ; analysis ; answer ; antimatter ; Arcturian dog bird ( Arcturian ); area ; assignment ; associate ; attack ; atmosphere ; attitude ; authority ; backwoodsman ; base ; battery ; belief ; body ; body chemistry ; " Bones "; boomerang ; boatswain's whistle ; briefing room ; camp ; campaign ; carbon cycle life form ; century ; channel ; charade ; charm ; chief security guard ; choice ; civilization ; class M ; claw ; clothing ; commander in chief ; communications officer ; communicator ; concept ; confrontation ; contact ; contradiction ; conviction ; courtesy ; creature ; curiosity ; custom ; damage report ; danger ; death ; defensive war ; definition ; demonstration ; detonation ; device ; discipline ; distance ; drama (aka play ); dress uniform, Starfleet ; Earth ; Earth history ; Earth-like ; Earth-type ; emergency ; emergency battery power ; emergency procedure ; emotion ; enemy ; energy ; energy-matter scrambler ; engine damage ; engine room ; engineering officer / Engineering Officer ; estimate ; evil ; environment ; Excalbia ; Excalbia's solar system ; Excalbians ; Excalbian spectators ; existence ; experiment ; explanation ; eyes ; face ; fact ; factor seven ; failure ; father ; father image ; flesh ; foot ; forgiveness ; France ; friend ; friendship ; frontal assault ; galley ; game ; general ; genocide ; gentle ; goal ; good ; Grant, Ulysses S. ; Green, Phillip ; guide ; haggis ; hailing frequency ; hat ; have the hide of ; heavy stun ; hero ; honor ; honor detachment ; hour ; Human (aka Earth men or Earthling ); humanoid ; humor ; IDIC ; illusion ; image ; immorality ; impostor ; inch ; information ; insubordination ; intelligent life ; invitation ; Kahless the Unforgettable ; Khan, Genghis ; kindness ; Klingon ; knowledge ; landing party ; lava ; life (aka lifeform ); light year ; Lincoln, Abraham ; log entry ; logic ; loony ; Louis of France ; logic ; magnification ; mass ; matter ; matter-energy conversion ; meaning ; memory ; mile ; Milky Way Galaxy ; mind ; mineral ; minute ; mister ; Mr. President ; molecule ; music ; musician ; nacelle ; name ; Negress ; nitrogen ; Nome ; number ; objection ; observation ; observation balloon ; observation station ; odds ; old-style measurements ; opportunity ; orbit ; order ; " out of your heads "; oxygen ; " paint someone "; peace ; phaser ; phaser team ; phenomenon ; place ; plate ; play ; pocket watch ; pool ; power ; power ; power failure ; prejudice ; president ; presidential honors ; property ; punch ; quality ; quantity ; quarrel ; question ; Qo'noS ; radiation ; reality ; recklessness ; red ; red alert ; red zone ; repair crew ; rescue ; reserve power ; restart cycle ; result ; right ; risk ; Robert the Bruce ; rock ; ruffles and flourishes ; rumor ; sanity ; scan ; science officer ; sea ; second ; second-in-command ; Security Officer ; security detachment ; sensor ; ship's surgeon ; sidearm ; skin ; slavery ; sling ; smile ; solution ; space legend ; spear ; spectacle ; speculation ; square kilometer ; stage ; standard dress ; Starfleet ; Starfleet Command ; starship ; subject ; suffering ; suggestion ; Surak ; surface ; surrender ; survival ; survivor ; synchronous orbit ; tape ; teacher ; telegraph ; term ; theme ; theory ; thing ; thought ; thousand ; Tiburon ; Tiburonian ; time ; Time of Awakening ; transporter chamber ; transporter room ; trap ; tribe ; tricorder ; tyranny ; Union Army ; United States of America ; violence ; Vulcan ; Vulcan (planet) ; Vulcan emissaries ; Vulcan history ; Vulcan language ; Vulcan philosophy ; Vulcan salute ; warp engine ; " when in Rome do as the Romans do " ( Rome , Romans ); vessel ; war ; warp power ; warrior ; weapon ; whiskey ; wisdom ; word ; World War III ; wrestle ; Zora

Unreferenced materials [ ]

insectoid ; Monitor , USS

External links [ ]

  • "The Savage Curtain" at StarTrek.com
  • "The Savage Curtain" at Memory Beta , the wiki for licensed Star Trek works
  • " The Savage Curtain " at Wikipedia
  • " "The Savage Curtain" " at MissionLogPodcast.com , a Roddenberry Star Trek podcast
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Star Trek: Enterprise

Scott Bakula, John Billingsley, Jolene Blalock, Dominic Keating, Anthony Montgomery, Connor Trinneer, and Linda Park in Star Trek: Enterprise (2001)

A century before Captain Kirk's five-year mission, Jonathan Archer captains the United Earth ship Enterprise during the early years of Starfleet, leading up to the Earth-Romulan War and the ... Read all A century before Captain Kirk's five-year mission, Jonathan Archer captains the United Earth ship Enterprise during the early years of Starfleet, leading up to the Earth-Romulan War and the formation of the Federation. A century before Captain Kirk's five-year mission, Jonathan Archer captains the United Earth ship Enterprise during the early years of Starfleet, leading up to the Earth-Romulan War and the formation of the Federation.

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Jeffrey Dean Morgan in Star Trek: Enterprise (2001)

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Did you know

  • Trivia Admiral Forrest is named after DeForest Kelley , the late Star Trek (1966) actor who played Leonard H. McCoy. Similarly, Commander Williams and Admiral Leonard from the pilot Broken Bow, Part 1 (2001) are named after series stars William Shatner (James T. Kirk) and Leonard Nimoy (Spock). Big Foot (1982) (#2.5) also had a character with a last name Forrest. That show had numerous references & stars from the Star Trek franchise, the most well known of which was William Shatner from the original TV series.
  • Goofs Whenever the video signal is being lost, instead of pixelating, as a digital signal would, the picture shows analog "snow," which would be unheard of by that era.

Commander Tucker : You aren't saying much tonight. Don't tell me you're still upset about me and Amanda.

Subcommander T'Pol : I'm not upset.

Commander Tucker : Sure sounds like it.

Subcommander T'Pol : You're mistaken.

Commander Tucker : Why would a few neuropressure sessions between me and a MACO be such a big deal. Unless...

Subcommander T'Pol : Unless what?

Commander Tucker : Unless you're a little jealous.

Subcommander T'Pol : I don't experience jealousy.

Commander Tucker : You're doing a pretty fair imitation of it.

Subcommander T'Pol : I am not, in any way, jealous of you and Corporal Cole.

Commander Tucker : You know, your voice is tensing up. That's a dead giveaway.

Subcommander T'Pol : I didn't know you were an expert in vocal inflections.

Commander Tucker : I don't need to be an expert to read you. Come on, admit it. You're a little jealous.

Subcommander T'Pol : Are you implying that I'm attracted to you?

Commander Tucker : That kind of goes along with the assumption, doesn't it?

  • Crazy credits The opening credits video footage of the Sojourner rover approaching the "Yogi" rock, taken by the Mars Pathfinder lander, make Star Trek: Enterprise the first television show or movie in history to use footage taken on another planet.
  • Alternate versions The Region 1 DVD release of Season 3 modifies the opening credits of the first three episodes of the season to say "Star Trek: Enterprise" instead of "Enterprise", in order to be consistent with the rest of the season.
  • Connections Featured in How William Shatner Changed the World (2005)

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Series / Star Trek: The Original Series

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"Space: the final frontier. These are the voyages of the Starship Enterprise . Its five-year mission: to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no man has gone before!" — Captain James T. Kirk , the legendary Opening Narration

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  Notably, he pitched it as " Wagon Train in space ", not " Wagon Train To The Stars ".

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  Takei facetiously put down fencing on his resume so he wouldn't be given a katana; once it came up in the script, he got a crash course the weekend before filming. He remains an avid fencer to this day. 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  At least some of that was due to Executive Meddling ; additionally, Grace Lee Whitney has mentioned that the female regulars objected to initial efforts to have them wear pants because they preferred showing off their legs . Whitney and Nichelle Nichols were both professional dancers, and Nichols used to whipstitch her skirt shorter in between takes because she thought it was too long, leading to a few shots where you can see her matching panties . 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 audiences note  the actors and studio were flooded with mail, and there was a huge amount of tie-in merchandise almost immediately and plenty of demand for more , 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.

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  No need to build new sets for an alien planet when you can just shoot a local city street and reuse props designed for the Roman Empire! 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:

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  • 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 .
  • 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 .

lincoln enterprises star trek

  • 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  By her own account, she was raped by an "executive" attached to the show — her description fits Roddenberry himself — and subsequently fired. 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 .

This series provides examples of the following tropes:

    open/close all folders 

  • Absurdly Dedicated Worker : In "The Return of the Archons" Landru guards his planet, long after its usefulness has ceased. Ditto the automated defense bot Losira in "That Which Survives".
  • Act of True Love : "The Empath", McCoy sacrifices himself to save Kirk and Spock from death or insanity via Cold-Blooded Torture. Again, he lives, but he didn't know that.
  • Adaptation Title Change : Two episodes' titles were changed when James Blish adapted them as short stories: "The Man Trap" became "The Unreal McCoy " (which may have been a working title from a draft script), and "Charlie X" became "Charlie's Law."
  • Adaptational Alternate Ending : In the episode "Operation - Annihilate", Spock is temporarily blinded when they test a cure for a neural parasite on him before using it to free a planetary population. In the novelization of that episode, the planet is freed from the infection before Spock goes through the procedure, which does not blind him.
  • Affectionate Parody : "A Piece of The Action" is an Affectionate Parody of gangster movies.
  • Afrofuturism : Star Trek, while not afro-futurist in and of itself, did have an influence on the genre due to the presence of Uhura; the fact that a black person had a place on a futuristic space ship left a serious impact on young viewers. She was identified in the first episode as a Swahili (there are many Swahili peoples, James Blish described her as Bantu), had a few lines in Kiswahili in a couple of episodes, and the official Star Trek Writers' Guide established that she was from the United States of Africa.
  • In "The Return of the Archons", a computer has effectively stagnated a planet's entire culture into an ongoing, meaningless cycle of merely existing.
  • In "For The World Is Hollow And I Have Touched The Sky", a computer keeps the generational refugees under its watch ignorant of the fact that they're living in an asteroid, and punishes those who try to find the truth.
  • In "The Changeling", one of Earth's probes - programmed to seek out life - collided with and damaged an alien probe that was programmed to sterilize soil samples from other planets. The alien probe used parts of Earth's probe to repair itself, resulting in their programs merging to " seek out life and sterilize it ".
  • In "The Ultimate Computer" the M-5 unit, designed by Dr. Daystrom, goes rogue after it mistakes a wargame for the real thing.
  • In "Dagger of the Mind", Dr. Helen Noel saves the day by using a passage to get to the power room and shut off the Tantalus Colony's force field.
  • In "Miri", the children use an air vent to infiltrate the lab where the Enterprise crew is working and steal their communicators.
  • In "The Trouble With Tribbles", Scotty speculates that the tribbles got into the food processors on the Enterprise via the actual air vents. Spock realizes that the grain the Enterprise is guarding on the nearby space station is in storage compartments with similar vents, prompting Kirk to beam over and leading to the episode's funniest moment.
  • Alice Allusion : "Shore Leave": Both in the characters seen by the good doctor, and the fact that the planet turns out to be one big Wonderland.
  • Alien Non-Interference Clause : The Prime Directive, which forbids any interference with the internal development of pre-warp civilizations. Story-wise, it's used as a plot device to keep the main characters from just using the easy way out of a problem.
  • All Planets Are Earthlike : Considering the technical and budgetary constraints, ridiculously so. The show hand waves it sometimes by making planets specifically based on Earth. Or making the episode actually take place on Earth .
  • The final draft of the “Dagger In The Mind” script clarified that Kirk thought Helen Noel was a passenger at the party, not a member of the crew, and he flirted with her to his embarrassment.
  • All Women Are Lustful : Contrary to his reputation, Kirk doesn't initiate a lot of his kisses, and when he does it's nearly always used as a means to an end.
  • The Horta is initially presented and believed to be (as the episode title states) a "Devil in the Dark", but turns out to be a mother protecting her eggs.
  • Balance of Terror is the first episode to feature the Romulans, who are introduced by launching an unprovoked sneak attack. In the selfsame episode the two main Romulan characters are examples of My Country, Right or Wrong and What a Senseless Waste of Human Life , and it is made very clear that if it weren't for their being on opposite sides of battle, Kirk and the Romulan Commander could have easily been friends.
  • The episode Errand of Mercy marks the first appearance of the Klingons, and in that very episode the Organians - a more enlightened species than Humans or Klingons - predict that at some future date , the Klingons and the Federation will become allies, working together. There's also "Day of the Dove", when after learning that they are being manipulated by an Energy Being into a senseless, endless war with Kirk's crew, the Klingons team up in an Enemy Mine . Kang: I do not need any urging to kill humans. A Klingon kills for his own reasons! Only a fool fights in a burning house!
  • In the Pilot Episode , Captain Christopher Pike's character was subjected to an illusion of Hell when he refused to cooperate with his Talosian jailers. The illusion was stated to be made from information gotten from his own mind, implying that he was raised as a Christian.
  • At the end of "This Side of Paradise" , when the Enterprise is leaving Omicron Ceti III, Dr. McCoy , reflecting on the euphoric effect the planet's spores had on the crew, states that "Well, that's the second time man's been thrown out of Paradise."
  • Captain Kirk's famous line to the alien impersonating the Greek god Apollo in "Who Mourns for Adonais?" : Kirk: Mankind has no need for gods. We find the one quite adequate.
  • In "The Ultimate Computer" , both Dr. Richard Daystrom and, consequently, the sentient M-5 computer he built believe in God. Kirk makes the M-5 realize that in committing murder, it has sinned, and it shut itself down out of remorse.
  • In "Bread and Circuses" , Kirk and Crew come upon a planet dominated by a Roman Empire but with 20th century technology, where a persecuted, pacifist new religion worships a sun god. At the end of the episode, Lieutenant Uhura discovers that this new religion does not worship the Sun but the Son, clearly referencing Jesus. Kirk even considers remaining at the planet for a number of years just so they can "watch it happen all over again."
  • Near the end of "The Way to Eden" , Adam, one of Dr. Sevrin's followers, literally dies on the planet Eden after eating a poisoned apple ; Spock sardonically points this out.
  • Amnesia Danger : In "The Paradise Syndrome", the danger was that the amnesiac character (Kirk) had forgotten that there was a danger.
  • The unfortunate fate that Captain Pike is ultimately reduced to.
  • The fate of Lazarus and Anti-Lazarus in "The Alternative Factor".
  • Charlie's reaction to the ending of "Charlie X".
  • And Your Little Dog, Too! : Villains often find that this trope is what forces Kirk to comply to them. Textbook case in "The Squire of Gothos", with Spock as the collateral.
  • The episode "The Enemy Within" involves a transporter accident separating Kirk from his aggressive side. While the unchecked aggressive side causes nothing but trouble, Kirk realizes he needs that side of him to be an effective leader. Kirk asks this aggressive side "Can half a man live?"
  • In "This Side of Paradise", anger frees Kirk and then Spock from the spores' influence. Later sonic frequencies irritate the rest of the crew and the colonists, freeeing them as well.
  • Antagonistic Governor : Kodos the Executioner, who was governor of a human colony that was facing starvation because of an exotic fungus. He executed 4,000 citizens in order to see to it that the other 4,000 wouldn't starve . He later disappeared, presumed dead, but in reality, had changed his name and was living life as an actor.
  • "Charlie X": Charlie Evans turns out to be a Reality Warper and starts abusing his powers when the crew of the Enterprise doesn't bow down to his every whim.
  • "The Enemy Within": Kirk is split into a good and an evil version . Guess which one is the enemy.
  • "The Devil in the Dark": Subverted. The silicon-based Horta was killing the miners to protect its eggs. The Enterprise crew heal it and communicate with it.
  • "The Doomsday Machine": It is a planet-eating machine from another Galaxy.
  • "The Ultimate Computer": A.I. Is a Crapshoot .
  • "The Tholian Web": The energy web is being created by the Tholians to destroy the Enterprise .
  • Apocalyptic Log : Losira's computer log in "That Which Survives", which explained how her colony died.
  • Applied Phlebotinum
  • Armor-Piercing Question : Surprisingly, one towards Kirk from the leader of the Organians in "Errand of Mercy" when they've stopped the Federation and the Klingon Empire from fighting. Kirk: Even if you have some power that we don't understand, you have no right to dictate to our Federation— Kor: Or our Empire! Kirk: —How to handle their interstellar relations! We have the right— Ayelborne: To wage war, Captain? To kill millions of innocent people? To destroy life on a planetary scale? Is that what you're defending?
  • Arc Words : When Gene Coon was involved, soldier vs diplomat. A lot of the time it’s Kirk’s Conflicting Loyalty and Character Development , but other characters have the conflict too, and it’s a continuing theme for other Trek series.
  • Artistic License – Physics : In "The Naked Time", the Enterprise is observing a planet in the process of breaking up. The only explanation given for why the planet is breaking up is that its star has gone dark, which would make no difference. It's as if it's just spontaneously exploding. What's more, they talk about its mass changing, which absolutely cannot happen under the laws of physics. note  The closest thing in real life would be, A.) Change the effect of gravity in some way (and most of the numbers related to gravity are called 'constants' for a reason), or B.) remove some of the planet's matter, which would change the total mass and either its density or volume (or both).
  • Ascended Extra : Most of the main crew members (with the exception of Kirk and Spock) are not credited with starring roles in the opening credits, even McCoy (for the first season). Many of them don't appear in certain episodes, and don't even receive any real focus or characterization until late season 1 and throughout season 2. Only the movies credit them with starring roles.
  • Aside Comment : At the end of "Journey to Babel", Doctor McCoy looks directly into the camera and happily states, "I finally got the last word."
  • As You Know : In "Wolf in the Fold" Spock explains to Captain Kirk how ordering the computer to compute the value of pi to the last digit will drive the Redjack creature out of it .
  • "Ass" in Ambassador : How many times has the presence of Federation diplomatic personnel actually helped matters? More often than not Kirk and company have to smooth over problems created by overbearing Federation officials. Alien ambassadors aren't much of an improvement.
  • Asteroid Thicket : In "Mudd's Women", Harry Mudd's ship flies through one.
  • Attack Reflector : Played With in the episode "The Corbomite Maneuver". Kirk threatens to use the eponymous strategy with a device embedded in the Enterprise . If any destructive energy hits it, the corbomite creates a reverse reaction of equal strength that destroys the attacker. He was bluffing: there was actually no such device and no such maneuver.
  • Author Appeal : Gene Roddenberry admitted in the book “Where No Man” that a lot of episodes were his sexual fantasies. He’s at least equal opportunity about it, giving Kirk gratuitous shirtless scenes and apparently letting Shatner stick his ass out as much as he wanted, saying fans liked to watch him leave a room.
  • Auto-Kitchen : The Enterprise has slots in the wall which can produce any food desired by inserting the correct computer tape. In The Next Generation , these are replaced by replicators.
  • Ax-Crazy : Captain, no, Lord Garth. Also most of his "court" of fellow asylum inmates, notably Green-Skinned Space Babe Marta, who is compelled to murder those she "loves." note  She is the only green space babe who kisses or is kissed by Kirk; and they certainly don't do it, as she reached for her dagger almost immediately.
  • Badass Crew : The Original Series establishes a long and proud tradition of these in Starfleet.
  • Batman Gambit : Kirk is very good at reading his opponents in battle, and thus can pull these off in ways that would make Batman himself proud. The Corbomite Maneuver is a distinct example, and the entirety of Balance of Terror has Kirk continuously doing this to the commander of a Romulan ship, estimating his every action and intention based on the maneuvers he makes: (Enterprise fires on the still cloaked Romulan ship, scoring a near-miss) Romulan Sub-Commander: "How, commander? HOW?!" Romulan Commander: "He is a sorcerer that one, he reads the thoughts in my brain!"
  • In the episode "Miri", at one point, the Long-Lived children get together and start chanting the word "Bonk" repeatedly (as in "Bonk on the head") as an indication of what they plan to do to the Enterprise crew who have beamed down to their planet.
  • Similarly, the space battle music from the episode "The Doomsday Machine" became a standard used over and over again in later episodes.
  • Beard of Evil : "Mirror Mirror" provides the Trope Codifier of Evil Twins with beards, thanks to the Mirror-universe Spock's natty goatee.
  • Beeping Computers : Computers in the original series beeped because it was a futuristic interpretation of the rather noisy computers of The '60s (which really did have blinking lights too).
  • In "Wolf in the Fold", it turns out that Jack the Ripper was just one of many creatures possessed by a Puppeteer Parasite over the centuries.
  • "Requiem for Methuselah" concerns an immortal being who takes credit for the deeds of many historical figures .
  • Inverted from perspective "Patterns of Force." We follow the crew of the Enterprise looking for John Gill, a Federation historian. It turns out he's created a replica of the Nazi movement on an alien world and made himself the Führer. Said aliens, and their planetary cousins, are shocked to learn of this.
  • Don't insult the Enterprise within earshot of Scotty, much less to his face. The Klingons find this out the hard way in "The Trouble With Tribbles". Then again, they are Klingons, so they may have been looking for that fight.
  • Don't imply to McCoy that logic is a good substitute for compassion in a crisis.
  • Beauty Is Never Tarnished : Very often, Kirk would be sweaty and his hair messed up in a fight, let alone be injured, but look perfect again the very next scene.
  • Benevolent Dictator : Khan Noonien Singh held this reputation, despite his pro-eugenics beliefs and absolute power throughout his conquered empire, he was regarded as the best of the Eugenics wars Super men, with his ruling style being described as "firm but fair" and it being specifically stated that under his rule their was "no mass killings, no wars that weren't started by other parties". By the 23rd century his rule has even become somewhat romanticised, with him being compared to the likes of Leif Ericson, Richard the Lionheart and Napoleon Bonaparte. This reputation even leads to the crew of the Enterprise seriously underestimating just how ruthless and ambitious the still living Khan really was.
  • In "Plato's Stepchildren", Alexander is first seen as a massive shadow against a wall. Said shadow shrinks as he approaches Kirk, Spock, and McCoy , revealing he's actually rather short compared to them. The actor playing Alexander was 3 feet, 11 inches tall.
  • Lazarus in "The Alternative Factor".
  • Charlie Evans does this in "Charlie X".
  • Black-and-White Morality : Averted . The Federation may be a near- Utopia , but they only remain as one through military power. They get called out on this more than once .
  • Black Comedy : "A Piece of the Action", and "The Trouble With Tribbles" both thrive on this trope. It can also be seen in dialogue moments in other episodes, such as this exchange in "This Side of Paradise" where Kirk and Spock ( the only crew remaining on the Enterprise ) are going to build a transmitter utilizing the communicators' emergency channel, but first Kirk has to fight Spock to free him of the spores: Spock: As you are probably aware , striking a fellow officer is a court-martial offence. Kirk: If we're both in the brig, who's going to build the transmitter? Spock: A logical point, Captain.
  • Black Dude Dies First : Averted in "The Galileo Seven" and "By Any Other Name"; in both cases, the black male character survives to the end of the episode while one or more white characters die.
  • Blue-and-Orange Morality : Eminiar and Vendikar, the two warring planets in "A Taste of Armageddon," have so sanitized their war with each other that they no longer send actual missiles—instead they just send computer signals signifying an attack and then have all civilians who happened to be within range of the theoretical attack disintegrate themselves in booths designed for that purpose. The leader of Eminiar considers Kirk a monster because he refuses to allow the same thing to happen to the crew of the Enterprise when the ship is calculated to have been "hit" by an "attack," and even more so when he destroys Eminiar's attack computers, immediately breaking the stalemate between the two planets.
  • Bluffing the Authorities : The episode "City on the Edge of Forever". After Kirk and Spock go back in time to 1930's New York City, they're about to steal some clothing to replace their Enterprise uniforms but meet a police officer and have to explain Spock's pointed Vulcan ears. They come up with a story that Spock is Chinese and had a childhood accident involving a mechanical rice picker and plastic surgery, but the cop doesn't buy it .
  • Bluff the Eavesdropper : In "The Deadly Years", due to having been rapidly aged by mysterious radiation and gone senile, Kirk has been forced to step down from command. His incompetent replacement has led the ship through the Romulan Neutral Zone, and the Romulans are about to destroy them. Suddenly a cure is found, a restored Kirk appears on the bridge and gives an order to relay a message to Starfleet—using a code previously established as having been broken by the Romulans, which briefly causes the crew to wonder if he's still senile. Nevertheless, they open the channels and Kirk sends a message that the Enterprise will self destruct via the Corbomite Device and destroy any ship in a huge radius. The Romulans intercept the message and leave in a hurry .
  • Blunt Metaphors Trauma : Thanks to his incredibly rationalist thinking, Spock has notable difficulty with understanding human euphemisms and metaphors.
  • Boldly Coming : Kirk is the Trope Codifier . That said, Kirk's reputation for sleeping his way across the galaxy has been greatly exaggerated in the public mind ; out of 79 aired episodes, he kisses another character in only 19 of them, and of those, thirteen are while he's under duress or doing it specifically to manipulate them . In fact, Kirk makes out with a woman purely for pleasure, with no other motive or emotional attachment, exactly once in the entire original series. Sex is likewise only implied in a few rare instances: once when he marries a native girl while amnesiac, and gets her pregnant; once when the show returns from commercial to find a woman brushing her hair in his room while he puts his boots back on; a Sexy Discretion Shot to an overhead lamp as Kirk kisses a Sex Slave girl who's been "ordered to please" him note  A line that was cut had Kirk drinking wine and saying "good," eating something and saying "excellent," and then — "And you?" and the woman says "Superb, I'm told." ; and Kirk sitting up in bed taking a call from the bridge, the woman (France Nuyen as the Dolmen Elaan) lying next to him, she rolls over and sits up to lean on his shoulder.
  • Many episodes begin and end on a shot of the Enterprise flying through space as the dramatic fanfare plays her in (or out).
  • A more meta example: Sulu and Rand share a scene in the first episode aired, "The Man Trap". They don't share another scene until the sixth and final movie , with Rand as a Bridge Officer under Sulu's command.
  • Borrowed Without Permission : Incorrigible larcenist Harry Mudd recounts how he managed to escape from a Federation penal colony to Captain Kirk and Mister Spock. Harry Mudd: I... borrowed transportation... Captain Kirk: He stole a starship!
  • Bottled Heroic Resolve
  • Brainwashed and Crazy : This happens in numerous episodes.
  • Brandishment Bluff : "The Corbomite Maneuver" Kirk: This is the Captain of the Enterprise . Our respect for other life forms requires that we give you this... warning. One critical item of information that has never been incorporated into the memory banks of any Earth ship. Since the early years of space exploration, Earth vessels have had incorporated into them a substance known as... corbomite. It is a material and a device which prevents attack on us. If any destructive energy touches our vessel, a reverse reaction of equal strength is created, destroying— Balok: [over intercom] You now have two minutes. Kirk: —destroying the attacker. It may interest you to know that since the initial use of corbomite more than two of our centuries ago, no attacking vessel has survived the attempt. Death has... little meaning to us. If it has none to you then attack us now. We grow annoyed at your foolishness.
  • Episode "Arena". Captain Kirk and the Gorn captain are forced to fight each other with improvised weapons. During their battle, the Gorn captain picks up a boulder and throws it at Kirk, pinning Kirk's leg to the ground.
  • One of the cavemen uses a boulder to pound on the shuttlecraft.
  • During a funeral ceremony, one of the cavemen throws a boulder at Spock, pinning him to the ground.
  • Bread and Circuses : The aptly named episode "Bread and Circuses" explores a planet in which the Roman Empire never fell. Gladiator sports are broadcast on TV and interrupted by commercial breaks.
  • Chekov does more screaming-in-pain than the rest of the crew combined. He even has a torture scene in the episode "Mirror, Mirror". This was explained as a convenient way to show there was mortal peril. In a nice inversion, he's the only one who doesn't get hit with the aging disease in "The Deadly Years". He still ends up getting subjected to a thousand and one medical checks, though. Chekov: Blood sample, Chekov! Marrow sample, Chekov! Skin sample, Chekov! If—if I live long enough, I'm going to run out of samples! Sulu: You'll live. Chekov: Oh yes, I'll live. But I won't enjoy it!
  • Butterfly of Doom : In "The City on the Edge of Forever", Edith Keeler's death must occur or else it will cause an alternate timeline where Germany wins World War II and Starfleet does not exist.
  • The Saurians were later established in Star Trek: The Motion Picture to be lizard people; there were a couple of them on the Enterprise .
  • Calvin Ball : Fizzbin, the imaginary card game Kirk and Spock make up to confuse the gangsters in "A Piece of the Action", is an Ur-Example .
  • Captain's Log : The Trope Maker ; Kirk's famous voice-over logs were conceived as a way of quickly introducing or recapping plot points that may have otherwise been confusing. He seems to do them in his head even when he's nowhere near a recorder. In early episodes (e.g, "Mantrap"), he even adopts an "Ominiscient Narrator" stance when referring to future events. When he says "Captain's log, stardate.... unknown", it can be downright chilling.
  • Cargo Concealment Caper : In the episode "Dagger of the Mind", a criminal from a penal colony sneaks aboard by hiding in a cargo container that's beamed up to the ship.
  • Cartwright Curse : So frequent you could almost take bets on whether the Girl of the Week is going to buy the farm by the end of the episode (or if she doesn't, pull a High-Heel–Face Turn ).
  • Cast Full of Pretty Boys : The show’s habit for putting the main men in obvious mascara and eyeshadow is well-documented and much appreciated. This observation began with the digitally remastered editions and wasn't noticed at the time. The relatively heavy television makeup was designed to create highlights and shadows since the cameras of that time saw flat. So to a 1960s viewer, even watching on a color set, the actors did not look heavily made up.
  • Catchphrase : Dr. McCoy 's " I'm a Doctor, Not a Placeholder " and " He's Dead, Jim ." Spock's "Fascinating" and "Illogical."
  • Catch the Conscience : "The Conscience of the King" plays with this trope; a man suspected of being the murderous tyrant Kodos the Executioner happens to be an actor currently starring in a production of Hamlet .
  • Usually in the form of the Enterprise or a second landing party arriving to save the day.
  • Lampshaded in "Friday's Child" when Kirk wonders why " the cavalry doesn't come over the hill in the nick of time anymore ." Then Scotty arrives with a Redshirt Army .
  • While Kirk has a lot of trauma and is a Broken Hero in the show, the writers obviously didn’t know they were going to have a movie series and give him a son that he knew about but had to stay away from. The Autobiography of James T. Kirk can do some fancy Arc Welding with how much Kirk likes running away from his problems; having the kid from “A Piece Of The Action” remind him of David, the traumas of season three pushing him to think he wants to be an Admiral, and reasoning that the more trio-based episodes after the first season is because of what happened with Edith and Sam.
  • Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan took Kirk’s penchant for Just Ignore It and applied it to the nature of the show, forcing him to actually deal with his consistent loss and pain, and certain villains of the weeks coming back to prove he can’t just run away from everything. “Generations” and his 10-Minute Retirement after all he’s gone through, does it as well.
  • Characterisation Click Moment : Originally, Spock didn't have the impassive, scientific characterization he is famous for. Leonard Nimoy said the character first began to click for him in "The Corbomite Maneuver", when the director suggested he "be the scientist, stay detached", and react to Balok's threatening ship with "Fascinating."
  • Cheated Angle : The Enterprise is almost exclusively seen from the starboard side, even straight on angles are slightly turned away. The reason was a combination of budget and limitations of model-making technology, the electronics for the lights were fed in through the port side of the secondary hull and thus the starboard side was the only one fully detailed with painting, windows and decals (including the inside of the port nacelle, which would face the camera). Whenever there was a need to show the port side they would mirror flip the decals and then mirror the footage. The Remastered version of the show, with a CGI model, was able to do this more often.
  • Chewing the Scenery : The Klingon executive officer Korax in "The Trouble With Tribbles" insults the Enterprise For the Evulz , underlining the last two words of this speech loud and clear with a wide-eyed stare: "I didn't mean to say that the Enterprise should be hauling garbage. I meant to say that it should be hauled away as garbage! " note  Fans adore this line and loudly reciting the whole insult parade became a favorite gag at the conventions of the 1970s.
  • City in a Bottle : "For The World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky" featured this on a generation ship.
  • " That Which Survives ". Thousands of years ago, a Human Alien civilization called the Kalandans made an artificial planet to live on. Unfortunately, the process created a microorganism that killed the personnel stationed on the planet. By the time they died, the disease had been transported back to the original civilization via supply ships, completely wiping it out.
  • '' Operation: Annihilate! " Going back to ancient times, a number of civilizations on different planets have been destroyed by outbreaks of mass insanity. The cause of the insanity is alien creatures that attack people and inject material into their bodies that takes control of their nervous systems. The aliens make the victims travel to other planets using starships, thus spreading the infection.
  • " What Are Little Girls Made Of? " The aliens who lived on the planet Exo 3 created android robots to serve them. When the androids developed Artificial Intelligence , the aliens became afraid of them and started to turn them off. In self defense, the androids Turned Against Their Masters and destroyed them.
  • " The Changeling ". The interstellar probe Nomad uses its alien technology-enhanced weapons to completely wipe out the population of the Malurian system, killing more than 4 billion people.
  • " I, Mudd ". The aliens who created the androids originally came from the Andromeda galaxy. Their home planet's star went nova and destroyed their civilization except for a few outposts, whose inhabitants died out over time.
  • " The Immunity Syndrome ". The entire population of the Gamma Seven-A system, consisting of billions of inhabitants, is killed by having their Life Energy drained by a giant space amoeba.
  • " Return to Tomorrow ". A half million years ago, a highly advanced Human Alien civilization fought an apocalyptic war that destroyed the surface of their planet, ripped away the atmosphere and killed all living creatures on it. Before the end, a few members stored their minds in advanced devices to wait rescue.
  • " The Empath ". The star Minara is about to go nova, and all of its planets (several of which have populations) will be destroyed. The Humanoid Alien Vians can only save the population of one planet. They do so, but the other civilizations are doomed.
  • " Let That Be Your Last Battlefied ". The Humanoid Aliens of the planet Cheron completely wipe themselves out in a genocidal war.
  • " The Lights of Zetar ". Long ago, every living thing on the planet Zetar was killed. The minds and Life Energy of 100 of its Humanoid Aliens inhabitants traveled into space and search for new bodies to possess.
  • " For the World Is Hollow, And I Have Touched The Sky ". Several thousand years ago, the Fabrini people's home sun went nova and destroyed their planets, but some of them were put on a ship resembling (or disguised as?) an asteroid and sent to another planet.
  • " Plato's Stepchildren ". When the planet Sahndara is destroyed by its sun going nova, almost all of its civilization is annihilated. A small number escape to Earth, then later another planet.
  • " Wink Of An Eye ". On the planet Scalos, radioactive water causes the entire race to live at hyper-accelerated speeds (which tremendously shortens their lifespans) and makes the male part of the population sterile. By the time the Enterprise arrives, there are only a few Scalosians left.
  • " All Our Yesterdays ". When the star Beta Niobe goes nova, its only planet, Sarpeidon, will be destroyed. However, the entire population of the planet has used time travel to journey into the planet's past. They are mentally and physically conditioned to fit in, but their civilization in the future is effectively destroyed.
  • Happens once in a while. In "Journey to Babel", Sarek is accused of murdering a Tellarite ambassador. The culprit is an Orion pretending to be a staff member of the Andorian ambassador. In "Court Martial", Kirk is accused of causing the death of one of his crew members. The crew member has faked his own death and is trying to sabotage Kirk's career, as he blames Kirk for ruining his.
  • Scotty has to do this in "Wolf in the Fold" after being set up for several murders by none other than Jack the Ripper himself—actually an alien entity who took possession over the centuries of (among others) Jack the Ripper and the city administrator investigating Scotty's alleged murders (conveniently stonewalling the investigation in the process).
  • Even Spock gets in on the fun in "The Menagerie", although the crime in Spock's case is mutiny, not murder, and the whole ordeal is arranged by an alien entity just like the other incidents, albeit out of compassion rather than any sinister motive. Then again, unlike in the other cases, Spock is actually guilty, and not mind controlled or framed - he just has a very justifiable motive.
  • Clip Show : "The Menagerie" shows us most of the original pilot episode, "The Cage".
  • Clothing Damage : Kirk must have a pretty steep uniform allowance to cover all of those shirts that get torn up (or completely torn off of him). An unintended case can be seen in "The Savage Curtain" when Kirk's pants split open in the back for a brief moment.
  • Combat by Champion : "Arena" has Kirk vs. Gorn captain. "Amok Time" has Kirk vs. Spock. "The Gamesters of Triskelion" has Kirk, Chekov, and Uhura vs. an Amazing Technicolor Population .
  • Comic-Book Adaptation : Gold Key Comics published its first Star Trek comic in 1967 and the series outlived the TV show by a full decade (ending only because Marvel Comics took over the rights so it could publish comics set post- Star Trek: The Motion Picture ). Early issues are noted for their bizarre artwork and extreme breaks with TV continuity, due in part to the artist being a freelancer living in Europe who had never seen the series and only had publicity photographs to work with. As a result, one issue features a cut-away drawing that suggests that the Enterprise isn't much bigger than a large yacht, while another issue has the Enterprise landing on a planet, decades before Star Trek: Voyager does it. Later, Marvel, DC Comics , and IDW Publishing all took turns publishing comics set in the TOS era.
  • This is the main draw of the franchise for many. Professional people from a variety of fields act professionally and work together to solve problems by the end of the episode.
  • Some newer Trek stuff is controversial with the old fans for the characters acting less professionally and competently and getting by more on luck and Indy Ploys .
  • Constellations as Locations : Implied with the Orions (the original Green-Skinned Space Babes). Background information and later parts of the franchise established that the green-skinned aliens were from the planet Orion, which is located in the Orion Sector (which sector is presumably geocentrically named for the Earth constellation).
  • Corrective Lecture : Attempted by Kirk in "Charlie X", when he attempts to explain to Charlie why slapping Yeoman Rand on the butt was not appropriate behavior, but also not trying to come down hard on Charlie, who had (as Kirk believed at the time) no supervision as a child, being the sole survivor of a crash when he was young. Kirk, trying to avoid having The Talk with Charlie, can only sum it up by saying, "There's no right way to hit a woman."
  • Couldn't Find a Pen : In one episode, a Horta (essentially a lava monster) burns, " NO KILL I " on the ground. Spock wonders if this translates to "I don't kill" or "Don't kill me". Or both? She doesn't explain, so it's left up to the viewer, but she's in agony and more concerned about her kids.
  • In "The Menagerie", Spock gets put on trial for commandeering the Enterprise and taking it to a forbidden planet.
  • " Court Martial ": Kirk gets put on trial for (seemingly) causing the death of a crew member through negligence.
  • Courtroom Episode : " Court Martial ", "Wolf In The Fold"
  • Cowboy Episode : "Spectre of the Gun", in which the main characters are forced to re-enact the gunfight at the O.K. Corral on an alien world.
  • Creator Cameo : Gene Roddenberry himself voiced the ship's cook in " Charlie X ".
  • Credits Montage : Featuring not only stills from the episode in question, but random shots from various other episodes as well.
  • In "Miri" they just do the familiar "nyah nyah-nyah nyah nyah" chant but it's made very sinister.
  • Cunning People Play Poker : The Corbomite Maneuver " when faced with Balok's incomprehensible mothership threatening to destroy the Enterprise, Spock contextualises their situation as a game of chess and concludes Balok has declared checkmate. Captain Kirk changes the game to poker, and then bluffs that Enterprise has a defense feature that will ensure that if it's destroyed, Balok's ship will also get blown up.
  • Spock is totally unaffected by Tribbles. He is only petting it because it is logical ... What's everybody looking at?
  • And cats. He has no particular fondness for the creatures . note  Vulcans were often compared with cats in fan essays of the time, and someone wrote a half-serious essay on how they could have evolved from felidae.
  • And dogs, too. See the space dog in "The Enemy Within".
  • Used as foreshadowing in “The Enemy Within”, as good Kirk (who thinks he’s the original at this point) is weepier than normal and gets distracted by the animal he’s holding being soft while trying to give orders. It turns out to be just a side of him that he needs, along with the toxic aggressive part of himself.
  • The Cloud Minders , which features the oppressive sky-city of Stratos and its subordinate, ground-dwelling Troglytes, some of whom have formed the rebellious Disrupters in an attempt to overthrow the city.
  • Return Of The Archons in which a whole society is run by a mind-controlling computer, and an underground resistance has formed to overthrow it.
  • Daddy's Little Villain : "The Conscience of the King" (a tragic Double Subversion ). The daughter of a former villain in hiding uses their cover as a performing theater troupe to kill off the remaining witnesses to her father's previous crimes as a way of "protecting" him from recrimination. Her father is extremely displeased with her when he finds out, having hoped to start a legitimate new life in their cover identities, and appalled that the blood on his hands had irreversibly stained her, as well.
  • Damn, It Feels Good to Be a Gangster! : "A Piece of the Action". The inhabitants of Sigma Iotia II are so enamored of 1920s Chicago gang culture that they decided to base their entire civilization on it .
  • Damsel out of Distress : Double subverted in “A Taste Of Armageddon”, as Kirk is held hostage and Spock comes in just as he’s got himself out of it. Kirk replies to “we thought you needed help” with admitting he still does.
  • Dangerously Garish Environment : " The Way to Eden " shows a group of space hippies taking over the Enterprise to fly to a "paradise planet." The planet is beautiful enough, but everything on it is lethal , and the hippie leader dies when he refuses to believe it.
  • "For The World Is Hollow And I Have Touched The Sky" is this for McCoy .
  • "A Wolf in the Fold" and "The Lights of Zetar" for Scotty.
  • Days of Future Past : Primarily a Space Western , with Kirk frequently acting as the Army Scout who helps the struggling colonists. But there was also plenty of "Age Of Sail" IN SPACE and the American Cold War IN SPACE.
  • Dead Man Writing : "That Which Survives". Losira's computer message to her fellow Kalandans about the death of the colony. Also the last surviving crewman of the USS Exeter recording a log warning anyone who finds it of the plague (while logging, the crewman succumbs).
  • Averted in "Spectre of the Gun" when Spock surprises McCoy by giving him a genuine compliment. McCoy : "I doubt that this combination of things was ever used for any purpose quite like this." Spock : (Sincerely) "Perhaps they would've been if [these people] had your ingenuity, Doctor." McCoy : (Looks up and blinks in surprise)
  • Death Ray : Phasers, at their highest setting, become Disintegrator Rays .
  • Decadent Court : The Romulan government at several points is implied to be one. The Platonians in "Plato's Stepchildren" started out with a good idea—create a society based upon Plato's Republic —but ended up as this after centuries of isolation. In "The Gamesters of Triskelion," the three brains running the planet have resorted to pitting random aliens against each other in gladiatorial combat after losing their purpose in life.
  • Deconstructed Trope : Kirk uses his sexuality a lot like a male version of a Heroic Seductress , but not only does he see it as Necessarily Evil , gets him a rep in-universe and he’s called out if he gets too cold, but Janice Lester is able to get away with Never My Fault (claiming he left her when it got serious when clearly she was the abusive one) and he’s drugged or coerced in some way no less than four times.
  • Depending on the Writer : The actors themselves have admitted that the characters’ levels of feminism range from early women’s lib with messages like right to choose at best, slightly patronising or just outright sexist insults at worst, depending on who was writing the episode. The main show creators to be sincere feminists were Gene L. Coon and D.C. Fontana.
  • A de-materializer, which breaks down the object in a controlled fashion.
  • A buffer, which holds the disintegrated object until transmission.
  • A transmitter, which transmits the disintegrated object as a beam of energy.
  • A re-materializer, which reintegrates the object in a controlled fashion.
  • invoked Contrary to popular opinion, the transported object is indeed the original object from the start, and the device does not kill living things that are being transported; it's the same matter, just transmuted into energy, beamed to a new location, and then transmuted back to matter. note  People transported are in fact conscious during transport. If there's unbroken continuity of consciousness, then there cannot have been a death. However, as you can probably imagine , transporters can be rather scarily dangerous if some part of the process were to be interrupted .
  • Deus est Machina : Several episodes, notably "The Apple".
  • Deus ex Machina : "Charlie X" (the Thasians), "Shore Leave" (the Keeper), "The Squire of Gothos" (Trelane's parents), "Errand of Mercy" (the Organians).
  • In "Obsession," the vampire cloud, which has been freely munching on the crew, finally heads home to reproduce. Kirk beams down to the planet Where It All Began to deliver a chunk of antimatter. When it blows, it rips half the planet's atmosphere away .
  • In "The Immunity Syndrome", the Enterprise must deliver an anti-matter bomb to the nucleus of the giant space amoeba . In a twist, Mr. Spock volunteers for a separate suicide mission , to deliver the probe that enables Kirk to target the nucleus.
  • The planet Gamma Trianguli VI in "The Apple" includes plants that throw poisonous thorns, rocks that act like anti-personnel mines, and directed lightning strikes. The novelization explains that this is because the planet's 'god' identifies the Starfleet people as a danger and want to eliminate them before they can interfere.
  • The planet Eden in the episode "The Way To Eden". Looks beautiful, but beware of differing chemistry; the fruit is poisonous and the even the grass is highly acidic.
  • Death of the Old Gods : "Who Mourns For Adonais" has the Enterprise meeting Apollo, the last of the Greek gods (who were actually Sufficiently Advanced Aliens ). Kirk pretty much tells him to stuff it, and then gets schizophrenic about whether humanity has Outgrown Such Silly Superstitions as religion in general, or just moved on to Christianity.
  • Depraved Bisexual : Dr Coleman from “Turnabout Intruder” is Janice’s lover, but is also fine with her spirit being in the body of Kirk, and responds to Janice-in-Kirk’s seduction.
  • Devil's Advocate : Spock would occasionally perform the duty of the Devil's Advocate, typically countering McCoy 's or Kirk 's spontaneous, Gut Feeling -inspired actions.
  • Various extra-series material (novels, for example), often refer in a disparaging way to the more "out there" episodes from The Original Series , usually in the form of Starfleet Officials claiming Kirk made up a large number of his reports, with his motive being contempt for his superiors. Invariably mentioned is the universally disbelieved incident in which aliens "stole the brain of Kirk's Science Officer," a reference to the episode in which Spock's brain is, indeed, stolen by alien babes, and which is considered to be the worst episode of the original series, if not of Star Trek as a whole.
  • The foreword to the novelization of Star Trek: The Motion Picture essentially says that the original series is a overwrought dramatization of actual events which should be regarded as unreliable. Fans debate its canonicity, since, while Trek literature is officially considered non-canonical, it's the only novel written by Gene Roddenberry himself.
  • Disintegration Chamber : In "A Taste of Armageddon" the (virtually) warring planets Eminiar and Vendikar use "disintegration machines" to dispose of persons who have been deemed casualties.
  • Disney Dog Fight : At the end of " Requiem for Methuselah ", Robot Girl Rayna Kapec must choose between Flint and Captain Kirk. The strain causes her to overload and die.
  • Distress Call : 14 different episodes (including both pilots) start with the Enterprise receiving or already responding to a distress signal.
  • Does This Remind You of Anything? : The platonians in “Plato’s Stepchildren” are played like domestic abusers. Parmen’s speech after he makes Kirk slap himself for speaking up to him is making excuses for himself and plying the three with gifts. When they force Kirk to act like a horse and Spock to laugh then cry, they blame Bones for what’s happening, and all three men are traumatised by it afterwards.
  • Door Jam : Several episodes (notably "Arena" and "The Tholian Web") contrive ways for Kirk to end up alone facing the Monster of the Week without back-up, whether becaue of alien meddling, transporter malfunctions, or interdiminesional anomalies.
  • Doomsday Device : "The Doomsday Machine" features a planet-eating device.
  • Doppelmerger : In one episode, a Teleporter Accident results in both Captain Kirk and a doglike alien getting turned into two individuals, one of whom has all of their negative traits. They eventually get fused back together in the transporter, and while the alien dies (ostensibly from too much fear), Kirk survives.
  • Double Standard: Abuse, Female on Male : Lampshaded in “Turnabout Intruder” when Lester in Kirk acts like it’s ludicrous to imagine a small woman like Lester overpowering a muscled man like Kirk. Ends up being an example anyway, as she’s Easily Forgiven to the point where even Shatner complained nothing was resolved, and Nimoy was disgusted she’s just treated as a stupidly Hysterical Woman , by design. His rant on this subject for the book Shatner: Where No Man is well known and often quoted online.
  • Even discounting the times he uses his prettiness and charm to get himself or his crew out of trouble, Kirk has a pretty bad track record on the whole being able to consent, whether it’s the one Green-Skinned Space Babe of the series forcing a kiss on him in “Whom Gods Destroy”, the Bed Trick in Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country , Deela enjoying kissing him when he’s not aware of her in “Wink Of An Eye”, mind raped in “Dagger Of The Mind” to believe he had sex and was in love, or having sex with Elaan after her tears drug him. He’s not exactly happy about all of it, but it seems to be something he feels like he just has to deal with.
  • Spock gets his own turn in “This Side Of Paradise”, Leila deciding that she wants him to stay, and giving him no choice in the matter by subjecting him to spores that affect his mind.
  • Doves Mean Peace : The Elba II and Tantalus Penal Colonies (which are both colonies that dealt with trying to treat the insane and cure them of their insanity) use insignias with a dove in it.
  • Downer Ending : "Who Mourns For Adonais", "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield", "The City On The Edge Of Forever", "Requiem for Methuselah", "Charlie X" and "A Private Little War".
  • Dramatic Chase Opening : "The Return of the Archons" starts with Sulu and another crewman running from some pursuers in a city street. They're both caught.
  • Dramatic Downstage Turn : Several instances, especially during dramatic scenes featuring female cast members. One simple example appears in a conversation between Leila and Spock near the end of the episode "This Side of Paradise".
  • Dress-Up Episode : a lot . "A Piece of the Action", "Return of the Archons", "Assignment: Earth", "The City on the Edge of Forever", that one where they ended up dressed as Nazis ("Patterns of Force")... This trope was popular because it allowed them to use standard, pre-existing costumes, props and sets, rather than having to make expensive new ones. There had been very few science fiction television shows (as opposed to movies) up to that time, outside of children's series like Captain Video and Tom Corbett Space Cadet . Series like One Step Beyond (1959) and The Twilight Zone (1959) often had people in normal clothing facing unusual situations. There were very few props hanging around to be re-used, unlike today, when science fiction has been popular for a long time.
  • Perhaps the most famous example, Captain Pike from the first pilot. More accurately, everyone but Spock was replaced.
  • The 2nd pilot episode, "Where No Man Has Gone Before", has Ship's Doctor Mark Piper, Communications Officer Alden, and Yeoman Smith. They were replaced by Leonard McCoy , Lieutenant Uhura, and Janice Rand, respectively, in the series.
  • Drowning My Sorrows : Bones and Kirk have a tendency to drink together, especially when Bones thinks Kirk isn’t handling shit well.
  • Dude, She's Like in a Coma : Deela from “Wink Of An Eye” is upfront about liking to kiss Kirk when he’s not aware of her, teasing that he’s probably used to that happening to him, and coos over him being pretty while he’s unconscious.
  • Spock's no slouch either. He's in the Vulcan Scientific Legion of Honor, and received two decorations for valor from Starfleet Command.
  • Duel to the Death : "Arena", "Amok Time", "The Gamesters of Triskelion".
  • Dutch Angle : Used in "Wink of an Eye" to denote the scenes taking place in hyper-accelerated time.
  • Dysfunction Junction : Despite the Status Quo Is God (series-only, not the films), everyone except Chekov is a mess; Kirk bases his identity on serving the Enterprise and thinks he doesn’t deserve to be happy, Spock is subject to Half-Breed Discrimination from everyone and has an estranged family , Bones has Chronic Hero Syndrome and killed his dying father only for there to be a cure months later, Chapel’s fiance goes insane and kills himself, and All There in the Manual has Uhura be a lonely Stepford Smiler , Scotty start drinking after his nephew dies at his post, and Sulu’s home be victim of a terrorist attack when he was young.
  • Dying Race : The Talosians in "The Menagerie," the Calandans in "That Which Survives," and the Scalosians in "Wink of an Eye."
  • And speaking of warp, the original Enterprise uses warp all the time, even for combat maneuvers, unless circumstances force them to rely on her impulse drive. Later series have ships use warp drive when they need to get from one place to another very quickly while sticking to impulse for combat and in-system maneuvers.
  • Though it's more subtle and less jarring than the transition from pilots to series, the first half of the first season (produced by Roddenberry) has a much stronger Wagon Train to the Stars emphasis, with the Enterprise functioning as a deep space exploration vessel whose missions often involved surveying uncharted space and re-supplying isolated frontier posts. When Gene Coon took over as showrunner, he introduced the United Federation of Planets, the Prime Directive, and the Klingon Empire, and the Enterprise took on many more diplomatic and strategic missions more consistent with a Cold War setting than The Wild West .
  • In this series, the Klingons are generally duplicitous schemers while Romulans are honor-bound warriors . This is the exact inverse of how these two races would be portrayed in later series. The more primitive make-up also means both races lack their forehead ridges ; the Klingons are just copper-skinned humans while the Romulans are more explicitly identical to Vulcans.
  • The Prime Directive functions quite differently in this series compared to any other — here it's effectively "don't make contact with primitive civilizations unless you absolutely have to, and never give advanced technology to primitives". The Prime Directive is waived in cases where said civilizations would be in danger from external forces (usually the Klingons) if the crew didn't act. By the time of Star Trek: The Next Generation , the Prime Directive has been redefined as "don't get involved in the affairs of any other civilization, regardless of their technology level, even if they ask you directly for help".
  • Speeds of Warp 10 and higher are mentioned a few times. Later series would establish Warp 10 as infinite speed and the absolute maximum way that speed can be quantified.
  • Most viewers are familiar with the red, blue, and green/gold uniforms used throughout most of the show, but in the first few episodes produced - including the pilot and " Where No Man Has Gone Before " - members of the Services department wear bronze uniforms. Notably, Spock, Gary Mitchell, and Lt. Kelso in "Where No Man Has Gone Before" all wear bronze uniforms that are quite distinct from Kirk's gold uniform.
  • Kirk takes point on almost every landing party. Later series (especially Star Trek: The Next Generation and Star Trek: Voyager ) have The Captain stay on the ship more often while the Number Two leads the away teams. In addition, the later series give the captain an office next to The Bridge for filling out paperwork and meeting with people one-on-one, something Kirk didn't have.
  • Easily Forgiven : The Kelvans in " By Any Other Name ". They hijack the ship, threaten the entire crew, and kill a female yeoman as a demonstration of their power (she wasn't acting as a danger to them in any way). And yet, at the end, Kirk forgives and agrees to help them.Then again, this could be sheer pragmatism given the Kelvan's power level and the fact that he has barely managed to convince them not to kill the rest of his crew (which they could do very easily).
  • Eat Dirt, Cheap : The Horta. It's a silicon lifeform that eats rocks.
  • Aside from the “you’ll be taught how to use your tongue” line, Kor in "Errand Of Mercy" circles Kirk and very obviously looks at his ass.
  • In “Spock’s Brain”, a woman comes onto the Enterprise, makes everyone collapse and because Kirk fell in a way that shows off his ass, she checks it out.
  • The Echoer : Played with. The episode "Assignment: Earth" has the mysterious Gary Seven conduct a covert operation on Earth during a 1968 orbital platform launch. While at his workstation, a secretary named Roberta walks in. Gary Seven needs to know what happened to two other agents on the same assignment, so he has Roberta sit at a dictation machine: an electric typewriter with a microphone and speech recognition software. When the machine starts typing every word Roberta says, she gets increasingly flustered, and Gary Seven is compelled to switch it off.
  • Eldritch Starship : The ethereal Thasians' ship, an odd lighting effect; the Planet Killer, a conical machine miles long that eats planets; and Balok's enormous, odd spaceship, the Fesarius .
  • Empathic Healer : Gem of " The Empath " heals injuries by taking the patient's pain into herself.
  • Empire with a Dark Secret : In " The Mark of Gideon ", there is a germ-free "paradise" of a planet which is willing to join the Federation. However, the reason why they invite only Kirk to their planet is so they can decrease the planet's overpopulation by using Kirk, who had a rare disease in his blood, to infect people.
  • The Klingons team up with the Enterprise crew in "Day of the Dove" to escape the emotion-eating entity that wants them to fight to death for its amusement.
  • In "Errand of Mercy", ironically, Kirk and Kor seem to be united in their mutual loathing of the Organians, somewhat to Kirk's surprise and Kor's amusement.
  • Enforced Cold War : Examples abound, since the show was written during the Cold War. Examples of this include the plots of "Balance of Terror", "Errand of Mercy", "The Trouble with Tribbles", "Friday's Child", and "Elaan of Troyius".
  • Enlightened Self-Interest : In " Whom Gods Destroy ", the insane Garth tries to convince Kirk and Spock that they should be friends (with the implication that the other option would be "or I kill you"). Spock: On what, precisely, is our friendship to be based? Garth: Upon the firmest of foundations, Mister Spock. Enlightened self-interest.
  • Escort Distraction : In "Mirror, Mirror", Lieutenant Uhura gets slinky-minky with Mirror!Sulu on the bridge so that Mirror!Sulu won't notice a warning light on his com panel. Engineer Scott is disabling the ship's phasers and bypassing transporter protocols in an effort to return the landing party to their correct universe. Once the tampering alert stops flashing, Uhura curtails the snugglies.
  • Everyone Can See It : A growing trend in the series and movies would be for Kirk and Spock to be off in their own little world, and background characters look either curious or annoyed. Original Series fans often viewed this (and wrote fan fiction accordingly) as close comrades thinking alike or even incipient telepathy rather than sexual interest, especially after Kirk was shown in a few episodes picking up on things intuitively.
  • "Everybody Laughs" Ending : Well, everybody but Spock. "Shore Leave", "The Trouble With Tribbles", "The Galileo Seven", "Spock's Brain". An actual plot point in "Day of the Dove", when the laughter drives the Energy Being away.
  • Evil Is Hammy : "The Enemy Within" has Evil!Kirk Chewing the Scenery .
  • Evil Twin : "The Enemy Within", which featured Kirk's evil self separated from his good self via transporter malfunction, and "Mirror, Mirror", which featured an entire universe of evil twins.
  • Explosive Breeder : The Tribbles are hermaphroditic and born pregnant. McCoy : The nearest thing I can figure out is they're born pregnant... which seems to be quite a time saver!
  • Expositron 9000 : The ship's computer.
  • A key example can be found in the episode "Requiem for Methuselah". In Flint's home, Mr. Spock finds a waltz by Johannes Brahms written in original manuscript in Brahms' own hand, but which is unknown. Likewise, Flint has a collection of Leonardo da Vinci masterpieces that have been recently painted on contemporary canvas with contemporary materials. Flint later admits that he was Brahms and da Vinci , among others.
  • "Who Mourns for Adonais?" reveals that the Greek gods were actually nearly-immortal aliens who helped inspire and build classical Greek culture in exchange for being worshipped .
  • The Face : Uhura is the Communications Officer , though Kirk handles important parleys, negotiations, and First Contacts himself.
  • Fade Around the Eyes : In the episode "Where No Man Has Gone Before", in one scene with Gary Mitchell after he has undergone his transformation, the rest of the screen fades out, leaving only his silver eyes visible.
  • Failed Future Forecast : The fact that it was a show set in the future but made while the Soviet Union was still around means that a lot of things said by the Russian Chekov got outdated. There's his My Grandma Can Do Better Than You exchange with Scotty where Scotty tells Chekov that Scotch whisky is a man's drink, and Chekov replies that it was invented by a little old lady from "Leningrad" . Chekov also attributes one of the "Russian inwentions" to somebody in Minsk, which was part of the Soviet Union but is now in modern-day Belarus.
  • Fallen Hero : Gary Mitchell, John Gill, Garth of Izar.
  • In "The Immunity Syndrome" Spock is in a shuttlecraft, adrift, and losing power. Kirk gives the order to bring the shuttle aboard, but Spock, fearing such a delay would endanger the ship, tries to warn them off. McCoy is having none of it. McCoy : Shut up, Spock! We're rescuing you! (nods at Jim, who nods back) Spock: ( Fascinating Eyebrow ) Why thank you, Captain McCoy .
  • Fan of the Past : Sulu and his Fleeting Passionate Hobbies , which the rest of the crew regard as unusual for the time period.
  • For people more into the men, the original uniforms, even untouched, were particularly flattering. The tendency for Kirk to get his shirt off or torn certainly counts, too. "Charlie X" features Kirk shirtless and in tights. It's very distracting. Also, Sulu goes topless in "The Naked Time".
  • And then for the fetish crowd, there's "Patterns of Force" with its whips, chains, and shirtlessness.
  • " The Devil in the Dark " has a mining colony be terrorized by an unknown creature. Captain Kirk and First Officer Spock explore the mine, and find the creature - a Horta. When it advances, they fire their phasers at it, creating a wound and causing it to retreat. However, once Spock conducts a psychic rapport with the creature, he and Kirk realize it's a brood mother defending her egg clutch. Doctor McCoy is brought in to heal the creature, which he does with silicon-based spackling compound. This ad hoc bandage works well, to the doctor's surprise.
  • In " Journey To Babel ", Bones performs surgery on Spock's father Sarek. As a Vulcan, Sarek's organs are arranged a bit differently than a human (his heart is where a human's liver is, for example), and Spock is the only crew member who can donate blood to him.
  • The episode " Spock's Brain " has a humanoid alien incapacitate the crew of the Enterprise . Upon recovery, they discover that she has absconded Spock's brain, leaving his body alive but mindless. It becomes the episode's mission to track down the brain thief and recover Spock's brain before his body fails from lack of purpose. Bones is ultimately able to operate on Spock and get his brain back in.
  • Dr. McCoy seems full of it, insulting Spock's "green blood," "computer" mind, and other Vulcan traits. Kirk and Spock often comment on the differences between Vulcans and Humans, but in a Gentleman Snarker way without any malice.
  • Spock gives back as good as he gets with his snarking about "human emotion." However, the context makes it clear that this is nothing more than banter amongst good friends and colleagues. Anyone but Kirk, Spock, McCoy , or (occasionally) Scotty trying to invoke this trope gets smacked down hard (usually—and appropriately—by Kirk, but Scotty does it to a junior officer in at least one episode).
  • Several episodes also revolve around two alien species' hatred of each other for no good reason.
  • Fascinating Eyebrow : When Spock raises his eyebrow, he says "fascinating" very nearly every time.
  • Feigning Healthiness : Whilst transporting numerous dignitaries in " Journey To Babel ", Captain Kirk is hospitalised by an assassin and Spock takes over command of the Enterprise. Meanwhile, Spock's father Sarek (one of the diplomats) needs a blood transfusion, with Spock as the only viable donor. However, as the quantity needed would also put him out of action for several days, Spock's sense of duty won't allow him to relinquish command whilst the ship is still in danger. To avoid him being responsible for his father's death, Kirk fakes an early recovery to retake command. He initially plans to simply hand over control to Scotty and return to his own treatment once the operation has started, but at that moment the Enterprise is attacked, forcing Kirk to stay on the bridge during the battle in spite of his wounds.
  • Female Gaze : The show had a loving relationship with Kirk’s ass, including a lingering shot of it as he walks out of his quarters in “The Corbomite Maneuver”. Nichelle Nichols in “Where No Man…” discussed the trope, summing up why female fans responded so well with both Kirk and Spock; Spock was emotionally unavailable, leaving women to want to get through to him, and Kirk was emotionally open as a man, when not many male characters were like that.
  • The Final Temptation : In "This Side of Paradise", the spores caused the target to be content with living a simple comfortable life, abandoning any greater ambitions.
  • Food and Animal Attraction : In "The Cage", during one of the illusions the Talosians create for Captain Pike, a horse starts nuzzling his jacket pocket in search of the sugar therein.
  • Forbidden Fruit : In "Requiem for Methuselah", the only part of Flint's mansion that Rayna Kapec is forbidden to enter is one specific room. Guess where she wants to go more than anywhere else? Flint doesn't want her to go in there for a good reason. It's the laboratory where she was created: she's a humanoid robot . The clue is when she tells Kirk that the area just outside that is the place she goes when she's troubled and wants to think things over.
  • Forceful Kiss : Deela plants one twice on Kirk in “Wink Of An Eye”, who struggles against her both times and is more concerned that all of his crew are in slow motion. Any other kisses between them are him trying to get her guard down. He gets a few of these in general, as well as can aggressively kiss women himself if he’s desperate or doing a particularly cold con.
  • Force-Field Door : The ship's brig has one of these.
  • In “Court Martial”, much is made of how Kirk has devoted his life to the service, and he could finally have had a breakdown, causing a lapse in judgement. Later episodes will have him genuinely messing up, and more on how his Married to the Job life is unhealthy, getting taunted in “Shore Leave” about how he can sleep forever if he wants to.
  • “Miri” is Close to Home for Kirk, Bones and Spock. For Spock it’s being between two worlds (a carrier, but still can’t go back to the ship), for Kirk we’ll see in “Conscience Of The King” why he assumes kids would just want comfort after a massacre, and for Bones, who had to let his father die, he has to race to find a cure before the last one of them goes mad and kills himself.
  • In “What Little Girls Are Made Of”, Kirk and his robot clone have a discussion about food, which ends by Robot Kirk (who knows Kirk’s backstory) smugly telling the real one he’ll never starve. A few episodes later, we find out that as a child, Kirk was a survivor of a famine-induced massacre.
  • In " Amok Time ", McCoy uses the fact that Spock hasn't eaten for three days in an attempt to convince Kirk that something is wrong, and Kirk dismisses it as simply being Spock in one of his contemplative phases.
  • Another example is " The Paradise Syndrome ", where Spock hardly eats for weeks while studying the obelisk.
  • Forgotten Fallen Friend : Everyone who got killed on the show. Deconstructed in the movies, movie novels and the All There in the Manual bios, as Kirk intentionally tries to forget about losses, because otherwise he can't deal. There's a tinch of evidence for this in the show too, as some characters like Dr. Korby or Sam Kirk are alluded to in episodes before they get axed, but never after.
  • Forgot the Call : In "The Paradise Syndrome", Kirk loses his memory and becomes a simple farmer, living on a planet with a bunch of displaced Native Americans.
  • A Form You Are Comfortable With : Trelane (" The Squire of Gothos "), the Organians (" Errand of Mercy "), the Thasians (" Charlie X "), the Metrons (" Arena "), and the Kelvans (who get stuck in that form in " By Any Other Name .")
  • Frequently-Broken Unbreakable Vow : Captain Kirk's willingness to break the Prime Directive whenever he needs to save the Enterprise and/or a "stagnant" culture is well known. He's also a hypocrite on the issue, condemning Captain Tracy in "The Omega Glory" for doing something he has done before and will do again.
  • Freudian Trio : Kirk (Ego), Spock (Superego) and McCoy (Id) form the page image for this trope.
  • Spock risks his career, and possibly his life, for his former captain (Pike) in "The Menagerie". Kirk does the same for Spock in "Amok Time", and again in the third movie.
  • Friends Are Chosen, Family Aren't : Spock has a very good relationship with his crewmates (particularly Kirk and McCoy ) considering he's culturally required to be The Stoic , but he has severe issues with his father, to the point where they didn't speak to one another as family for almost two decades. Stories involving his family show a different and troubled side to Spock.
  • FTL Test Blunder : "The Naked Time" has Spock and Scotty performing a Dangerous Forbidden Technique to restart the Enterprise's warp engines after they'd been shut down. It was an untried technique, with the possible consequence of blowing up the ship, but not doing it would guarantee crashing on a collapsing planet. Fortunately, the only consequence of the forced restart was that the Enterprise was flung three days back in time, introducing the idea of using the warp drive for time travel to the series, which would feature in other episodes and the franchise as a whole.
  • The Gadfly : Chekov and his constant, deliberately erroneous references to Glorious Mother Russia . It's made very clear that he only does it to mess with people's heads.
  • The paradise planet in "That Side of Paradise" is a lush world where no one can die and fills everyone with an innocent joy, even Spock. Spock outright calls it "a true Eden" and the episode ends with Kirk and McCoy concluding that the trouble they had on the planet means man was meant to leave the Garden of Eden.
  • The name "Eden" pops up in the episode "The Way to Eden", which is about a group of space hippies searching for the mythical paradise Eden. It turns out to be a False Utopia . Although Spock strongly encourages the hippies to continue to look for the real Eden, or make it themselves.
  • The Garden is also referenced in the episode "The Apple", where a race of innocent humanoids serve a "god", Vaal, a computer shaped like a serpent head. According to Chekov, the original Garden was located just outside Moscow. After Kirk and company save the day and destroy the false god, the knowledge of good and evil is then known by the inhabitants. Spock makes a reference and Kirk asks if there is anyone onboard who remotely resembles Satan. Spock: No-one to my knowledge.
  • Genocide Survivor : In "The Conscience of the King", Kirk is stated to be a survivor of a genocide on the planet Tarsus IV, where the Governor ordered thousands of citizens killed to ensure the rest could survive, using eugenics to decide who lived and died. Oddly, Kirk's status as a survivor of a genocide is rarely touched on elsewhere in the series.
  • George Lucas Altered Version : The late 2000's saw the series get a high-definition transfer for the series, but created special edition versions to show in syndication with remaking the existing visual effects shot for shot, some enhanced visuals to expand the environment and some newly created shots to help flesh out the story (largely establishing shots to help capture the look of other planets and cultures, including one of Starfleet Command). By and large the effort was made to capture the look and feel of the original FX with updated CGI renders rather than trying to play catch up on later parts of the franchise, though established Trek production legend Mike Okuda was the one to oversee it.
  • In the episode " The Naked Time ", Kirk does this to Spock. After several slaps, Spock finally retaliates and sends Kirk flying across the room. It does seem to work though.
  • Kirk attempts it on McCoy , who is under the influence of the Lotus-Eater Machine in " The Return of the Archons ". This one isn't so successful.
  • Get Back to the Future : "Tomorrow Is Yesterday", "All Our Yesterdays".
  • Glowing Eyes of Doom : Gary Mitchell gains these when he gains godlike powers.
  • In " The Paradise Syndrome ", an amnesiac Kirk is mistaken for a deity by transplanted American Indians on a distant planet.
  • " Who Mourns for Adonais? " has an actual surviving Greek God who reveals he's just a powerful alien who had become too used to being worshiped by mortals.
  • In " The Omega Glory ", Spock is mistaken for the devil. (This was actually a real-life objection the producers had to his appearance.)
  • Godwin's Law of Time Travel : " The City on the Edge of Forever " has a plot where McCoy saving the life of Kirk's Girl of the Week causes a peace movement that leads to the US losing WWII and the Federation never existing. The episode ends with Kirk letting her die to preserve history.
  • Godzilla Threshold : In " A Taste of Armageddon " where Kirk and the landing party are being held captive by a civilization whose leaders' simply will not listen to reason and Kirk see that things are going to go from bad to worse to apocalyptic, he interrupts their leader speaking to Scotty through a communicator. Speaking quickly before he's restrained, he gives Scotty an encrypted order the aliens don't understand (General Order 24). Scotty calls them back to inform them that if they don't play ball, he'll use the Enterprise's weapons to destroy the entire surface area of their planet. His quiet, grim tone when he's telling them this leaves no doubt that he'll go through with it.
  • Gold-Colored Superiority : The captains wear gold uniforms. Anyone wearing a Red Shirt is not so lucky. This all changes starting with Star Trek: The Next Generation , however. The command uniforms were originally a greenish shade close to chartreuse, but the color came out on many people's TV sets as yellowish, so eventually the producers threw in the towel and changed them to gold.
  • In " The Alternative Factor ", Matter!Lazarus goes stark raving mad upon learning of the existence of his Anti-Matter double and becomes bent on destroying him, even if it means the destruction of both universes.
  • " Is There In Truth No Beauty? " revolves around Kollos, an ambassador of the Medusan race , whose physical appearance is so hideous: or maybe so beautiful: that any humanoid who looks at them directly goes insane. This is a subversion, as Kollos, in contrast with Shoggoths and Eldritch horrors, is clearly a good guy.
  • In "Patterns of Force," John Gill, a Human historian, broke the Prime Directive and encouraged the inhabitants of Ekos to institute fascism in order to combat its disorganized anarchy. It worked.
  • In "That Which Survives," a people rendered extinct by disease tried to prevent others from their planet from joining them by setting up a self-defense mechanism. It worked.
  • The adults in "Miri" tried to prolong their lives through bioengineering. They ended up creating a disease that did preserve life, but only in children. Adults are killed within a week.
  • "The Ultimate Computer" is meant to replace starship captains, but ends up killing Red Shirts because it is the most efficient way of doing things.
  • Good Cannot Comprehend Evil : In "The Savage Curtain", Surak, Spock, and President Lincoln have a hard time understanding the motives and actions of the opposing "evil" side. Only Kirk seems to have a grasp of their potential for deceptiveness and duplicity.
  • In "Return of the Archons" Spock decks somebody with an ordinary punch and Kirk says "Isn't that a little old-fashioned?"
  • Good Republic, Evil Empire : Why the Federation is unlike the Klingons, according to Kirk.
  • Got the Whole World in My Hand : The Terran Empire's sigil from "Mirror, Mirror" shows a dagger stabbed through the Earth.
  • Grand Theft Me : In " Turnabout Intruder ", the Girl of the Week and Mad Scientist Dr. Janice Lester uses an alien device to swap her mind into Kirk's body (poor, desperate girl) in order to fulfill her dream of being a starship Captain, because, y'know, chicks can't do that stuff in The Future (although it's made fairly clear that her mental instablity and not her gender is what prevented her from achieving success, for which she irrationally blames Kirk)... Anyhoo, Hilarity Ensues , and we get to watch William Shatner act like an Large Ham with a side of girl, instead of the usual Large Ham .
  • Grand Theft Prototype : In "The Enterprise Incident", the Starfleet Command sent the Enterprise on a mission to steal a cloaking device so they could learn how to neutralize it.
  • The Great Repair : In " The Galileo Seven ", an Enterprise shuttlecraft is pulled off course and crashes on an unknown planet. The crew is repeatedly attacked by primitive humanoids, and there's dissent over Commander Spock's decisions while Scotty attempts to repair the shuttle.
  • In the episode "Bread and Circuses" Bones gives Spock a Grudging "Thank You" and receives a Think Nothing of It in return. McCoy : Spock, er, I know we've, er, had our disagreements. Er, maybe they're jokes, I don't know. As Jim says, we're not often sure ourselves sometimes. But, er... what I'm trying to say is... Spock: Doctor, I am seeking a means of escape. Will you please be brief? McCoy : What I'm trying to say is, you saved my life in the arena. Spock: Yes, that's quite true. McCoy : [indignant] I'm trying to thank you, you pointed-eared hobgoblin! Spock: Oh yes, you humans have that emotional need to express gratitude. "You're welcome," I believe is the correct response.
  • There's another one in "Let This Be Your Last Battlefield". One of the aliens of the week is set up as someone who's hotheaded and difficult, but ultimately at least somewhat sympathetic. Viewers get a hint of that second half coming when in his first exchange with Kirk and McCoy , after reacting very angrily to their (perfectly accurate) accusation that he had stolen a Federation ship, the alien visibly pulls himself together enough to thank them quite sincerely for rescuing him.
  • The Guards Must Be Crazy : In "A Taste of Armageddon", "Space Seed", "All Our Yesterdays", "A Piece of the Action" and "Whom Gods Destroy".
  • "A Piece of the Action" is the funniest example. Captain Kirk positively revels in giving all the mob chiefs offers they can't refuse.
  • The series was partially inspired by the Horatio Hornblower books.
  • Guy on Guy Is Hot : Practically a fandom nod in “Wink Of An Eye”, as Deela notes Kirk “feels great affection for the Vulcan”, and wonders if she can make him demonstrate that, the actress’s tone of voice knowing full well what she’s insinuating.
  • Halloween Episode : " Catspaw ", which was first broadcast on October 27, 1967.
  • Hands-On Approach : In “Requiem For Methuselah”, and as he still has no clue how to play from “Piece Of The Action”, Reyna teaches Kirk to play pool.
  • Hate Plague : In "Day of the Dove", an Energy Being that feeds on hate brings the Federation and the Klingons, who are trying to abide by the peace treaty, into conflict. It goes as far as implanting False Memories so that the manipulated will have an extra source of conflict. Those who are killed are somehow brought back to life with their fatal wounds healed to fight again. Once they all figure it out, the creature is repelled from the ship by laughter. Lots and lots of laughter.
  • He Who Fights Monsters : This trope is why Alexander, the court jester of the Platonians in "Plato's Stepchildren", refuses to take McCoy 's concoction that will give him psychic powers. As much as he loathes Parmen for his abuse, the idea that he could turn out as cruel and manipulative as his master, along with even greater psychic abilities to boot, sickens him even more.
  • "This Side of Paradise" After Kirk deliberately provokes Spock to anger to kill alien spores manipulating him. Spock says that striking a fellow officer is a court martial offense. It's clear Spock is embarrassed by his emotional behavior, no matter how involuntary. Kirk reasons, logically as Spock notes, that if they're both in the brig no one can build the device needed to free the rest of the crew.
  • "Amok Time" has Spock in the grip of blood fever during a bout of pon farr . Spock explains the situation to Kirk and McCoy , who both tell him that they'll never tell another soul about the private information he's divulged to them. This is especially poingnant for the Doctor, as he and Spock are Vitriolic Best Buds , and it would be easy for him to mock Spock over it, but he never does.
  • The Hero : Captain Kirk
  • And Spock in Amok Time when he believes he has killed Kirk.
  • High-Heel–Face Turn : Frequently with women Kirk seduced.
  • Historical Domain Superperson : In the episode "Requiem for Methuselah" the Enterprise crew meets an old human named Flint who is both immortal and possessed of superhuman strength. Flint was originally born around 3800 BC and lived as many notable historical figures during his long lifetime including King Solomon, Alexander the Great , Johannes Brahms , Leonardo da Vinci , and Lazarus. He kept his immortality secret by letting each persona eventually "die" and establishing a new identity elsewhere.
  • Hollow World : "For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched The Sky" has a variation, a shell covering an artificial planetoid to hold the atmosphere in.
  • Hollywood Torches : In "Errand of Mercy" and "Catspaw".
  • Holodeck Malfunction : Subverted in the episode " Shore Leave ". The planet's safety protocols are working just fine, but the landing party doesn't know that and thinks they are actually in danger. The protocols do break down when the Enterprise returns to the planet in the animated series because the guy in charge died in the meantime and the AI chose to go rogue through sheer boredom.
  • Honor Before Reason : In "Spectre of the Gun", Kirk refuses to ambush the Earps, in spite of the severe danger they present. Even after one of them kills Chekhov, he doesn't kill the defeated party.
  • Hotter and Sexier : Look at “The Corbomite Maneuver” in comparison to “The Cage”. The women’s uniforms go from turtlenecks and pants to mini-dresses, and stern Chaste Hero Pike gets replaced with Captain “tits out in the hallway” Kirk.
  • Human Aliens : Most alien races encountered are indistinguishable from humans, even the Klingons; they weren't given rubber foreheads until the films. This is mostly due to budget reasons, though it's odd that only Spock requires a disguise whenever the crew infiltrates an alien world.
  • Humans Are Interesting : Or fascinating , even.
  • Spock as well, in "Operation Annihilate" where he is in unbearable pain as a result of being infected by an alien parasite and nearly driven insane. He still insists on returning to duty, claiming (truthfully) that he can control the pain with Vulcan techniques.
  • I, Noun : " I, Mudd ".
  • I Have Your Wife : Plenty of villains seem to know that threatening Spock will get Kirk to cooperate (at least for a while), and vice versa. Sometimes it’s “I have your crew”/”I have your captain” but mostly it’s just those two.
  • "I Know You're in There Somewhere" Fight : Kirk and Spock in "This Side of Paradise"; Kirk has to get Spock angry enough so he can overcome the influence of the mind-altering spores. It worked a bit better than Kirk was counting on.
  • Idiosyncratic Cultural Gesture : "Journey to Babel" reveals that Vulcan couples extend their pointer and middle fingers from their hand and touch the tips as a sign of being in a relationship.
  • I'm a Doctor, Not a Placeholder : Trope Maker ; Dr. McCoy 's Catchphrase whenever called upon to perform a task or give advice outside of his expertise.
  • Imperiled in Pregnancy : In " Friday's Child ", a usurper named Ma'ab kills Aka'ar, the Teer (tribal king), in an attempted coup. He then demands Aka'ar's pregnant wife Eleen and her unborn son killed, as the unborn son is the true heir of succession. Kirk, Spock, and McCoy have to go on the run with Eleen to keep her safe.
  • The Gorn in Arena shrugs off injuries that would kill a human and is very strong, but isn't very agile. Kirk finally manages to stop it using an improvised cannon.
  • The two aliens in "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield" are the last members of their respective races and still continue to fight it out.
  • Impostor-Exposing Test : In "The Trouble with Tribbles", the Tribble dislike for Klingons is used to identify the Klingon spy disguised as a human.
  • Improvised Bandage : A mysterious alien creature has been menacing some Federation miners, and Captain Kirk and First Officer Spock investigate. When they encounter the creature, it ignores warnings to stay back, so they fire phasers at it. The creature is wounded, and retreats. Later, the pair discover the creature is intelligent, and menaced the miners to protect its eggs. A silicone-based spackling compound is used to patch the creature's wound, and its hatchlings start digging tunnels faster than the miners ever could.
  • Improvised Weapon : The rough-and-tumble fights often involve these. Kirk in particular is a master: ropes, pillows, and that stick thing resembling a reactor control rod he uses to beat Khan.
  • In-Camera Effects : The series would achieve the shaking of the bridge when under attack by simply shaking the camera and getting the crew to wobble about . Later SF productions with a bigger budget, such as the Trek films, replaced the cheesy effect with Practical Effects : sets would be placed on top of a large platform and the camera would be still while the entire set was shaken. That would be counted as Practical Effects .
  • Industrialized Evil : In "A Taste of Armageddon", the Enterprise discovers two planets are involved in a bizarre war in which computers simulate the conflict, and civilians deemed "killed" in the simulation are required to report to disintegration chambers. The people willingly go to their deaths, believing that in doing so, they are preventing an actual war from breaking out.
  • Inertial Impalement : In "The Menagerie", during the illusionary battle between Captain Pike and a Rigelian warrior, Pike is kneeling in a courtyard holding up a broken spearhead braced against the ground. The warrior jumps down on him and impales himself on the spearhead.
  • Inexplicable Cultural Ties : A key element of Roddenberry's goal for the series, to tell stories applicable to Earth in The '60s . The alien-culture-of-the-week will therefore be similar enough to one from Earth to get the point across. "Bread and Circuses" acknowledges the prevalence of these and implies that the phenomenon is understood by Federation scientists, providing an alternate Trope Namer , the Hodgkin's Law of Parallel Planet Development.
  • Innocuously Important Episode : “Shore Leave”, character-wise, as Finnegan calling Kirk old leads to Kirk actually getting an edge in their fighting, and upgrades his wish to just rest for a few days to a deeper need to “ sleep forever ”. “The Deadly Years" is similar, showing Kirk’s denial over his getting older and less competent, taking it the worst out of all of them, and learning the lesson that he needs to be young in order to be a good Captain. Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan even does a Continuity Nod to it.
  • Interplay of Sex and Violence : Kirk and Spock’s fight in “Amok Time” gets… grindy. Spock choking Kirk out cures him of Pon Farr, and while said choking is happening, Kirk starts to put his legs around Spock’s back.
  • Involuntary Group Split : Happens to Kirk and Spock in "Devil in the Dark".
  • It Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time : Why Sarek married Amanda Grayson: "At the time, it seemed the logical thing to do."
  • It's the Same, Now It Sucks! : invoked Used by Spock as a Logic Bomb in "I, Mudd": Spock: [to Alice 27] I love you. [to Alice 210] However, I hate you. Alice 210: But I'm identical in every way with Alice 27. Spock: Yes, of course. That is exactly why I hate you; because you are identical. [both Alices succumb to the logic bomb] Spock: Fascinating.
  • Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique : Garth uses this on Dr. Cory and Kirk in "Whom Gods Destroy" in an attempt to learn the transporter code word. Naturally, it doesn't work.
  • Jack the Ripoff : Subverted : the killer actually is Jack the Ripper , who was really a noncorporeal alien possessing human bodies .
  • Jekyll & Hyde : In " The Enemy Within ", a Teleporter Accident splits Kirk into Good and Evil halves. They both have to be convinced that they need each other before the split can be undone.
  • Jerkass Has a Point : In “The Trouble With Tribbles”, with the exception of Chekov, nobody in the bar objects when the Klingon calls Kirk a swaggering dictator with delusions of godhood, which gets the betrayed Puppy-Dog Eyes look from Kirk later on.
  • Jerk Jock : Though not a jock, Kirk was tormented endlessly by upperclassman Finnegan when he was younger. One of his fantasies is finally getting to punch him out.
  • The titular device in " The Ultimate Computer " is designed to run a starship with a minimal crew; the Enterprise is chosen for its test run.
  • In "A Taste of Armageddon" entire governments have been replaced this way.
  • Judicial Wig : When Trelane puts Kirk on trial for defying him in " The Squire of Gothos ", he wears a white and long curly wig along with his judges' robes.
  • Just Testing You : Kirk and Scotty set up a challenge/response password before Kirk beamed down to a planet in order to prevent imposters from getting beamed up. Naturally a shapeshifter takes Kirk's form and tries to get Scotty to beam him up. When he doesn't know the password, he tries to cover it up by saying that he was just testing Scotty. Scotty catches on immediately and concludes that Kirk must be in trouble, since the real Kirk would never "test" him like that.
  • Kill the Cutie : Edith Keeler in "The City on the Edge of Forever". After all, You Can't Fight Fate .
  • Kill the Poor : In the episode " The Cloud Minders ", on the planet Ardana, rather than being killed, the poor are enslaved and forced to live out their entire lives underground.
  • Kirk Summation : The Trope Namer and Trope Maker . Kirk (or occasionally another character) would often either try to reason with the episode's antagonist or put them in their place before ending things.
  • Knockout Gas : In the episode "Space Seed". After Khan takes over the Enterprise, Kirk orders that all decks be flooded with Neural Gas, which would render everyone aboard unconscious. That attempt fails, but later the attempt succeeds.
  • Watching in production order, Spock is understating it when he says the crew has had a few rough months in "Shore Leave", with two court martials , Kirk being revealed to have survived a genocide and suffering Mind Rape helped on by the ship psychologist , Spock getting a load of racism , everyone going insane on a planet where all the adults die , and Chapel losing her fiance .
  • Gene Coon in “A Piece Of The Action” did a gentle poke of how much a Lust Object Kirk was in the show, with Krako putting his hand on Kirk’s shoulder guiding him away, and both Shatner and Nimoy’s faces have Here We Go Again! expressions.
  • The “alternate earth” of “Miri” has Kirk saying in voiceover, just on the edge of sighing, “it seems impossible, but there it is”.
  • WEEEEE ...THE PEEE -PLE!
  • The actual reason was revealed recently: Control freak Roddenberry often rewrote, and re-rewrote, and re-re-wrote the scripts up to the last nanosecond, such that it became very difficult to memorize lines. Instead of asking "Line?" and ruining the take, Shatner would laboriously strive to remember what he was supposed to say, creating the effect.
  • Last of His Kind : "Who Mourns for Adonais?", "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield". "Devil in the Dark" plays with this one; the Horta is merely the last of her generation , trying to guard over a massive hoard of eggs until they hatch.
  • "The Trouble With Tribbles": Kirk asks Scotty what it was that the Klingons said that made him disobey orders and start a fist fight with them. Scotty passionately replies, "They called the Enterprise a garbage scow! Sir."
  • "Friday's Child": Upon learning that the new baby destined to one day rule a tribe is named Leonard James Akaar, Spock cannot help but be flabbergasted by the smugness of Kirk and McCoy . Spock: [genuinely exasperated] I think you're both going to be insufferably pleased with yourselves for at least a month. Sir.
  • Scotty also has his own leitmotif, typically used in lighter moments. It is prominently heard in both "The Trouble with Tribbles" and "By Any Other Name".
  • Let's You and Him Fight : In "Amok Time" Spock's "fiancée" has chosen another, and elects to invoke a ritual in which the two fight for her hand. He's perfectly willing to fight Spock for her, but she elects Kirk as her champion instead - for reasons that Spock later describes as "logical." Unfortunately, since Vulcans have a really bad case of mating fever, Spock is not in his right mind at the time and fully capable of killing his much weaker captain and Kirk (who agreed to be the champion because he thought he could simply throw the fight and walk away) doesn't know it's a Duel to the Death till it's too late to back out.
  • Liberty Over Prosperity : In "Space Seed", after Khan's attempt to take over the Enterprise fails, Kirk says that he and his followers can either be punished under Starfleet regulations (which would presumably involve a long prison sentence) or accept exile on an uninhabited planet. Khan: Have you ever read Milton , Captain? Kirk: I understand. [later] Scott: It's a shame for a good Scotsman to admit it, but I'm not up on Milton. Kirk: The statement Lucifer made when he fell into the pit. "It is better to rule in hell than serve in heaven."
  • Star Trek: 25th Anniversary is a combination flight simulatior/ Adventure Game voiced by the original cast, plus one generic Redshirt who is routinely the first to perish should the player screw up. The game was followed by Judgement Rites , in which Chekhov and Uhura are finally allowed to join the landing party (something they rarely did in the series).
  • There was also a 25th Anniversary port for the NES , though the setting and storyline are different. As exhaustively covered (and suffered) by The Angry Video Game Nerd , the final level deposits Kirk back on Iotia II, where Bones foolishly bet and lost his communicator in a card game. This causes a calamity in the future, forcing Kirk to complete a massive Chain of Deals to get the communicator back.
  • The Game Boy version of 25th Anniversary again changes the storyline, this time involving a Doomsday Machine roaming through space. Work on a defensive weapon begins in earnest, but the weaselly Klingons dissemble the device into 12 pieces and scatter them all over space, requiring Kirk to Catch 'Em All .
  • Star Trek: Starfleet Academy takes place in Kirk's era, though the Enterprise does not appear. It is, however, possible to beat the infamous Kobayashi Maru scenario by naming yourself " James T. Kirk ", unlocking a prototype ship.
  • Star Trek (Bally) was tied to the original television series, with minor art changes to help promote The Motion Picture .
  • Star Trek (Data East) was released in time for the 25th anniversary of the show.
  • Bally's Star Trek , originally featured the crew in their television designs. Soon after production, however, it was redecorated to bring it closer to Star Trek: The Motion Picture instead.
  • Data East's Star Trek was released as part of the 25th Anniversary of the television series. Features oodles of character cameos on the playfield and a great transporter effect on the backglass.
  • Lima Syndrome : Deela kidnaps Kirk to be a Sex Slave in “Wink Of An Eye”, and demands the right to like him. Of course she wants him to be docile, and then decides she likes him better as a Defiant Captive , so her assertions to the trope are nebulous.
  • Literal Maneater : The salt vampire from the episode " The Man Trap " mostly operates this way, though there is one exception where it takes on a hunky male form to attract Lt. Uhura.
  • Literal Split Personality : In "The Enemy Within", Kirk gets split into his good half and his evil half.
  • Literary Allusion Title : Rather famous for the grandiloquent episode titles. There's "The Conscience of the King", "Bread and Circuses", and "Is There In Truth No Beauty" among others.
  • Lobotomy : The episode " Spock's Brain ", in which aliens, to put it simply, steal Spock's brain, and the episode revolves around the Enterprise crew getting it back and reattaching it.
  • Logic Bomb : One of Kirk's favorite tactics for dealing with rogue computers ; it invariably causes a shutdown, and occasionally a self-destruct. Examples include "The Changeling", "I, Mudd", "Return of the Archons", "The Ultimate Computer", and "Wolf In The Fold".
  • Long-Lived : The children in "Miri" (hundreds of years) and Mr. Flint in "Requiem for Methuselah" (six thousand years). The tie-in novel Cry of the Onlies has Flint coming to the children's planet to be a mentor for them, especially those who chose to have treatments so they would age at a normal rate.
  • Loss of Inhibitions : In "The Naked Time," the crew experiences strange feelings and behaviors after a landing party investigating a mysterious disaster beams back to the ship, gradually infecting almost everyone. Dr. McCoy ultimately realizes the water on the planet had mutated, causing it to affect the brain like alcohol. While some effects more resemble delusions (e.g., Sulu calling Kirk "Richelieu" , unless he's playacting), a lot of them (Sulu leaving his station early to fence at the gym, Christine Chapel making an Anguished Declaration of Love to Spock, Spock breaking down in tears over his inability to accept either part of his heritage completely and Kirk confessing how stressed he feels because of his position) fall under the lack of inhibitions that alcohol typically causes.
  • Lotus-Eater Machine : This was the plot of the original pilot, " The Cage ," though Pike sees through the ruse easily. However, another character trapped there doesn't want to leave the setup—and knows that it's all an illusion—as after having been horrifically mangled in a crash the aliens were able to restore the illusion of her original beautiful appearance. They give her a illusory Captain Pike to live with until the real Pike returns to the planet in a later episode made up of the original pilot.
  • In "A Private Little War", Kirk and McCoy discover that the Klingons gave flintlock weapons to village-dwelling native people who didn't have guns before. Instead of their tradition of peaceful trade with the nearby hunter-gatherer people, the Klingons encourage the villagers to attack them. To restore the balance of power, Kirk provides the hunter-gatherers with similar weapons. McCoy compares their situation to the "Brush Wars" of the mid-20th Century .
  • "Bread and Circuses" features a world with 1960s-level tech (television, firearms) but a society that mirrors the Roman Empire , complete with the slow rise of Christianity (albeit 2000 years late).
  • Ludicrous Precision : Spock's figures, constantly. Discussed in "Errand of Mercy".
  • Machine Empathy : Scotty could often sense when something was wrong with the Enterprise from subtle changes in her "feel". Possibly justified, because machines cause vibrations that engineers familiar with said machine can actually feel when touching it, such as through the hull of a starship—Scotty himself confirms this in the NextGen episode " Relics " when he compares the Enterprise -D to his Enterprise with Picard.
  • Made a Slave : Season three has the dubious honour of trying to do this five times in one season, with Bones, Kirk, Spock, Chapel and Uhura used for entertainment in “Plato’s Stepchildren”, Bones again forced to stay in “For The World Is Hollow And I Have Touched The Sky” and “The Empath”, Kirk kidnapped for breeding in “Wink Of An Eye” because he’s “pretty”, and captured in “Mark Of Gideon” to spread an STD and stem overpopulation.
  • Mad Love : Nurse Chapel and Spock (well, on Chapel's side, at least), McGivers and Khan.
  • The Mafia : "A Piece of the Action" is an entire episode revolving around a Mafia planet.
  • The Main Characters Do Everything : Kirk and his highest bridge officers often beam into danger despite the presence of specialists on board for that purpose.
  • Male Gaze : In "Mudd's Women", the camera rather obviously pans to the women's derrieres as they walk along the corridors of the Enterprise after leaving the transporter room.
  • The Man in Front of the Man : In "Patterns of Force", a society of Human Aliens has emulated the regime of Nazi Germany, complete with atrocities committed in for racial and cultural motives. The officers of the regime carry out the orders of their Fuhrer, who they only see via television broadcast. It turns out later that the Fuhrer was drugged and under the control of his Deputy. It was the Deputy Fuhrer who was really responsible for giving orders to the Nazi forces, while the true Fuhrer had good intentions all along.
  • Mars Needs Women : "Mudd's Women"—Mudd is transporting the women to provide companionship to lonely colonists.
  • Martyr Without a Cause : All three of the main trio have admitted at some point that peace and happiness are not regular emotions for them, and are just that little too willing to sacrifice themselves. The kicker is that Bones will complain when Kirk and Spock act like self-sacrificial idiots, but then do the exact same thing himself.
  • Master-Apprentice Chain : Pike—>Kirk—>Sulu (although seen briefly in TOS, the Pike-Kirk relationship is only shown in any detail in the reboot and in the non-canon Expanded Universe ). Chekov appears to be a mentee of Kirk as well, but ends up on a different career path (in Starfleet Intelligence as opposed to starship command) after the second movie.
  • Mate or Die : The Vulcan pon-farr period provides a biological imperative that strong, as seen with Spock in " Amok Time ". The Federation has no knowledge of it, as Vulcans do not speak of it even among themselves.
  • The drone-like Lawgivers in "Return of the Archons." In that case, the drone-like humanoids were controlled by an intelligent supercomputer.
  • The original builders of the Androids on Exo III were also stated to have been a society of biological creatures who ruined their homeworld and retreated underground where they became a more mechanized, machine-like society.
  • The Kelvans from the Andromeda Galaxy are implied to have a culture like this; they are completely organic beings, but in their true form they experience none of the sensory distractions of humanoids, and consider themselves much more efficient. They go about trying to take over the Milky Way with very straightforward methods (transforming Kirk's crew into vulnerable dust-cubes that only their technology can restore to human form, for example) but without any of the typical Trek villains' hamminess. The Federation is saved from them by the fact that, when in artificial humanoid form, the Kelvans become Sense Freaks and can be incapacitated in a variety of ways, such as by the effects of alcohol or unfamiliar emotions like pleasure or jealousy.
  • The Eyemorg (humanoid female) society in the infamous episode "Spock's Brain" were totally reliant on a mechanized underground industrial complex run by advanced computers (for which purpose they tried to steal "Spock's Brain," because they lacked the knowledge to maintain this infrastructure themselves); this was in contrast to the primitive, Ice Age-like culture of males that lived on the surface.
  • The Fabrini who lived aboard a generational asteroid ship, which they all believed was actually a planet, were similarly run by an advanced, tyrannical computer called The Oracle. The Fabrini were less "rigidly mechanical" and more "rigidly traditional" though, the rigid traditions being enforced by The Oracle.
  • The Doomsday Machine is a planet-eating, extragalactic superweapon hypothesized to have destroyed its creators, and is now moving through the Federation's part of the galaxy. It's practically indestructible, and has an anti-proton beam capable of easily obliterating most starships, and consumes entire planets. In the end, it isn't even destroyed, just shut down due to internal damage.
  • Nomad is a hybrid of human and alien probes which travels through space on a mission to "sterilize" planets, i.e. kill all organic life forms for no other reason than they are imperfect. It was first encountered after killing four billion people , is powerful enough to easily outgun the Enterprise despite only being about five feet long, and can bring the dead back to life. It was only beaten by showing it that it, too, was imperfect , motivating it to self-destruct.
  • Men Are the Expendable Gender : Only three female personnel are killed in the whole series, whereas dozens of male Starfleet personnel are killed. In one of the three aversions, "By Any Other Name", the Black Dude Dies First trope is also averted, as the white female redshirt is killed by the Kelvans (sparing the black male redshirt in the party) when the Kelvan could have killed both of them just as easily.
  • Military Science Fiction : The U.S.S. Enterprise is the focus of the show, and she is explicitly a military vessel in the service of The Federation Star Fleet . However , due the fact that the Enterprise operates entirely in deep space, her crew complement is not comprised entirely of soldiers. Instead, the crew consists of spacemen who are specifically qualified to operate the ship. This doesn't in any way reduce her status as a military craft: the Enterprise is designed to and fully expected to both facilitate and withstand combat, and is often diverted from her explorations - by order from Starfleet Command - to perform various missions of a purely military nature, such as stealing sensitive technology from the Romulan Empire, or preventing the Klingons from establishing a base in a tactically important area. This strongly contrasts some of the later installments, particularly Star Trek: The Next Generation , which takes on a much more relaxed tone in comparison . "Although the Enterprise is a military vessel, its organization is only semi-military. The "enlisted men" category does not exist. Star Trek goes on the assumption that every man and woman aboard the U.S.S. Enterprise is the equivalent of a qualified astronaut, and therefore an officer." - The Making of Star Trek, page 209. "I'm a soldier, not a diplomat." - James Kirk
  • Used by the Platonians in "Plato's Stepchildren", with the most blatant example being Parmen forcing Spock to laugh and cry.
  • Mirror!Spock forcibly mind-melding with Dr. McCoy in "Mirror, Mirror".
  • The Neural Neutralizer in "Dagger of the Mind" was used for this. Upon learning that it works, Dr Noel inserts a one night stand into Kirk’s mind when it didn’t go that way originally, though she draws the line at Adams installing an obsessive love for her in him.
  • Minored In Ass Kicking : The reserved, cerebral Spock and his skill at hand-to-hand fighting (Vulcan nerve pinch! Judo chop!).Helped by his Vulcan strength.
  • Dilithium crystals are a fundamental aspect of the Star Trek universe, as all Federation starships use them for their Faster Than Light engines. They have basically one important property: they are able to safely interact with antimatter to produce a controlled reaction. They cannot be replicated and can decay in quality, which adds to some tension in either repairing the imperfections in the existing crystal, or finding new sources of dilithium.
  • Star Trek's technical manuals all try to provide consistent explanations for the science and technology of the series.
  • Mirror Universe : "Mirror, Mirror" features an alternate universe where the Federation is part of the tyrannical Terran empire.
  • Monster Is a Mommy : "The Devil in the Dark" has the Horta, which is only protecting its eggs.
  • "Obsession". A couple of red shirt security personnel are drained of blood and killed by the vampire cloud in the opening scene.
  • "The Devil in the Dark". Two miners and an Enterprise Security man are destroyed by the Horta's acid secretions, one in the first scene.
  • "Wolf in the Fold". Several women are slaughtered by the "Jack the Ripper" entity during the episode. One of them dies before the opening credits.
  • Monster of the Week : In SF author David Gerrold's book about writing the episode "The Trouble With Tribbles", he recounts seeing the first episode broadcast, which featured a creature that sucked all of the salt out of people's bodies, thereby killing them. He hoped Star Trek wasn't going to turn out to be a Monster of the Week show, which ironically for him, it did. (Only if one considers political intrigue, human(oid) assassins, hostage situations, high tech pseudo wars, missing persons, (sometimes in other times or dimensions), and direct military conflict to (somehow) equal "monsters of the week").
  • Mood Lighting : Whenever Kirk is putting the moves on a female (of any species), the lighting softens, playing up the female's sexiness.
  • Morality Chain : Kirk keeps Bones and Spock from being at each other’s throats (lampshaded in his final orders in “The Tholian Web”, assuming now that he’s dead the two are locked in mortal combat), Kirk calls Spock the “noblest half of himself”, and Bones keeps the other two from too much self-sacrifice.
  • In "The Empath", when aliens offer Kirk the choice of sacrificing McCoy or Spock, McCoy takes out Kirk with drugs. Spock is glad; since this leaves him in command, he can make the sacrifice himself. McCoy proceeds to drug him as well and sacrifice himself.
  • Ensign Garrovick attempts to do this in "Obsession", but Kirk isn't knocked out, and has no intention of sacrificing himself anyway. Just using himself as bait.
  • Muggle in Mage Custody : Alexander is a dwarf who is not given the psychokinetic power that the other denizens of Platonius have. As a result, he is treated as a court jester and slave, and subjected to cruel treatment, particularly from Parmen.
  • Multinational Team : Each of the bridge crew represents a part of the world (and an alien).
  • In multiple episodes, they use their phasers to create a heat source, by shooting a rock.
  • In one episode, Yeoman Rand uses a phaser to reheat Kirk's coffee!
  • Mundanization : Episodes in which the crew visits Earth's past, or a planet that unusually mimics it, derive a lot of the humor from the Fish out of Water setting.
  • In " Turnabout Intruder ", when a crazy ex-lover of Kirk switches bodies with him and the suspicious crew has no valid proof and she begins ordering the deaths of anyone who opposes her, Scotty suggests to McCoy that they mutiny, since they know that it would throw the captain into a fit and they would be able to stop him under regulations.
  • Spock's actions in transporting Captain Pike to Talos IV constitute a mutiny, for which he is put on trial—which is a ruse to buy him more time.
  • Kirk considers the crew's actions in "This Side of Paradise" to be a mutiny: they abandon the ship due to being Brainwashed and Crazy .
  • My God, What Have I Done? : Dr Noel from “Dagger Of The Mind” puts a one night stand into Kirk’s mind (they originally just danced and he talked about the stars), but immediately regrets it once Adams tortures him and makes him think he’s dangerously in love with her. When Kirk says Adams died alone, without even a tormenter for company, she gets the message.
  • My Grandma Can Do Better Than You : The exchange where Scotty tells Chekov that Scotch whisky is a man's drink, and Chekov replies that it was invented by a little old lady from Leningrad.
  • My Sensors Indicate You Want to Tap That : in the episode "Mudd's Women", the computer tells the all-male hearing board the effect the women are having on them: elevated heart rate, sweating, rapid pulse. All except Spock.
  • Neck Snap : The Vulcan tal-shaya technique performed by the Orion spy in "Journey to Babel".
  • "The Immunity Syndrome" has Spock states that the Vulcan crew of the U.S.S Intrepid would have been incapable of realizing that they were dying without a logical explanation.
  • "I, Mudd": Realizing that the androids were wholly logical, Spock prescribes a hefty dose of human illogic as just the thing to deal with them .
  • Also from "I, Mudd", Chekov discovers that the android girls were programmed by Harry Mudd...which he decides isn't necessarily a bad thing. Alice 118: We are programmed to function as human females, lord. Chekov: You are? Alices: Yes, my lord. Chekov: Harry Mudd programmed you? Alices: Yes, my lord. Chekov: That unprincipled, evil-minded, lecherous kulak Harry Mudd programmed you? Alices: Yes, my lord. Chekov: This place is even better than Leningrad.
  • "The Enemy Within", after a transporter accident splits Kirk into two people, one good and one evil, it's revealed that his good side isn't capable of command. Spock postulates that it is humanity's faults, tempered by their morals and ethics, that give them the ability to lead.
  • Sylvia in “Catspaw” gets angry at Kirk for trying to seduce her, and he calls her out on how she captured him, has him chained up for half the episode, and brainwashed his crew, so why shouldn’t he try?
  • Niceness Denial : In "Amok Time", Spock hugs Kirk and gleefully shouts his name when he finds out he's not really dead . However, Spock claims that he did this not because he sees Kirk as a friend, but rather because he's relieved that a captain hasn't been lost.
  • Noble Male, Roguish Male : Bought up by Nichelle Nichols in the difference between how Kirk and Spock are treated in-universe (and by female fans). Kirk gets Eating the Eye Candy , ripped shirts and women kidnapping him because he’s pretty. Spock on the other hand, is actually wanted as a romantic partner any time he has to cope with a Girl of the Week , Expanded universe novels will further this on, Kirk having an undeserved reputation as someone who sleeps with anyone and Spock only looking more aloof and repressed (so I Can Change My Beloved ) in comparison.
  • No Challenge Equals No Satisfaction : At the end of " This Side of Paradise ", McCoy notes that this is the second time mankind has been thrown out of paradise. Kirk comments that, no, they left on their own, because maybe it's mankind's fate to only be happy when they have to struggle and fight for everything they get.
  • No Immortal Inertia : In " Miri ", children live for hundreds of years due to a virus, but when they reach puberty, they become ill and insane and die within a few weeks.
  • The character played by Majel Barrett in "The Cage" is referred to only as "Number One," the unofficial nickname attached to her position as Captain Pike's first officer.
  • Neither the male Romulan Commander played by Mark Lenard in "Balance of Terror" nor the female Commander played by Joanne Linville in "The Enterprise Incident" are ever referred to by name.
  • Non-Standard Prescription : Doctor McCoy has Scotty visit a club with a belly dancer, saying it's a prescription. In the films, Bones drinks Romulan Ale for "medicinal purposes." The ship's doctor in the original pilot also gives Pike a glass of martini instead of medicine, stating that there are things that people will tell their bartender that they refuse to tell their doctor.
  • Although paper still exists, characters take notes on what are obviously tablet computers. Most characters find reading e-books off of screens to be more convenient than hauling wood pulp around. And this was over forty years ago.
  • The characters are reading what the series calls "microtapes." Yet another example of Zeerust , in that microfilm was predicted to replace paper books back in the 1960's.
  • Averted in the unaired pilot, where the ship's computer produces printouts.
  • No Social Skills : Charlie Evans, due to being raised by Energy Beings .
  • No Transhumanism Allowed : Discussed . When Khan is awoken in " Space Seed ", he has a discussion with Kirk once they have determined his identity, lamenting the fact that the humans of the 2260s are practically indistinguishable from those of the 1990s. He was hoping to awaken in a world of genetically modified Ubermenschen like himself, at the very least.
  • Not Rare Over There : In "Elaan of Troyius", the ship's dilithium crystals crack in the middle of a battle. Unfortunately, there are none left... until they realize that Elaan's necklace has a bunch of them. She surrenders it gladly, bemused that they would want what to her planet are Worthless Yellow Rocks .
  • In the episode " Balance of Terror ", the defeated Romulan Commander says that he and Kirk "are of a kind," just before blowing himself up. Romulan Commander: You and I are of a kind. In a different reality, I could have called you friend. We are creatures of duty, captain. I have lived my life by it. Just... one more duty... to perform .
  • In the Gene Coon written “Errand Of Mercy”, the Organians don’t see much difference between Klingon rule and the Federation (and neither does Kor), no matter how much Kirk would like to think otherwise.
  • Not So Stoic : "Amok Time" has Spock react in excitement when Kirk isn't dead.
  • Novelization : between 1967 and his death in the late 1970s, James Blish adapted virtually every TOS episode in short-story format for a series of paperback books ( Star Trek 1 , Star Trek 2 , etc.). A handful of leftover stories were subsequently adapted by his widow, J.A. Lawrence, as the final Star Trek 12 volume, plus the Harry Mudd stories were combined with an original novella to form the novel Mudd's Angels . Early Blish volumes exhibit Early-Installment Weirdness as they are based on early scripts of some episodes, resulting in noticeable differences in plot and characterization from the broadcast episodes.
  • Numbered Homeworld : Rigel VII ... XII ... how many of those were there, anyway?
  • A famous example is Edith Keeler from "The City on the Edge of Forever". A time-traveling Dr. McCoy saves her, and because she lives, she leads a pacifist movement that prevents crucial war research during WWII, causing the Nazis to win the war. Kirk has to let her die to reset the timeline.
  • The Organians look like this for most of "Errand of Mercy". Spock describes the planet as a stagnant culture, and the planet seems to be populated by amiable old men who placidly allow the Klingons to conquer them, rebuking Kirk and Spock's efforts to inspire a resistance because they abhor violence so much they'd rather allow arbitrary executions than fight back . It's only at the end that we learn the Organians have simply pretended to be harmless (and executed, and humanoid) to make their visitors feel at ease . When tensions come to a head, they revert to their luminous true forms and make both sides sit in the corner.
  • The most infamous example might be the fight in " Amok Time ", which features a stunt double that looks nothing like William Shatner fighting an equally non-Leonard-Nimoyish stuntman.
  • Though you could also cite the fight between Ricardo Montalban's stuntman and whoever was doubling for Shatner in " Space Seed ".
  • Or the fight in " Court Martial ", where seemingly two random guys fought in place of actors William Shatner and Richard Webb.
  • In " Wolf in the Fold ", Hengist, (played by the non imposing John Fiedler), is doubled by someone a few inches taller and more than a few pounds heavier.
  • Of the People : In the episode "The Return of the Archons", outsiders are said to be not of the body.
  • Oh, Crap! : In "Amok Time" Kirk is chosen to face Spock in battle. Kirk agrees, reasoning that, if things get bad, he'll quit and Spock will be declared the winner. Then, when the lirpa (the staffs with really big blades) are produced, T'Pau announces, "If both survive the lirpa , combat will continue with the ahn-woon ." When Kirk asks about what she means, she tells him "This combat is to the death."
  • Omnicidal Maniac : Matter!Lazarus from "The Alternative Factor". In order to kill his enemy, his Anti-Matter double, he has to cross the threshold into the other universe, but bumping into said enemy while in the same universe will destroy both universes. Despite knowing this, he's so far gone that he simply doesn't care.
  • Once Done, Never Forgotten : In "Court Martial", this turns out that Ben Finney, the man Kirk supposedly killed by accident and caused the titular court martial to happen and who actually faked his death to try to make Kirk go to jail and in the climax tries to crash the Enterprise on a planet with everybody on board believes that, because of "one little mistake" that Kirk reported while they served in another ship earlier in their careers, he was being constantly mocked by everybody else in their class, who made Captain before him. It's made pretty obvious as the episode goes that Finney has become completely freaking insane from his obsession over this, including constantly sending letters to his daughter Jame ranting about it (which make Jame accept that maybe her father is crazy enough to try to frame Kirk) and the wide-eyed glee he shows as he tries to kill Kirk with his bare hands at the climax.
  • One-Hit Kill : The Romulan Plasma Torpedo is this, but only at close range .
  • One-Winged Angel : Sylvia in "Catspaw" turns into a giant cat when Kirk refuses to obey her.
  • The Romulans appear in one episode per season: "Balance of Terror" in season 1, "The Deadly Years" in season 2 note  though they are not seen onscreen and their ship is reused stock footage from "Balance of Terror" , and "The Enterprise Incident" in season 3.
  • Kirk faces a different Nefarious Klingon Commander once per season: Kor in season 1's "Errand of Mercy", Koloth in season 2's "The Trouble with Tribbles", and Kang in season 3's "Day of the Dove". (Both Koloth and Kang were intended to be a returning Kor, but the actor who played him was unavailable both times.)
  • Once for Yes, Twice for No : if not the Trope Maker , then certainly the Trope Codifier with Captain Pike's portrayal in " The Menagerie ".
  • Orchestral Bombing : Like many dramatic series of its era, the show makes full and effective use of a brassy orchestral soundtrack. In fact all music used in this series was recorded especially, avoiding the use of common "library" music heard in many other series such as The Twilight Zone and The Fugitive .
  • The alien Kirk hunts down in "Obsession" is a shapeless cloud that can travel through space at warp speed without a ship, that subsists off of human blood.
  • In the first episode aired, "The Man Trap", the monster can appear as someone the viewer finds attractive... but its true form is a shaggy creature with a lamprey-like mouth, that feeds through its fingers , on salt .
  • Outlaw Town : "A Piece of the Action" has a planet whose culture has modeled itself after 1920s gangster culture.
  • When his memories are about to be transferred over to an android double, Kirk quickly mutters, "Mind your own business, Mr. Spock. I'm sick of your half-breed interference, do you hear?" Later on, when the android meets up with Spock, it says those lines, alerting Spock that this isn't their captain and prompting him to quickly gather a team to beam down. (" What Are Little Girls Made of? ")
  • Also occurs in "Day of the Dove," when Chekov is ranting about the Klingons having murdered his brother Piotr. Sulu immediately knows something is wrong because Chekov's an only child.
  • The rest of the crew is alerted to Janice Lester's hijacking of Kirk's body by her increasingly irrational and paranoid behavior in "Turnabout Intruder."
  • Used as part of a Batman Gambit in "Mirror, Mirror" when the crew convinces the Mirror Universe Spock to assist them in returning home and to set up the Heel–Face Turn that Mirror!Spock would perform later on, as referenced in subsequent episodes of DS9 and Voyager . Mirror Spock: You must return to your universe, and I must have my captain back.
  • Out-of-Character Moment : "The Naked Time", "This Side of Paradise" and "Amok Time" are entire episodes about this trope.
  • Papa Wolf : Kirk considers every man and woman under his command his responsibility, and if you harm them, he will not be happy.
  • Parental Title Characterization : Spock, when not calling his parents by name, calls them "Mother" and "Father". This is because Vulcans ( his father's species ) tend to be quite formal in their language and don't tend to openly express affection.
  • "The Squire of Gothos" has Trelane getting punished by his "parents" (who appear as blobs of energy)- just in time to stop him from finishing off Kirk.
  • In "Charlie X", the alien species that raised Charlie return to take him back before he can do any more damage, and they undo most of the damage that he has already done, though they are unable to bring back the crew of another ship which Charlie destroyed, probably because there wasn't enough left after the explosion.
  • People Puppets : "Plato's Stepchildren", and a literal example in the ending of the original version of " Catspaw ".
  • Pilgrimage : Between the original series and the first movie Spock resigned from Starfleet and went to a monastery on Vulcan to eliminate his emotions. Everyone wears robes and meditates.
  • Planet Spaceship : In "For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky", a group of aliens have been sequestered inside a large interstellar asteroid for so long that they have forgotten that they are actually inside one.
  • Pleasure Planet : "Shore Leave" takes place on a planet where aliens go for amusement and the Enterprise crew finds danger and weirdness.
  • Plot Hole : "The City on the Edge of Forever" makes no attempt to explain how Kirk, Spock, and McCoy get back after fixing the time rift in Earth of 1930. They simply show up. The Guardian of Forever heavily implies it can pull them back if the timeline was reset.
  • Pointy Ears : On Spock and other Vulcans; appropriate for Space Elves . Romulans, which are related to Vulcans, also have pointed ears, and Spock comes in for some Fantastic Racism when the visual similarity is noticed.
  • Polarity Reversal : The Trope Maker .
  • Poorly Disguised Pilot : " Assignment: Earth " was intended to spin off a series of the same name. The existing script was reworked to include the Enterprise , but the focus is still clearly on Gary Seven and the other new characters; Kirk and his crew have almost no impact on the outcome.
  • Powerful and Helpless : This trope is mentioned directly by McCoy in Whom Gods Destroy when the Elba II penal colony is overrun by the inmates and turned chaotic while their landing party is still on the now shielded and unapproachable planet. The Enterprise in orbit, though powerful enough to destroy a planet, can do nothing to get their men back - using the phasers to blow away the shield runs the risk of killing everyone they're trying to save . Scott: "We could blast our way through the (force) field, but only at the risk of destroying the Captain, Mister Spock and any other living thing on Elba Two." McCoy : "How can we be powerful enough to wipe out a planet and still be so helpless?"
  • In his final log in "Where No Man Has Gone Before", Kirk merely notes that Mitchell "gave [his] life in performance of [his] duty", and omits the part where he first gained vast psionic powers and began to think of himself as a god who regarded humans as insects to be crushed. Justified in that not only is Mitchell not at fault for what was effectively an injury sustained in the course of duty (the galactic barrier which they had been ordered to explore) but he is also Kirk's friend from their academy days.
  • Likewise, in "The Doomsday Machine" Kirk states that his log will note that Commodore Decker died in the line of duty, omitting the part where the man pretty much went insane with survivor's guilt and almost got the crew of the Enterprise killed. It's heavily suggested that Kirk is attempting to imply by omission that Decker performed a Heroic Sacrifice by piloting the Constellation into the Doomsday Machine to destroy it, instead of the truth, that he went out in a futile suicidal gesture by crashing into the machine with a shuttlecraft. Note that Spock is the one who brings up Kirk logging Decker as having died in the line of duty, which he seems to endorse despite having been in a power struggle with Decker for most of the episode. Although he doesn't say it in so many words, he obviously felt for Decker in the same way that he felt for Gary Mitchell.
  • " Day of the Dove ". An entity that feeds on hate and violence invades the Enterprise , setting Kirk and Klingon Captain Kang and their crews against each other. Realizing that they're being manipulated, Kirk and Kang refuse to fight each other, Kang even giving Kirk a good-natured (for a Klingon) slap on the back that almost has the Captain reeling, but they manage to drive out the entity by refusing to feed it with their hatred.
  • "The Menagerie": Pike realizes that the Talosians cannot read strong, violent thoughts, and also that they rely on him to supply the imaginations they use to fuel the illusions they attempt to trap him in. So he sits in his cell, stewing in hatred and anger until the Keeper gets careless and Pike seizes him. note  Footage came from the unaired pilot episode "The Cage".
  • In the episode " And The Children Shall Lead ", the evil entity called Gorgan gets its power from the fact that the children believe it has power. When that belief is taken away, Gorgan dies rather messily.
  • There is only one curse in the entire series, occurring at the end of " The City on The Edge of Forever ". It's notable for being one of the few curse words on American TV during the 1960s and showing just how hurt Kirk is as a result of the Bittersweet Ending . Kirk: Let's get the hell out of here.
  • Bones does say "Don't give me any damnable logic..." in one episode , and a gangster from the gangster episode does say "hell" in a non-religious context. Neither case is given the emphasis of Kirk's declaration.
  • Prodigal Family : Spock got estranged from his father after joining the Starfleet instead of the Vulcan Science Academy and rejecting his betrothal to another Vulcan. The trope is ultimately subverted as Sarek dies before he can get properly re-introduced in his son's life.
  • Proud Warrior Race : While the Klingons and Romulans are the expected examples, there are many species in this series that fit this trope.... including humanity to some extent.
  • Proxy War : " A Private Little War " has the Klingons supplying increasingly advanced firearms to one tribe of a primitive planet, to install them as a puppet leader of that world. Another tribe, one that Kirk had met years before, begins to demand similar weapons by the end, and Kirk begins arranging a Federation-aligned alliance of tribes to oppose the Klingon-controlled ones. He even references the brush wars of the 20th century as he does so.
  • Psycho Ex-Girlfriend : Janice Lester in "Turnabout Intruder" is an ex-lover of Kirk's. She uses a machine to steal Kirk's position by swapping their brainwave patterns .
  • Psycho Serum : McCoy 's adrenaline-like drug in "The City on the Edge of Forever" causes temporary insanity when injected at overly high doses. When the ship hits some turbulence, he accidentally injects himself with a very high dose.
  • Charlie Evans from "Charlie X".
  • Trelane from "The Squire of Gothos." Made even better by the fact that while he looks like an adult human, by his species' standards Trelane is a child.
  • Psychotic Smirk : Chekov gets a particularly nasty one in "Mirror, Mirror" when he threatens to kill Kirk for disobeying an order. Doubles as Slasher Smile .
  • In "Space Seed", Khan Noonien Singh was named for Kim Noonien Singh, one of Roddenberry's buddies from World War II . Roddenberry hoped that the name would attract the attention of the Real Life Singh in hopes that they would reconnect.
  • David Gerrold did a similar thing in writing "The Trouble With Tribbles"; the space station on which the episode takes place is in orbit around "Sherman's Planet". Gerrold's girlfriend at the time was one Holly Sherman.
  • Pummeling the Corpse : In " A Private Little War ", the previously violence-averse Tyree snaps when he sees his wife stabbed to death. In the ensuing climactic battle, Tyree rushes and quickly overpowers the man who stabbed his wife, and staves in his head with a large rock. Tyree's mind, clouded with berserk fury, does not register that his opponent is dead, so he spends the rest of the battle bashing the corpse's shattered head. Even after the battle ends, Tyree continues to bash the unresisting corpse until Kirk stops him.
  • The appropriately-named Agony Booth in the episode "Mirror, Mirror."
  • The neural neutralizer in "Dagger of the Mind" is not intended as such, but ends up being used this way.
  • The Klingon Mind-Sifter in "Errand of Mercy."
  • In "Operation: Annihilate!", parasitic creatures that resemble flying pancakes attack planetary colonists—and eventually Spock.
  • In "Wolf in the Fold", the Enterprise crew encounters "Redjac", a noncorporeal parasite responsible for numerous serial killings throughout the centuries. One of the humans it possessed was Jack the Ripper.
  • Put on a Bus : Yeoman Rand during the first season. (Grace Lee Whitney later said that the producers wanted girl-of-the-week guest stars as love interests for Kirk.) The starship comes back for the movies and a time travel episode of Voyager .
  • In the episode "Who Mourns for Adonais". Kirk and Dr. McCoy are discussing Lieutenant Carolyn Palamas. McCoy : One day she'll find the right man and off she'll go, out of the service.
  • Implied in the episode "Balance of Terror", when Kirk marries two officers , but is interrupted as a Red Alert goes off. The groom reminds the bride that for the moment he's still her superior officer. note  Though she could simply be transferring in some way - many militaries ban married couples from being in a direct chain of command.
  • Taken up to eleven in " The Tholian Web " where there are three different time-sensitive crises (plus the non-time sensitive crisis of McCoy and Spock starting to lose their temper towards each other worse than usual due to everything else that's going on) going on at the same time: Kirk is lost in another dimension and running out of oxygen in his space suit, the Tholians are building the titular web around the Enterprise which will be unable to escape if it's completed before they fix their weapons and figure out a way out of it, and the part of the space they're in is also causing the crew to suffer Space Madness unless McCoy figures out a way to nullify its effect.
  • Radio Silence : In "Balance of Terror", the Romulan ship heads home under cover of a cloaking device and comm silence. Unfortunately for them, one of the officers violates orders in order to call home base to report the success of their mission, and the transmission is detected.
  • Ramming Always Works : How Kirk destroys the titular device in "The Doomsday Machine", using a derelict starship to which Scotty manages to restore some engine power.
  • Rape by Proxy : Downplayed in “Plato’s Stepchildren”, as Spock and Kirk are forced to kiss Chapel and Uhura to the sadistic joy of the Platonians, and all four are traumatised and disgusted; Chapel not wanting her crush on Spock to be used like this, and Uhura feeling safe around Kirk, until now.
  • Ray Gun Gothic : The Original Series was the last of the classic examples. Soon afterwards, 2001: A Space Odyssey and the Real Life moon landings introduced more realism into the genre.
  • Readings Are Off the Scale : Said by everyone : Spock, Chekov, Uhura...
  • Real Award, Fictional Character : In " The Ultimate Computer ", Dr. Richard Daystrom is cited as a 2243 Nobel Prize winner for the invention of duotronic computers.
  • Reality-Changing Miniature : In "Catspaw", Silvia's little silver Enterprise causes the real ship to overheat when the model is exposed to a flame, and the old girl to be surrounded by a force field when the model is encased in hard plastic.
  • In "Miri", the kids on a planet identical to Earth are hundreds of years old.
  • In "Requiem for Methuselah", Flint is thousands of years old and posed as various historical figures .
  • Reckless Gun Usage : Two instances, both involving Time Travel and the not-gun-shaped Phaser. In "The City On The Edge of Forever", a 1930s bum gets hold of one and vaporizes himself playing with it . In "Tomorrow Is Yesterday", Kirk is captured by Air Police in 1969, and cringes (with priceless facial expressions) as they fiddle with his weapon, toss it around, and several times almost press the trigger, conflicted between justifiable fear and the need to not let them know who he is or what they have.
  • Red Shirt : Actually an Unbuilt Trope : By and large, most of the people who die in a given episode tend not to be very plot-important, but only 24 red-shirted crewmembers died across all 80 episodes, in a series fraught with evil computer programs , shape-shifting salt vampires , planet destroying superweapons , and explosive rocks . Considering their job, and the fact that the ship has 430 crewmembers, that's not bad for a five-year mission.
  • Redemption Equals Death : Dr. Elizabeth Dehner in the 2nd pilot episode "Where No Man Has Gone Before" and Captain Merik in "Bread and Circuses".
  • Religion of Evil : The cult of Landru in " The Return of the Archons ".
  • Repressive, but Efficient : " Patterns of Force ", in which a lawless planet adopts Nazism as its hat with the justification that it was "the most efficient state the Earth ever knew." Their version of Nazism is treated in-universe as just as flawlessly efficient.
  • Resort to Pouting : "Tomorrow is Yesterday" introduces a rather inconvenient modification to the Enterprise's main computer, the installation of a feminine personality. After it refers to Kirk as "dear" one too many times when he specifically ordered it not to, he makes a notation in the log that he considers it a fault. If it cannot be repaired, his recommendation is that the whole thing be scrapped. There is an entirely audible pout as the computer replies with a sulking "Computed."
  • Rewatch Bonus : While the thinking he can just assimilate other cultures would be called out later on by the Gene Coon era, “The Enemy Within” shows most of the flaws and positive qualities that would last Kirk the rest of his life, from even his good side wanting to pretend something bad never happened, to his bad side only showing intelligence when it’s time to act weak but charming, and his compassion both helping and harming him.
  • Right-Hand Cat : Isis (to Gary Seven) in "Assignment: Earth" and Sylvia (to Korob) in "Catspaw".
  • Rude Hero, Nice Sidekick : Inverted ; Captain Kirk is a charming Officer and a Gentleman . By contrast, his first officer, Spock, is more tactless and ruthlessly pragmatic. The fact that he's also The Stoic when he does these things probably doesn't do his image any favors.
  • Trying to explain Spock's Pointy Ears to native people. The cake-taker has to be this gem, from "The City on the Edge of Forever": Spock: You were saying you'd have no trouble explaining [the ears]. Kirk: [to a cop] My friend... is obviously Chinese. I see you've noticed the ears... well, they're... actually easy to explain... Spock: Perhaps the unfortunate accident I had as a child...? Kirk: ...the unfortunate accident he had as a child. He caught his head in a mechanical... rice picker... but, fortunately, there was an American, uh, missionary living close by who was a, uh, skilled, uh, plastic surgeon in civilian life who... Cop: All right, all right. Drop those bundles and put your hands on the wall.
  • Chekov claiming everything was "inwented in Russia." Chekov: It makes me homesick... just like Russia. McCoy : More like the Garden of Eden , Ensign. Chekov: Of course, Doctor. The Garden of Eden was just outside Moscow. Very nice place.
  • Rubber-Forehead Aliens : Infamously, the Klingons (though they didn't even have the budget for that until the movies). Vulcans are Rubber Pointy Ear Aliens.
  • In "The Omega Glory", the Yangs have a sacred text which turns out to be identical to the US Constitution.
  • In "A Piece of the Action" our heroes discover a planet has been using a book about gangs in 1920s Chicago (left by a previous Federation vessel) as their holy book.
  • Sadist : The Platonians enjoy humiliating Kirk and company in “Plato’s Stepchildren”, the wife especially looking like she’s finding it all sexually appealing.
  • Sadistic Choice : Everyone is forced to make these every so often.
  • Sailor Fuku : In the episode "Court Martial", Jame Finney wears a futuristic version of this.
  • Sarcastic Devotee : Both Spock and Bones are devoted to the captain, but are also quite willing to question/make sarcastic comments about his orders when the situation warrants it. Spock: Captain, you are an excellent starship commander, but as a taxi driver, you leave something to be desired!
  • Science Is Good : The show portrays a fairly utopian, post-scarcity, post-racism future for humankind, with Cool Starships and Faster-Than-Light Travel . Unlike many science-focused works, the original series is fairly idealistic and romantic, showing respect for both nature/tradition and new science and medicine.
  • Scientifically Understandable Sorcery : While there are plenty of incidents where the Enterprise crew seems to encounter the supernatural, said supernatural thing is always shown to have a scientific basis when sufficiently analyzed by the characters. That said, sometimes the thing is too advanced to analyze with the Enterprise's technology, and thus remains indecipherable (though not actually thought of as "magic"; they just acknowledge that what they've encountered is so far above/beyond them that they can't realistically understand the principles it works on).
  • Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right! : Whenever Kirk violates given orders, it's specifically to avoid the loss of his ship and crew, or to avoid making a situation worse by not seeing it through to the end.
  • Trelane, the Squire of Gothos... at least until Kirk breaks whatever it is he has behind that mirror. In the episode "Catspaw", Sylvia and Korob... until Kirk shatters the power transmuter wand tied to the illusions to themselves and the planet. You may notice a theme .
  • Justified/Played with in "Charlie X", because he really doesn't understand the rules .
  • Gary Mitchell from "Where No Man Has Gone Before".
  • Screw the Rules, They're Not Real! : In " A Taste of Armageddon ", Jim Kirk and his crew discover that the Planet of the Week, Eminiar VII, is conducting a Forever War with a neighboring planet, Vendikar, entirely by computer simulation, with the "simulated" casualties ordered to report to the government for euthanasia. They're horrified but aren't allowed to do anything about it under the Prime Directive ... until the computer erroneously marks the Enterprise as a valid target and designates it "destroyed". Kirk refuses to abide by the Eminian-Vendikari rules, and instead starts blowing up the euthanasia booths and ultimately the computer. The Eminian head of state complains that with the computer gone, their underlying civilizations will be destroyed by war instead of merely people's lives. Kirk counters that the simulated war has taken all the horror out of the conflict, and with it any incentive to make peace , and how about they try that instead.
  • Khan Noonien Singh and his cryogenically frozen followers, in the episode " Space Seed ".
  • In "The Alternative Factor" , if Lazarus and his insane counterpart from the antimatter dimension were ever to meet in the same universe, that universe would be destroyed. Both of them are sent into an intermediate dimension so that this can never happen, and where the two of them will be locked in combat for all eternity .
  • Sealed Orders : In "The Enterprise Incident", Captain Kirk receives secret orders to steal a Romulan cloaking device . As part of The Plan , he acts like a Jerkass as a form of Obfuscating Insanity .
  • Second Episode Introduction : McCoy doesn't appear in either of the pilots, but does appear in the first proper episode.
  • Secret Test : Balok in "The Corbomite Maneuver", the Ekosian Resistance in "Patterns of Force", and Korob in "Catspaw".
  • Self-Destruct Mechanism : The Enterprise has one on board. It requires simultaneous voice input from three senior officers to activate.
  • Serious Work, Comedic Scene : The show does this practically Once per Episode , breaking the tension of an episode's conflict with a joke. For example, the episode Spock's Brain features this exchange after Spock starts describing the culture of Sigma Draconis VI: McCoy : I should never have reconnected his mouth. Kirk: Well, we took the risk, Doctor.
  • Send in the Search Team : Whenever the Enterprise loses track of important personnel on a planet, they send in the Redshirt Army to find them. This occurs in several episodes, with varying degrees of success.
  • Sensible Heroes, Skimpy Villains : Almost everyone in the mirror universe dresses skimpier than they do in the main universe. Though you'd be hard-pressed to take the basic female Starfleet uniform and make it skimpier without violating broadcast codes, they found a way.
  • While both hammy, Kirk vs Mudd. In both episodes, Mudd complains that Kirk is uptight and needs to take orders (from him, specifically), while Kirk always fires back that Mudd is a criminal sleazeball.
  • " This Side of Paradise " has the Enterprise on a rescue mission to settlers on a Federation colony, supposedly endangered by deadly radiation.
  • In " The Way to Eden ", the crew of the Enterprise meets a group of space hippies who hope to settle a new colony on a planet they call Eden.
  • In " The Trouble with Tribbles " the Federation and the Klingons are competing to develop a colony world. The Enterprise is tasked with delivering a special grain hybrid to kickstart the colony's agriculture. A Klingon agent subsequently poisons the grain.
  • In the episode "Mudd's Women", Mudd has pills that he claims makes a woman more attractive.
  • Mirror Universe Spock is this for many viewers.
  • Shapeshifting Seducer : The pilot episode and the season 2 episode "Catspaw" feature women who change shape to find a form that pleases the captain.
  • Shirtless Scene : Kirk has a lot of these.
  • Shout-Out : To the show's precursor Forbidden Planet , which included the early line, "We'll reach D.C. point at 1701."
  • Showing Off the New Body : In “Return To Tomorrow”, Sargon puppets Kirk’s body, saying it’s excellent and complimenting Bones on “maintaining” it, while Janice Lester in “Turnabout Intruder” takes the opportunity to grope his abs when she steals it.
  • Show Some Leg : Lampshaded in “Is There In Truth No Beauty” when Spock needs a diversion to mind meld with Kolos, Kirk knows just the thing: flirting with Miranda Jones to distract her. For once it doesn’t work, and she’s only annoyed by the deception.
  • Shown Their Work : In " Tomorrow Is Yesterday ", the Enterprise travels back in time to 1968. It's mentioned that three astronauts are taking part in a manned moon shot on Wednesday. Two years after the episode aired, Apollo 11 blasted off on July 16, 1969 (a Wednesday) carrying three astronauts (Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Michael Collins). Given that the Apollo program was already getting started around the time of this episode, however, it was already known that there would be three astronauts per spacecraft, and odds were good that at least one of the craft bound for the moon would launch on a Wednesday.
  • Silly Rabbit, Cynicism Is for Losers! : In " A Taste of Armageddon ", the Eminian leader insists that peace is impossible and that their 500-year-old simulated war with declared casualties reporting in to be neatly and cleanly killed is the lesser of two evils. Kirk insists that they can make peace if they just try harder, and helpfully provides them with motivation to do so by shutting down the war computer and forcing them to choose between real-world messy warfare and swallowing enough pride to find a peaceful solution.
  • " Let That Be Your Last Battlefield " is a commentary on race relations; two aliens who have mirrored skin tones (right side of the face black, left side white and vice versa) fight over this difference. When they reach their homeworld, they discover that they are the Last of Their Kind ; everyone else killed each other in the race war. They keep fighting anyway.
  • In " A Taste of Armageddon ", the two warring powers have forgotten why they were fighting in the first place!
  • Sliding Scale of Continuity : The series adhered to the level 2 of continuity ( Status Quo Is God ) well enough that with a scant few exceptions and Character Development for the main three (Bones and Spock are less at each other's throats, Kirk tries to be less of a soldier) you can watch the series in any order and it generally makes perfect sense.
  • Sliding Scale of Idealism vs. Cynicism : The show was mostly on the idealism end of the spectrum, showing that in the future, humanity managed to finally stop fighting with each other and form a world government free of racism and other evils. It’s particularly notable seeing as how it was made during a time when America’s biggest issues were racism and the threat of nuclear war.
  • Slut-Shaming : Both played straight and ultimately avoided with Kirk, as in episodes like “Dagger Of The Mind”, he’s gently teased by Bones and Spock for accidentally flirting with Dr Noel, but when things go badly wrong and she shoves a false one night stand in his brain, they’re both sympathetically hovering around him at the end of the episode, and it’s not treated as something he deserved. Played straight as an arrow with both in-universe and out “Kirk Drift” though.
  • Smart People Play Chess : Spock, logically, as well as Kirk, who was stated to be quite bookish at the academy, play 3-D chess. They are often seen playing while having a conversation relevant to the plot.
  • Many individual episodes also employ this trope: when a landing party beams down to a planet, there is usually exactly one woman on the team, whose narrative function is to have a romance arc with either another member of the landing party, or the episode's villain.
  • "The Way to Eden" features a group seeking a world where they can set up such a society. In the end, it doesn't work out (both because the planet they've chosen is uninhabitable, and because their leader is a nut), but it's interesting that, out of the whole crew, the one who is most sympathetic to their goal is Spock. Spock : Miss Galliulin... It is my sincere hope that you do not give up your search for Eden. I have no doubt but that you will find it, or make it yourselves.
  • "Errand of Mercy" features an alien society that thrived for eons without technological advancement. Although , they really don't need to use technology. They are, after all Sufficiently Advanced Aliens .
  • In "Balance of Terror", both the Romulan and the Enterprise crews cut their ship's power to avoid detection. During this, the crews whisper so they will not alert the enemy. This is actually justified by the fact that starship sensors are established to be able to detect even very faint vibrations - such as heartbeats - from very long distances: the impact of voices hitting the hull could give them away.
  • Space Is an Ocean : The Enterprise is a "ship," equipped with "torpedoes," and the crew is arranged along naval lines. Several touches are intended to put the audience specifically in mind of the age of Wooden Ships and Iron Men : the in-ship intercom's attention chime is a bosun's whistle, and the standard bit of incidental music played when the Enterprise is in flight is in a style often used for incidental music accompanying a sailing ship under way.
  • Space Mines : In the episode "Balance of Terror", the Romulan ship uses one of its self-destruct devices as an impromptu mine in an attempt to destroy the Enterprise . It's also noted in the Writer's Guide that the Enterprise's photon torpedoes can be used as mines, but this is never actually done in any episode.
  • Space Western : Gene Roddenberry famously pitched the series as " Wagon Train to the stars". The first season in particular gives the impression of the Enterprise'' crew as frontiersmen exploring and expanding into a vast and untamed wilderness.
  • Spock knew that the shapeshifter in question couldn't hold another identity for more than a few minutes. He says so, and explains that all he has to do is wait. That's when the "Shoot him! No, shoot us both" dialogue occurs.
  • Leonard Nimoy hated this episode, noting that as The Smart Guy Spock should have been able to easily and quickly create the kind of highly personal trick questions only his best friend, Kirk, should be able to answer properly to identify himself. According to Spock, he did not make his choice based on the order to shoot them both, but rather based on which one was winning: Kirk was recovering from serious injuries and thus was at a disadvantage against the healthier duplicate.
  • "The Man Trap" features a shapeshifting creature that drains the salt from people. It shapeshifts several times before settling on shifting into McCoy 's form. It can be spotted by its tendency to curve its index finger and nibble slightly on the arc of the finger.
  • In "The Enemy Within", Kirk is split by a transporter accident into his "good" and "evil" halves. In what might be considered a subversion, it turns out Kirk's "evil" half is not so much evil, as driven by passion and base instinct, and Kirk's "good" half, the logic and intellect side, is incapable of acting competently without it.
  • In "What Are Little Girls Made Of?", Spock is able to spot the android Kirk because the genuine article focused on a particular out of character thought, embedding it in the android's programming.
  • Despite the franchise's well-earned reputation for Rubber-Forehead Aliens , the original series did introduce some nonhumanoid aliens in some of the series' most highly-regarded episodes: the Horta in "Devil in the Dark," the tribbles in "The Trouble with Tribbles"; the true forms of Sylvia and Korob as seen at the end of "Catspaw"; and several non-corporeal aliens . Within the limits of the special effects technology available at the time, the original series actually did fairly well in this regard. Additionally, the Kelvans are stated to have had a truly bizarre physiology before taking on human form to steal the Enterprise .
  • TOS also introduced the Tholians, an extremely xenophobic race that had the general appearance of a virus. Despite only appearing in one episode, they became a fan favorite and the subject of wild speculation. Eventually, throughout the remainder of the franchise, a few canonical facts were given about the species: They have six legs, no evidence of a circulatory system, require temperatures above 400 degrees Kelvin to survive (lower temperatures would cause their carapace to rupture and eventually explode), have two sexes despite being hermaphroditic, and can emit radiation as a means of communication.
  • Stealth in Space : The Romulans' cloaking device technology shields them from both visible light and sensor readings, but also blinds the ship itself, and draws so much power that it must be dropped in order to fire, allowing for " Balance of Terror " to be a submarine episode (specifically, the 1957 film The Enemy Below ) Recycled IN SPACE!
  • Stealth Pun : The name of the librarian in "All Our Yesterdays" is "Atoz". Which is what you get if you take the phrase "A to Z" and compress it.
  • Stinky Flower : Discussed. When Kirk and his crew are spouting Non Sequiturs to get some robots to shut down , Spock says that " Logic is a wreath of beautiful flowers that smell bad ".
  • Straw Vulcan : Among other examples, in " The Galileo Seven ", we're shown Spock's first command, as the shuttle he is in charge of crashes on a desolate planet filled with savage aliens. Spock determines that a display of superior force will logically frighten away these aliens while the crew make repairs to the shuttle. Instead, as Dr. McCoy points out, the aliens have an emotional reaction and become angry and attack, something Spock did not anticipate. In the end, Spock's desperate act of igniting the fuel from the shuttle to create a beacon proves to be the correct action since it gets the attention of the Enterprise and allows for a rescue. When called on this "emotional" act, Spock replies that the only logical course of action in that instance was one of desperation. Also, much of the conflict in the episode comes from Spock steadfastly refusing to take the emotional reactions of the men under his command into account, or to even acknowledge that they have them, expecting them all to act like cool, logical Vulcans. Spock's been around humans long enough he should know this attitude is illogical.
  • The Strength of Ten Men : In "Space Seed," Khan's "I have five times your strength!" Spock, as well, being half-Vulcan - he's thrice as strong as a human. This is not always apparent since he tends either to avoid physical confrontation or end them instantly with a nerve-pinch to shut down the opponent, but on the few occasions he ended up in a fight, this trope is clearly in play.
  • "Metamorphosis": Lost scientist Zefram Cochrane, inventor of the warp drive, is discovered by the Enterprise . He has an otherworldly companion that allowed him to live for centuries, not unlike the fey servant of the Ur-Example of this trope, Prospero .
  • "Requiem For Methuselah": Mr. Flint owns a planet in the Omega system. He has a number of robots as servants and a beautiful female ward named Rayna Kapec. He has tremendous technological power, enough to destroy the Enterprise. He has two dark secrets. The first is that he is an immortal man from Earth and is thousands of years old. The second is that his ward is not human, but actually an android robot in female form, and he needs to have her emotions wakened so she will love him. Her name may be a reference to Karel Čapek , who coined the word "robot".
  • Styrofoam Rocks : In "Return of the Archons", a melon-sized "rock" bounces off a stuntman's head and he keeps running. Apparently it wasn't supposed to hit him at all, and was left in under time pressure.
  • Sufficiently Advanced Alien : "The Corbomite Maneuver", "The Squire of Gothos" and more.
  • Super Cell Reception : Naturally, the communicators came before cell phones, but they look much like them (having arguably inspired their modern look), and are often subject to both ends of this trope.
  • Take a Third Option : Kirk is famous for these. When faced with two undesirable options in "Operation: Annihilate!", he outright tells his crew to go and find him a third one.
  • Talking the Monster to Death : Usually with Kirk delivering a Logic Bomb to a psychotic computer.
  • Talking Is a Free Action , by way of the Captain's Log used to bring viewers up to speed on current events. In "By Any Other Name", as the Enterprise approaches the Energy Barrier, Kirk records a log detailing a plan to defeat the Kelvans—while the Kelvans are on the bridge with him.
  • Tall, Dark, and Snarky : Spock definitely fits into this trope.
  • Tap on the Head : Often played completely straight with the human characters, especially Kirk, but Spock uses his famous Vulcan nerve pinch instead.
  • Chekov was supposedly introduced after an article in the Soviet state newspaper Pravda allegedly mocked the show for not having a Russian, when the Russians had been the first into space.
  • Chekov was then used as a delivery vessel for a number of minor Take Thats to the Russians for the remainder of the series, turning In the Original Klingon into an art form: Chekov: It makes me homesick. It's just like Russia. Bones: More like the Garden of Eden, Ensign. Chekov: Of course, Doctor. The Garden of Eden was just outside Moscow—a very nice place, must have made Adam and Eve very sad to leave.
  • The insult "Herbert" that the space hippies use in "The Way to Eden" was definitely a Take That at a real-life Herbert. However, no-one is exactly sure who it was supposed to be: depending on who you ask, it was either Herbert Hoover or Herbert Solow, who was the show's production executive for the first two seasons.
  • Uhura's normal place on the bridge was directly behind the captain's seat, the center of attention and focus. Many, many shots of Kirk included her. " There's a black lady on TV ", indeed.
  • Team Kids : Uhura, Checkov, and Sulu are the Team Kids to the Kirk/Spock Team Mom and Dad, with Bones and Scotty as uncles . This is made apparent in "Who Mourns For Adonis", when Checkov suggests he comfort Lt. Palamas. Kirk asks him how old he is and when Checkov tells him, Kirk says he's too young.
  • Teenage Wasteland : "Miri" features a planet where a virus has killed off all the adults, leaving the children to look after themselves.
  • Teens Are Monsters : Charlie in "Charlie X." Being a juvenile Reality Warper with boundary issues doesn't help, though he does turn out to have a serious Freudian Excuse for his actions.
  • Many (usually the transporter being out of order and unable to beam the heroes aboard), but notably in " The Enemy Within ", which creates an Evil Knockoff and a wimpy knockoff of Kirk.
  • The lack of safety features of the transporter is highlighted in Season 3's "And the Children Shall Lead", when Kirk and Spock accidentally transport two crewmen into open space because the transporter system doesn't have any mechanism to warn that they are not locked on to a habitable location.
  • Teleport Interdiction : Federation correctional facilities, such as the Tantalus penal colony in "Dagger of the Mind" and the Elba II asylum in "Whom Gods Destroy", include security fields that prevent beaming in or out while in operation.
  • Sulu doesn't appear in " Space Seed ". He was replaced by Makee K. Blaisdell as Lt. Spinelli.
  • Scotty and Sulu are absent from " The Alternative Factor ". For unknown reasons they were substituted in the roles of engineer and helmsman by Charlene Masters and Leslie, respectively.
  • During filming of the episode " The Gamesters of Triskelion ," George Takei was busy filming The Green Berets . Chekov took his place in the script, with a barroom brawling style in the episode's fight scenes taking the place of the martial arts scenes planned for Sulu.
  • Ditto " The Trouble with Tribbles "; Chekov's instant recognition of quadro-triticale makes more sense knowing that the script was originally written for Sulu, as Sulu had an established background in botany.
  • Uhura doesn't appear in " The Doomsday Machine ", her duties assumed by Lt. Palmer, played by Elizabeth Rogers.
  • For " Turnabout Intruder ", the final episode, Uhura takes the day off and is replaced by a Lieutenant Lisa. ( Nichelle Nichols had a singing engagement that conflicted with the shooting schedule.)
  • Tempting Fate : In "The Menagerie", a few episodes before several traumatic missions and causes for my greatest failures , Kirk calls having to be part of Spock’s mutiny trial hearing the worst moment of his service. The Talosians tell him at the end that Pike has illusion and he has reality, and he can’t quite keep up the smile.
  • In The Cage, Talosian society is revealed to be so addicted to their own natural ability to create realistic psychic illusions that they allowed their entire civilization to crumble around them while they endlessly enjoyed the fake realities they constructed.
  • In The Apple, the Enterprise encounters a society that has been kept in primitive cultural stagnation by an advanced computer that carefully controls the entire planet they live on.
  • That's an Order! : Occurred in 13 different episodes.
  • This Is No Time for Knitting : In "Court Martial", McCoy is aghast to find Spock playing chess against the computer while Kirk is losing a court martial for criminal negligence. However, Spock reveals that he has been using the chess games to confirm that the ship's computer's memory banks have been tampered with to frame Kirk: since he's the one who made the chess program to begin with and thus the computer has to be at least as good as he is, he should only be able to force a stalemate at best, but he's won several games in a row by that point, proving that something is wrong with the computer.
  • This Was His True Form : The shapeshifting creature in "The Man Trap"; the two telepathic aliens in "Catspaw".
  • There Are No Therapists : Bones is apparently an expert on space psychology, and tries to Team Dad everyone, but he tells Edith he’s no psychiatrist.The crew could really use one.
  • Those Wacky Nazis : "Patterns of Force" features a planet of Nazis!
  • The Three Faces of Adam : Kirk is The Hunter (brash, impulsive and adventurous), Spock is The Lord (wise, rational and logical) and Bones is The Prophet (cynical, outspoken and compassionate).
  • Throwing Your Sword Always Works : During one of the illusions that Captain Pike is subjected to in the original pilot episode, he winds up using this on a giant warrior threatening the Love Interest , causing it to fall and get impaled.
  • Time Bomb : "Obsession", "The Immunity Syndrome", "The Doomsday Machine".
  • "Wink of an Eye" features aliens who move so fast that they're invisible to the naked eye and everyone else appears frozen to them. (Interestingly enough, so long as none of the aliens or the people they abducted into their 'timeframe' by means of a drug are actually around to watch, both they and the crew seem to function in parallel and on the same timescale just fine. This point is never addressed.)
  • Kirk receives the drug when it's slipped into his coffee, inadvertently making it look like he's on a rush.
  • Time Travel : "Tomorrow Is Yesterday" has a time disturbance send the crew back to Earth of the 1960s. "The City on the Edge of Forever" has a weird time portal on a strange planet send the Power Trio back to the 1960s. "Assignment: Earth" has them do it deliberately for "historical research."
  • Time Travel Episode : In " The City on the Edge of Forever ", Bones accidentally steps through a time portal that takes him back to the 1930s, where he inadvertently changes the timeline so humans never went into space. It's up to Kirk and Spock to follow him and repair the damage.
  • Time-Travel Romance : Kirk falls for Edith Keeler in the 1930s in "The City on the Edge of Forever." Unfortunately, You Can't Fight Fate .
  • Time-Travelers Are Spies : "Tomorrow is Yesterday", "Assignment: Earth".
  • Doubling as a Wham Line , from the episode "For the World Is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky". Old Man: You are... not of Yonada? Kirk: No, we're from... outside your world. Elder Yonadan: Where... is outside? Kirk: [solemnly] Up there. Outside, up there, everywhere. Elder Yonadan: So they also... [seizes in pain, whispers] Many years ago, I climbed the mountains, even though it is forbidden. [winces in pain] Kirk : Why is it forbidden? Elder Yonadan: [winces in pain] I am not sure. [winces again] But things are not as they... teach us, for the world... is hollow, and I... have touched the sky! [screams in pain, falling over dead]
  • Most of the episodes get a Title Drop, including "Obsession", "The Changeling"' and yes, "Spock's Brain".
  • That's What I Would Do : In "Balance of Terror", this is Kirk's comment after the nameless Romulan commander dodges one of the Enterprise 's attacks: "He did exactly what I would have done. I won't underestimate him again."
  • Thousand-Yard Stare : Kirk has one in “Is There In Truth No Beauty”, telling Bones “we’re all vulnerable in one way or another” before staring off briefly with a haunted expression. He’s had a lot of brandy.
  • Token Minority : Played with. On the one hand, Star Trek was perhaps the first mainstream show to actively do this, as part of its utopian themes. However, people from all sorts of minorities were shown almost every episode, which means they were hardly tokens, but also most of these characters were minor or one-shot. Among the main cast, it could be said that Sulu and Uhura fit this trope.
  • One Girl of the Week has a guy obviously in love with her who is Too Dumb to Live. Given that said girl had to spend four years on Vulcan to retain her sanity, I'm sure trying to make her feel strong emotions is a wonderful idea! Oh, and what better way to get a girl to like you than by ruining her career by murdering the ambassador she's accompanying? The ambassador is an Eldritch Abomination the mere sight of which can make humans go mad. Just walk up, look it straight in the whatever-seeing-organs-it-possesses, and kill it. What could possibly go wrong?
  • Special mention to Joe Tormolen in "The Naked Time" for taking off the glove of his hazmat suit to fucking scratch his nose. He then just leaves the glove off for no apparent reason, touching things with his bare hands. Then when Spock stresses the importance of not touching anything and they have to be decontaminated, Tormolen says nothing, doesn't even seem nervous like he's thinking "Hey, maybe I shouldn't have done that." His stupidity gets him killed and the entire crew infected.
  • Touched By The Monster : Interestingly it’s Kirk that gets grabbed a lot by Ruk in all the stereotypical damsel ways in “What Are Little Girls Made Of”, including one bit where he’s held by the waist and forced in close.
  • Tragic Bromance : Kirk and Spock, both ways. Kirk is completely broken when Spock dies, and doesn’t expect that he’ll actually come back, and in The Autobiography of Spock , Spock wonders if he could have saved Kirk one last time, and can’t bring himself to visit the man’s grave.
  • Trespassing to Talk : During the first season episode "A Taste of Armageddon", Kirk escapes captivity and waits in his captor's office to have a calm, albeit at gunpoint, conversation about the reasons for Kirk's imprisonment.
  • The Federation has a peace treaty with the Romulan Star Empire that established a demilitarized zone along their mutual border, the Romulan Neutral Zone. " Balance of Terror " revolves around a string of Romulan raids on Federation listening posts along the Neutral Zone, meant to test the Federation's willingness to retaliate for breaches in the treaty.
  • " The Savage Curtain ": Kirk points out to Colonel Green that he was notorious for striking his enemies while in the midst of negotiating with them.
  • True Companions : Kirk, Spock and McCoy .
  • Kirk must face the Gorn captain in " Arena " in a Duel to the Death to determine which of them has trespassed into the other's territory.
  • Kirk vs. Spock in " Amok Time " is the other classic example. Spock is badass enough when he's in his right mind. Spock driven beyond the point of insanity by his mating instinct is horrifying for Kirk and McCoy !
  • Turns Red : The Companion, when Kirk and crew attack it with something like an EMP; it takes Cochrane to stop it from killing our gallant crew.
  • Turn the Other Fist : The episode "The Trouble With Tribbles" features this kind of punch by good ol' Scotty when a Klingon is insulting the Enterprise .
  • Two Girls to a Team : For most of the show, there are two women in the core cast: Lt. Uhura and Nurse Chapel. Initially, Yeoman Rand was part of the cast as well, but the actress was let go in the middle of the first season. Only one episode ("The Naked Time") features all three women; Nurse Chapel and Yeoman Rand never interact with each other, but Uhura seems to be on fairly good terms with the both of them.
  • Two of Your Earth Minutes : Occurs in multiple episodes.
  • In the episode "The Galileo Seven," Spock's legs get pinned between a large rock and a cliff. After he is freed, he is visibly limping; however, later in the episode, he is shown walking around the bridge with no indication that the injury had ever occured. Justified in that Spock may heal faster than humans and that McCoy may have had a chance to treat his injuries in the meantime.
  • Underestimating Badassery : In " Errand of Mercy ", the Klingons conquer Organia, not knowing that the Perfect Pacifist People living there are actually ludicrously powerful Energy Beings . They didn't need the Federation's help to rescue their planet .
  • Unknown Relative : In the episode "Journey to Babel" Kirk is surprised to meet Spock's parents . It's a little unrealistic that a Starfleet captain tasked with transporting a distinguished delegation to a vital conference would have no idea that Vulcan's ambassador to the Federation is his first officer's father.
  • Unlimited Wardrobe : Guest star Barbara Anderson (Lenore Karidian, "Conscience of a King") shares the record with Ricardo Montalban and Joan Collins for the most costumes worn in an episode (six).
  • Unsuccessful Pet Adoption : Zigzagged. In "The Trouble with Tribbles", Uhura adopts a Tribble (a little fuzzy alien), but has to give it away because all Tribbles multiply like crazy and are "born pregnant". However, it's a bit ambiguous on whether Tribbles are usually kept as pets. They are sold, but Kirk and other such characters frequently comment on how bad they are as pets.
  • Unwitting Instigator of Doom : Doctor McCoy (and Edith Keeler) in "The City on the Edge of Forever".
  • Updated Re-release : The remastered episodes, with redone special effects, HD film transfers, and rerecorded stereo soundtracks.
  • Khan suffers a brief one when no one from the bridge is willing to join him, even with Kirk's life at stake.
  • In " Turnabout Intruder ", Dr Janice Lester grows increasingly unhinged as the rest of the suspicious crew begin to mutiny and rebel against her orders while she's in Kirk's body.
  • "The Conscience of the King" deals with trying to discover if actor Anton Karidian really was a murderous tyrant named Kodos the Executioner. By the end of the episode, this has happened to two villainous characters. Karidian, who is Kodos and becomes spooked when he overhears an argument between Riley and Kirk about his past during a performance of Hamlet , breaks down backstage during the intermission , believing the voices to be ghosts from his past. At the same time, his daughter Lenore reveals she has murdered seven of the nine witnesses who could still identify him, and plans to kill Kirk and Riley, even swearing she would destroy a planet to save him. Kodos breaks down further as he realizes his actions in the past have corrupted his own child as well. In true Shakespearian fashion, this causes a chain reaction that ends in the death of Kodos, who dies trying to stop Lenore from shooting Kirk and instead takes the lethal blast meant for Kirk. Lenore is pronounced completely insane in the epilogue, as she believes her father to be alive and well.
  • Evil Kirk in "Mirror, Mirror". " I. ORDER. YOU!!!! "
  • And Evil Kirk in "The Enemy Within". "IIIIIII'MMMMMMMM CAPTAIIIIIN KIIIIIIIRK!"
  • Virus and Cure Names : Rigellian Fever, cured by Ryetalyn.
  • In "For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky," the inhabitants of Yonada believe themselves to live on a "world" but are actually living in a hollowed-out asteroid that has been turned into a starship, as one elderly Yonadan discovers by comitting the titular act, before being killed for his "heresy" by the Oracle that controls their ship.
  • Wanting Is Better Than Having : Spock in "Amok Time", almost word for word. Spock: After a time, you may find that having is not so pleasing a thing after all as wanting. It is not logical... but it is often true.
  • War Hero : Captain Kirk is openly stated to have been decorated many times for valor. Kirk doesn't talk about his awards or display them, preferring to keep them locked away in his quarters. His record is so impressive that in the episode " Court Martial " where Kirk was framed for the death of a crewman and put on trial, the prosecutor tried to have his decorations entered into the record without being read aloud to the court. Fortunately, Kirk's defense attorney saw right through this ploy and insisted that more of Kirk's list of medals be read into the record. Cogley: I wouldn't want to slow the wheels of progress. But then on the other hand, I wouldn't want those wheels to run over my client in their unbridled haste. Stone: Continue. Computer: Awards of Valor, Medal of Honor, Silver Palm with Cluster, Starfleet Citation for Conspicuous Gallantry, Karagite Order of Heroism... Cogley: Stop. I think that's enough. I wouldn't want to slow things up too much.
  • Weakened by the Light : In "Operation: Annihilate!", the parasites that infected the colonists on the planet Deneva are destroyed by bright light.
  • Weapon Running Time : In "Balance of Terror" , the Romulans' plasma bolt travels at sublight speed and has a limited range. This allows the fleeing Enterprise to travel far enough before the bolt hits that it survives the weakened bolt's impact. A full-power hit would have destroyed the ship.
  • Well-Intentioned Extremist : The Vians in " The Empath " use a beautiful, mute empath in combination with our Power Trio to determine whether her race is worthy of survival before their sun goes nova. Their methods consist of torture and mutilation, resulting in gross physical and psychological damage. Turns out that the empath's race is worthy of preservation, and the Vians, logical and possessed of their own morals and ethics regarding life , needed only "good old-fashioned human emotion" to help them see that.
  • We Need a Distraction : Both “By Any Other Name” and “Is There In Truth No Beauty” have the woman notice that Kirk is trying to seduce them as a blatant distraction.
  • Kirk is often upset whenever one of his crew members (usually a Red Shirt ) dies. He is also clearly upset when the Romulans decide to self-destruct rather than surrender in "Balance of Terror".
  • What's more, the Romulan Commander himself sees his own mission the same way: he's testing new weapons (a cloaking device and extremely powerful plasma torpedo) to see if the Romulans have a sufficient technological edge to win another war against the Federation, and to see if the Federation has grown soft in the intervening years. He is haunted by the fact that if his mission goes well, a new war will be the result, with senseless wastes of Human and Romulan lives on both sides. Nevertheless, he fights to the best of his ability, as his duty demands. This all serves to highlight the fact that he and Kirk aren't so different.
  • What Measure Is a Non-Human? : The Horta (rock monster) in "The Devil in the Dark".
  • Where's the Fun in That? : "The Squire of Gothos". Kirk asks his captor, "Where's the sport?" in simply hanging him, as he had planned. Instead, Kirk talks his captor into staging a "royal hunt" . This buys Kirk enough time for a Deus ex Machina rescue.
  • Who Even Needs a Brain? : In "Spock's Brain", Spock's brain is stolen by aliens who use it as a computer to run their planet's infrastructure. For some reason, his autonomic functions still work, but he is completely unconscious. Kirk has to get the brain back quickly, because Spock's Vulcan physiology is especially dependent on that tremendous brain. (While a brain-dead human could be kept "alive" easily for quite some time.) So that they can restore the brain quickly when they find it, McCoy rigs up a device that fits on Spock's head and allows his lifeless body to walk around, manipulated by a remote control. With three buttons. S.P.O.C.K has made a song called "Mr. Spock's Brain", based on the above episode.
  • Wide-Eyed Idealist : Edith Keeler in "The City on the Edge of Forever", a passionate advocate of peace— in the face of Nazi Germany . Spock: She had the right idea ... but at the wrong time.
  • With Great Power Comes Great Insanity : "Where No Man Has Gone Before", and to a lesser extent (or at least power level), "Whom Gods Destroy".
  • World of Ham : A galaxy of ham, in this case. With most of the principal cast being classically-trained stage actors and having earned their early TV credentials in Westerns, note  and, in Shatner's case, as a television lawyer in a Canadian Perry Mason copycat it comes with the territory.
  • Worthy Opponent : Several examples, with the Romulan commander in "Balance of Terror" being a particular standout.
  • Usually it's to show how evil the villains can get, as the main characters would rarely ever do it (unless their body is taken over or if they are under the influence of something). In one episode alone, one minion slaps Uhura and would do it on two more occasions if others hadn't stepped in.
  • Another instance is when an ex-lover of Kirk's, while in Kirk's body, hits Kirk, who is in her body. This shocks the rest of the crew, who at this point haven't learned about the change and grow suspicious, as Kirk would never hit a girl like that.
  • Kirk chins Shahna, his "drill thrall" in "The Gamesters of Triskelion", into unconsciousness, but it doesn't get him very far.
  • However, Kirk has a weird tendency to lay his hands on female characters as part of "normal" conversation, including grabbing them by the arms or shoulders and shaking them, even women he hasn't been sleeping with. This tendency towards physical conversation also extends to male crew members.
  • This tendency doesn't extend to when the girls hit first. Both Kirk and McCoy have slapped women right back in a few episodes.
  • In the very first episode, when the salt vampire disguises itself as Nancy, the woman archaeologist who's supposedly been living on the planet, it's Spock who convinces McCoy by beating the living shit out of "Nancy" , who isn't affected at all, finally pretty casually backhanding Spock clear across the room.
  • Xanatos Gambit : "Amok Time". T'Pring benefits no matter who wins the duel. Turns out Vulcans love these, since they are, as Spock comments, "Logical. Flawlessly logical." They're always looking to turn some kind of benefit from plans and events.
  • Ye Olde Butchered English : T'Pau in "Amok Time" consistently messes up "Thee" and "Thou," using "Thee" as second person singular subject.
  • You Can't Fight Fate : In "The City on the Edge of Forever", Edith Keeler must die so that Germany doesn't win World War II and wipe the Federation from existence. (Had she lived, she would have founded a peace movement that would have delayed the United States' entry into the European front of WWII, allowing Nazi Germany sufficient time to develop the atomic bomb and thus win the war.)
  • Averted, at least for a decade or two, with the "microtape" data cartridges, which look very much like 3.5" diskettes and can store a fantastically large amount of information compared to modern technology. note  as in, one of them can store the entire Internet as of 2017. At the very least recording tapes still exist as a means of long term bulk data storage, with higher capacity tapes and better formatting being made to fill this niche need.
  • Maybe the in-universe designers of the Enterprise wanted the crew to remember they were talking to a machine , but 21st century GPS units sound much more human and less mechanized than the ship's computer voice.
  • There is now a remastered version of Star Trek with modern, CGI special effects. In contrast to the changes done on Star Wars , the remastering is generally (though far from universally) well-received (it helps that the Blu Ray release utilizes seamless branching to allow the viewer the choice of watching the episodes as they were originally broadcast, or with the updated special effects). It should also be noted they only remastered the original special effects and didn't take the opportunity to tweak any plot points . The CGI also embraces a degree of Stylistic Suck , so that the improved effects aren't jarring against original footage.

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The Church of Trek

In Futurama, the Star Trek fandom grew from easy-to-punch nerds to a religious cult that influenced countries, eventually getting to the point that world leaders executed Trekkies en mass and scrubbed every known existence of Star Trek from public knowlege.

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Alternative Title(s): Star Trek 1966

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lincoln enterprises star trek

Star Trek premiered on television in September 1966. Since that time fans have witnessed the voyages of a variety of starships named Enterprise . Captain Kirk's five-year mission, seen in the original Star Trek television series (1966-1969) and in the animated series (1973-1975), featured the Constitution -class USS Enterprise NCC-1701. A second Constitution -class starship USS Enterprise , NCC-1701-A, first sought out new life forms and new civilizations at the end of Star Trek: The Voyage Home (1986). Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987-1994) featured Captain Picard's Galaxy -class USS Enterprise NCC-1701-D, which was succeeded by the Sovereign -class USS Enterprise -E in the feature film Star Trek: First Contact (1996). In Star Trek: Enterprise (2001-Present), fans journeyed back to the future with Captain Archer's Enterprise NX-01 of the Earth Starfleet.

Other, less prominent space vessels named Enterprise have included the Ambassador -class USS Enterprise NCC-1701-C from the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "Yesterday's Enterprise ," and the Excelsior -class USS Enterprise NCC-1701-B from the 1994 feature film Star Trek: Generations .

The futuristic Enterprise about which we know the least was not featured prominently in any Star Trek television episode or feature film. In fact, its first, and for at least 23 years, its only appearance was as part of an illuminated display aboard another space vessel named Enterprise .

In Star Trek: The Motion Picture , Kirk and McCoy watch on a viewscreen in Kirk's quarters, while Commander Decker guides the mechanical Ilia-probe on a tour of the USS Enterprise . While walking in the ship's recreation deck, Decker points out a display of nautical and space vessels, indicating to the Ilia-probe that "all those vessels were called Enterprise ."

Susan Sackett describes each of the ships in the display on pages 93 and 94 of The Making of Star Trek: The Motion Picture .

The first illustration (left to right) depicts an actual U.S. Navy sailing frigate of that name; the second shows the World War II carrier U.S.S. Enterprise ; the third, NASA's space shuttle Enterprise ; since this was 23rd-century art work, the fourth illlustration is of the very first starship U.S.S. Enterprise (never seen on television, but according to Gene Roddenberry, who supplied the sketch, it is a forerunner to the vessel we all know), and the fifth, the starship U.S.S. Enterprise as she appeared before refitting.

All but one of the Enterprise vessels were either taken from real-world history, or from the Star Trek television series. The fourth vessel in the display, which Sackett describes as "the very first starship U.S.S. Enterprise ," was never seen or heard of in Star Trek circles prior to its appearance in Star Trek: The Motion Picture . This space vessel appears to consist of two rings connected at various points along their circumferences by small struts, and further bound by a sail-shaped pylon that extends inward toward the central axis of the rings, along which runs a thin, roughly cylindrical boom. A presumably rocket-based propulsion system is located at the boom's aft end, and the forward end features an awkwardly shaped pod.

The Star Trek Sketchbook: The Original Series suggests that the basic design of the "ring ship" may have originated during preproduction of the first Star Trek episode, "The Cage," as a possible design for the Enterprise . The Sketchbook has a section entitled "The Search for the Enterprise Exterior." The section, which spans pages 62 through 71, shows "some of the sketches Matt made to design the ship that would warp space and travel to the stars." Page 64 shows two sketches related to the ring ship design. The upper sketch is a perspective drawing of the ring ship, and the lower sketch is a close-up drawing of what appears to be the forward pod of the ring ship.

It is possible, however, even if only remotely, that the ring ship design did not predate the original Star Trek television series. Page 69 features a sketch that almost certainly dates to the late 1970s. Beneath Jefferies' signature on the sketch is the marking "6-77", suggesting that the sketch may have been made in June 1977. This opens the possibility that the ring ship sketches may not predate Star Trek . Another item of circumstantial evidence that the ring ship design might not predate Star Trek is that no design even remotely reminiscent of the ring ship appears among the sketches of early Enterprise concepts in The Making of Star Trek , which was published in 1968.

To summarize, it seems likely that at least the basic design of the ring ship dates to 1960s, prior to the production of "The Cage," but it is also possible that the design did not come about until after the production of the original Star Trek series.

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Gene Roddenberry's wife owned and operated Lincoln Enterprises, a company that specialized in the sale of Star Trek and Gene Roddenberry-related merchandise. Two of the items offered in a full-color catalog published at that time featured a futuristic spacecraft that bore a remarkable resemblance to Matt Jefferies' "ring ship" Enterprise from Star Trek: The Motion Picture .

Michael and Denise Okuda describe the "ring ship" Enterprise on page 137 of the second edition of the Star Trek Encyclopedia :

This ship was designed by Matt Jefferies for a television series project developed by Gene Roddenberry after the run of the original Star Trek. Unfortunately, the series was never produced, and this remains the only appearance of the design.

Although the ring ship design may have predated Star Trek 's debut in 1966, the poster artwork sold through Lincoln Enterprises, and used as the basis by Jefferies or perhaps another artist for ST:TMP's "ring ship Enterprise ," would seem to date to some point in the 1970s. It seems likely that the "Starship" project was not based on Star Trek , since Roddenberry created a number of non-Trek science-fiction television productions in the 1970s, and since his primary focus with respect to Star Trek at that time seemed to be a revival of the original television series, rather than a totally new concept with a radically different starship Enterprise .

An issue of Star Trek Communicator magazine from the late 1990s or early 2000s featured what is perhaps fans' best look at the artwork of the "ring ship" Enterprise from Star Trek: The Motion Picture . Based on Matt Jefferies' painting, restored by Michael Okuda, the image has been described as being based on an enlarged portion of a set photo of the display area of the recreation deck from Star Trek: The Motion Picture . The photo was retouched, with middle tones restored in order to better distinguish the ship from the background. Although some of the thin, white, longitudinal lines on the rings were restored, most of the detail was part of the original artwork, including the lettering and most of the dark background texture. Since the original artwork from Star Trek: The Motion Picture seems to have been lost, Michael Okuda's restoration is perhaps fans' best peek at that ship.

It is believed that the original transparency featured on the recreation deck set may have been made from a high-contrast, black-and-white photo print of Matt Jefferies' painting, with some additional, painted texture.

Note that the "ring ship" Enterprise is identified in the image as USS ENTERPRISE XCV 330. Jefferies -- or whoever created the ST:TMP artwork based on Jefferies' design -- may have created the alphabetical portion of the "XCV 330" markings at random. It may be no concidence that the letters X, C, and V are adjacent to one another on QWERTY-style typewriters. Samuel A. Falvo II offers this alternative, very reasonable explanation, that...

...Starfleet branched out from the United States Navy, in the same manner that the U.S. Air Force branched out from the Army. Consider that the ranking system used by Starfleet is a naval system. Roddenberry himself was a Navy enlistee, if memory serves me correctly. It seems likely, therefore, that he'd use the ranking system he's most familiar with. This is why the Federation has Commodores instead of Lt. Colonels, and Admirals instead of Generals. As further evidence, we find that the registry of the USS Enterprise in the Navy was none other than CV-6 during World War II, with later refits to CVA-6 and CVS-6. A whole new class of nuclear-powered ships were later released, with Enterprise being badged CVN-65. (http://www.cv6.org/1946/1946.htm) Therefore, I can say with 90% or more confidence that XCV is the US Navy's space-borne ship designation system, and that XCV-330 (for eXtra-terrestrial Carrier Vessel) happened to be the number assigned to the Ringship Enterprise .

The following sketches by Matt Jefferies seem to be among Jefferies' earliest sketches of the ring ship design. Thus, they date to either the mid-1960s, as part of preproduction for Star Trek , or perhaps to the 1970s, possibly created for Gene Roddenberry's "Starship" project.

Page 112 of Stan Goldstein & Fred Goldstein's Star Trek Spaceflight Chronology (Pocket Books, 1980) describes the "ring ship" Enterprise as follows:

As imaginative as the Goldsteins' speculative description of the Enterprise "ring ship" is, it seems unlikely that the Enterprise would be a practical passenger carrier. If its length is truly 300 m, then its habitable volume would seem to be far too low to comfortably accommodate 950 people, much less house the recreation facilities mentioned in the description.

The role of the "ring ship" USS Enterprise XCV 330 within the Star Trek universe is unclear. It is evident that the ship predates the USS Enterprise NCC-1701, which was launched in 2245, according to the Star Trek Chronology . The USS Enterprise NCC-1701 has been described as the first starship of the Starfleet of the United Federation of Planets to bear the name Enterprise. If this is so, then the XCV 330 cannot be a vessel of the Federation Starfleet.

The television series Star Trek: Enterprise (2001-Present) features a vessel named Enterprise , registry number NX-01, an NX-class starship of the Earth Starfleet, launched in 2151 and in service during at least the early years of the 2150s. If the XCV 330 is a vessel of the Earth Starfleet, then it is likely that the XCV 330 predates or postdates the NX-01. Since the United Federation of Planets is said to have been founded in 2161, only ten years after the launch of the NX-01, it seems unlikely that the XCV 330 was launched subsequent to the launch of the NX-01. On the other hand, the XCV 330 may not be a vessel of the Earth Starfleet. If this is the case, then it could have been launched at any time prior to the launch of the USS Enterprise NCC-1701. It could even be in service as a contemporary of the Enterprise NX-01.

The Star Trek: Enterprise episode "First Flight" features a wall painting that is very reminiscent of the display from the USS Enterprise NCC-1701's recreation deck in Star Trek: The Motion Picture . The painting appears in a lounge called the 602 Club, in a scene that takes place roughly a decade prior to the main events of the episode, set in March 2153. This author has seen the "First Flight" painting in some detail, and can confirm that it is directly inspired by the ST:TMP image. The ship's configuration matches that of the USS Enterprise XCV 330. Most interestingly the ship has markings which read "XCV 330," with the "V" mostly obscured, as it is in the image from Star Trek: The Motion Picture . On the other hand, the "First Flight" ship is not labeled "USS ENTERPRISE" as is the ship in Star Trek: The Motion Picture . It is possible that this was done to slip an item of Star Trek continuity onto fans' television screens beneath the radar of some of the people in charge of the series Star Trek: Enterprise . This line of reasoning is entirely speculative, however, with no supporting or refuting evidence.

If the ship from "First Flight" is intended to be the Enterprise XCV 330 from the display in Star Trek: The Motion Picture , then we might conclude that the "ring ship" Enterprise was launched in the early 22nd century, some eight or more years prior to the 2151 launch of the NX-01. As seen in the television series Star Trek: Enterprise , many Vulcan starships have a basic configuration similar to the XCV 330. One might speculate that the Enterprise XCV 330 was a test vehicle constructed by humans and inspired by Vulcan technology. Since the Enterprise XCV 330 is the only known human-designed ring ship, it is possible that humans decided not to pursue the ring ship configuration in most of their "production" starships. They might have chosen instead to continue to use the configuration of a main body with warp engine nacelles, as pioneered by Zephram Cochrane's Phoenix in 2063 ( Star Trek: First Contact ), evolving to what would be used some nine decades later in the design of the Enterprise NX-01. Nonetheless, test data obtained from flights of the XCV 330 might have led to significant advances in human-designed spacecraft systems, giving the USS Enterprise XCV 330 a historical significance similar to the real-world space shuttle orbiter Enterprise OV-101.

The following is a purely speculative history of the USS Enterprise XCV 330.

  • April 2063 - Zephram Cochrane's Phoenix becomes the first human-designed spacecraft to attain warp speeds. ( Star Trek: First Contact )
  • 2143 - As of this time, a painting of the XCV 330 can be found at the 602 Club on Earth. (Exact date is conjecture)
  • 2151 - Starship Enterprise NX-01 is launched from Earth as the first human-designed vehicle capable of sustained flight at speeds as high as warp factor five. ("Broken Bow" [ENT])
  • 2245 - Starship USS Enterprise NCC-1701 is launched. ( Star Trek Chronology )
  • 2273 - During the "V'Ger Incident," Starfleet Commander Will Decker leads a V'Ger-created android probe replica of Lieutenant Ilia on a tour of the USS Enterprise NCC-1701. While touring the ship's recreation deck, Decker shows the Ilia-probe illustrations of past vessels called Enterprise . One of them is the USS Enterprise XCV 330. (Exact date is conjecture. In the Star Trek: Voyager episode "Q2," the last voyage of the USS Enterprise NCC-1701's famous five-year mission is said to have occurred in 2270, and in Star Trek: The Motion Picture , Decker indicates that Kirk has not logged a single star hour in two and a half years.)

The author wishes to thank Mark Meece for loaning his copy of the Star Trek Spaceflight Chronology for the purpose of researching for this article.

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The Star Trek “Origin” Movie Is Finally Going Into Production

The new Star Trek prequel movie is set to be revealed on the big screen. Probably.

LOS ANGELES - DECEMBER 1: Leonard Nimoy as Commander Spock (Mr. Spock) in the STAR TREK: The Origina...

For 30 years — from 1979 to 2009 — the longest wait between new Star Trek feature films was seven years. And, for most of that period, from the release of Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979) to Star Trek: Nemesis (2002), there was almost always a new Star Trek movie in theaters every two to four years. But after the wildly successful J.J. Abrams-directed reboot film in 2009, the release clip for Trek movies went from maximum warp to impulse power, to glacially slow. And now, by the time the next Star Trek movie hits theaters, it will have been about 10 years since the previous one — Star Trek Beyond — beamed into cinemas in 2016.

Since that time, for Trekkies, updates of a new Star Trek film have been very similar to the game football Lucy plays with Charlie Brown; just when a hypothetical movie sounds real, it gets snatched away. But now, there’s a glimmer of hope. Thanks to reports out of CinemaCon 2024, it looks like, the next Trek film is scheduled for release in either 2025 or 2026. But what’s it about? And will it really happen?

Star Trek 14 is “an untitled origin story”

Chris Pine and Zachary Quinto in 'Star Trek' (2009).

The new “origin story” will be set before the 2009 reboot. But how many decades before?

During CinemaCon 2024, Paramount confirmed several in-development projects including a live-action GI Joe / Transformers crossover (teased in 2023’s Rise of the Beasts ), a hardcore Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles live-action movie, a remake of the sci-fi thriller The Running Man (from Edgar Wright), the confirmation of an Avatar trilogy, and the assertion that a new Star Trek feature film will go into production this year, with a release date soon to follow.

Since 2016 to now, there have been at least five different attempts to make a new Star Trek film, either as timey wimey direct sequel to Beyond (“Star Trek 4”) a one-off space mobster movie (Quentin Tarantino’s script) or something else entirely (Noah Hawley and Matt Shakman’s attempts that remain undisclosed). But now, although Paramount is reportedly developing a sequel to Beyond — which would feature the reboot cast from the 2009 film one last time — the next Star Trek movie is not that sequel, but instead, as previously reported , an “origin story” that “takes place decades before the 2009 Star Trek film that rebooted the franchise.” This movie has been confirmed to be directed by Toby Haynes ( Andor, Doctor Who ) with a script from Seth Grahame-Smith ( The Lego Batman Movie , Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter) .

Wait? Wasn’t the 2009 film an “origin story?” While the answer to this question is technically a “yes,” the 2009 film (just titled Star Trek ) was also partially a time-travel sequel to the canon established in The Next Generation , and literally everything else in the Trek franchise up until that point. By saying the new prequel film takes place “decades before” the first reboot, this could hypothetically mean that the movie takes place in both the Prime and Kelvin timelines simultaneously.

TLDR: The Trek timeline diverged in the first reboot movie, beginning in the year 2233, so, a story set even a few decades before that divergence, in the 2210s or 2220s or earlier, would be consistent with all versions of Trek's future history. Presumably, the “origin story” won’t take place in the two decades between the prologue of the 2009 film (2233) and the main story (2258), because honestly, even for hardcore Trekkies that’s a big canon headache. So, sometime in the early 2200s, but before the 2230s is probably the best bet. And, even if the movie was set a bit earlier than that — say in the late 2180s or 2190s — we’d still be dealing with a very early point of Starfleet history that has never been depicted and that we know almost nothing about. Hence, if you squint — and don’t think about the prequel series Enterprise (2151-2161) too much — then yes, we’re looking at an origin story in which pretty much anything could happen.

Star Trek “origin” movie release date

LOS ANGELES - DECEMBER 1: The USS Enterprise during the opening credit for in the STAR TREK: The Ori...

One of the earliest shots of the USS Enterprise — from the 1964 Star Trek pilot episode “The Cage.” The new prequel film will likely be set half a century before this moment.

While some tweets out of CinemaCon seemed to indicate that the new Star Trek movie could hit next year in 2025 , TrekMovie confirmed that the “Untitled Star Trek Origin Story,” is on the Paramount slate for 2025 or 2026. TrekMovie also predicted that 2026 is more likely, writing, “If Paramount can move fast enough they could get the origin movie into theaters by 2026 — in time for Star Trek’s 60th anniversary.” Then again, 2025 is not impossible, it’s just cutting it a little close.

It should also be noted that the entire corporate entity of Paramount is reportedly close to a merger that would see it purchased by Skydance Media, the same production company behind the three existing J.J. Abrams-produced Star Trek reboots. If that deal is finalized soon, then, yes, this Star Trek feature film might actually happen very quickly. And if it doesn’t, there will still be plenty of new Star Trek shows streaming , not to mention the first direct-to-streaming standalone Star Trek movie, Section 31 , starring Michelle Yeoh, which will hit Paramount+ sometime later this year.

All the reboot Star Trek films (2009-2016) are currently streaming on Paramount+. The previous ten films (1979-2002) are all on Max.

Phasers on Stun!: How the Making — and Remaking — of Star Trek Changed the World

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A Star Trek Origin Movie Is Coming in 2025 From Director Toby Haynes

  • A new Star Trek prequel film, an "origin story", is in development, at Paramount.
  • The Star Trek history before Kirk's missions on the Enterprise is largely unwritten, leaving room for creativity with the new film.
  • Director Toby Haynes, known for Andor , is working on the film alongside writer Seth Grahame-Smith; a 2025 release window was announced at CinemaCon.

Star Trek may finally be coming back to the big screen. A prequel to the 2009 J.J. Abrams reboot of the franchise is in the works from director Toby Haynes . The news comes from Paramount's presentation at CinemaCon today, as reported by Collider's Steve Weintraub and Britta DeVore . With Haynes, who recently helmed six episodes of the acclaimed Star Wars series Andor , at the rudder, the film will be written by Seth Grahame-Smith .

So far, other details on the new film are scarce, but it will reportedly be an "origin story", taking place decades before the 2009 Star Trek film, which took place in 2255. That likely means that it will not feature the cast from the 2009 reboot, which has so far been difficult for Paramount to wrangle together for a fourth film, despite numerous attempts to do so . That doesn't necessarily mean that a fourth movie isn't happening: back in March, Paramount hired The Flight Attendant scribe Steve Yockey to pen a new script for the film. For their part, the cast is game as well, with Zoe Saldaña recently stating her willingness to return for a fourth mission on the USS Enterprise .

What Happened Decades Before Kirk's First Missions on the Enterprise?

The history of the Star Trek universe prior to the celebrated voyages of the Enterprise is largely unwritten. The first starship Enterprise 's adventures in the 22nd century were chronicled on the UPN prequel series Star Trek: Enterprise . That series ended with the founding of the United Federation of Planets in 2161, which leaves almost a century of mostly unexplored history between that and the history now being charted on Star Trek: Strange New Worlds (and the first two seasons of mothership show Star Trek: Discovery ).

At some point, the nascent Federation faces a devastating war against the Romulan Star Empire , while also engaged in a Cold War with the Klingons. The USS Enterprise will eventually be launched in the 23rd century, under the captaincy of Robert April, who has been briefly glimpsed on Star Trek: The Animated Series and Strange New Worlds , before being handed off to Christopher Pike . Apart from that, however, Haynes and Graeme-Smith have a near-blank canvas upon which to make their mark.

In addition to Andor , Haynes has also helmed episodes of Doctor Who , Sherlock , and Black Mirror ; his work on the latter series includes the episode " USS Callister ," a loving pastiche of Star Trek . Graeme-Smith wrote the novels Pride & Prejudice & Zombies and Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter ; he worked on the story for the upcoming horror comedy sequel Beetlejuice Beetlejuice .

A new Star Trek prequel film is in development; no date has yet been set beyond a 2025 release window . Stay tuned to Collider for future updates.

A Star Trek Origin Movie Is Coming in 2025 From Director Toby Haynes

Scotty Will Return in Season 3 of 'Star Trek: Strange New Worlds'

Martin Quinn's version of the character first appeared in season 2's finale.

The Big Picture

  • Martin Quinn to bring authentic Scottish flair as Montgomery Scott on Star Trek: Strange New Worlds.
  • Quinn adds a new perspective to the character previously played by actors from Canada and England.
  • Star Trek: Strange New Worlds continues to explore the adventures of the USS Enterprise under Captain Pike.

A classic member of the Enterprise crew will return for the third season of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds . After debuting in the final episode of the show's second season , Martin Quinn will stay on board as Montgomery "Scotty" Scott in the upcoming season of Paramount+'s newest Star Trek series. As reported by BBC Scotland in an interview with Quinn, the character will recur on Strange New World 's third season, which is currently filming in Toronto, Ontario.

Quinn is the first-ever Scot to play the character, who was previously played by a Canadian ( James Doohan ) and an Englishman ( Simon Pegg ), and the interview notes that he's adding authenticity to the character, making sure that the show's writers use authentic Scottish slang: "They let me put in the word 'baw-heid' instead of 'turnip-heid'. Maybe they think all Scottish people are farmers? But they were very gracious about it." Quinn is from the town of Paisley; he has previously appeared on episodes of Limmy's Show , Annika , and Derry Girls .

Who is Montgomery Scott?

Played by Doohan in Star Trek: The Original Series , Scott is the ever-capable head engineer of the USS Enterprise , famed for his ability to solve catastrophic problems in short periods of time. After the series went off the air, Doohan reprised the role in Star Trek: The Animated Series and in all six of the feature films starring the series' original cast. He also returned for a cameo in Star Trek: Generations , attending the launch of the USS Enterprise-B , and guest-starred on the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "Relics", where he is discovered by the Enterprise-D 's crew a century in the future, having been preserved in a transporter buffer. Pegg took on the role for J.J. Abrams ' cinematic reboot of the franchise, and reprised it for its two sequels; a fourth film is still up in the air .

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds features the adventures of the USS Enterprise under the command of Captain Christopher Pike ( Anson Mount ) prior to The Original Series . It has so far featured two different chief engineers. Hemmer ( Bruce Horak ) was a member of the Aenar species, and sacrificed himself in the show's first-season finale to save the rest of the crew from the Gorn. His replacement was Pelia ( Carol Kane ), a long-lived Lanthanite, who joined the crew in the show's second season.

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds is currently filming its third season; no release date has yet been set . Stay tuned to Collider for future updates.

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds follows Captain Christopher Pike (played by Anson Mount) and the crew of the starship USS Enterprise (NCC-1701) in the 23rd century as they explore new worlds throughout the galaxy in the decade before Star Trek: The Original Series.

The Star Trek Origins Movie Is Officially Moving Forward, But I Have Two Serious Concerns About It

Am I the only one wondering about these things?

Zachary Quinto's Spock and Chris Pine's Kirk in Star Trek Into Darkness

If you have a Paramount+ subscription , you know full well how the Star Trek franchise has been thriving on TV again for many years now. Streaming has allowed the shows like Discovery , Picard , Strange New Worlds , Prodigy (which is now housed at Netflix) and Lower Decks to be made, and there are more upcoming Star Trek TV shows on the way, as well as the Michelle Yeoh-led Section 31 movie . However, not the franchise’s theatrical film side of things, we haven’t seen anything since 2016’s Star Trek Beyond , but apparently that’s about to change. Paramount Pictures is officially moving forward with that Star Trek origins movie that was reported about earlier this year , though after hearing this news, I can’t help but have two serious concerns about it.

During the Paramount presentation at CinemaCon today that CinemaBlend attended, it was mentioned that this Star Trek movie, which will be directed by Andor ’s Toby Haynes and written by Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter ’s Seth Grahame-Smith, is set to begin production later this year and is expected to be released sometime in 2025. Beyond that, no other details were revealed, so the only other thing we know about this project is that it’s set decades before the events of 2009’s Star Trek , i.e. the movie that kicked off the alternate timeline which follows Chris Pine’s James Kirk, Zachary Quito’s Spock and more.

Therein lies my first concern with this origins movie: exactly how is this going to function as a prequel? Not to get too nerdy, but the point of divergence between the Kelvin timeline and the main Star Trek timeline occurs when Nero’s ship’s came back in time to the former reality, which also happened to be the same day James Kirk was born. Everything before that day happened the same way in both timelines, including the events of the TV show Star Trek: Enterprise . So because that series chronicled Starfleet’s first deep-space exploration and ended with the formation of the United Federation of Planets, what origin is there to tell?

The main thing I can think of at the moment is we’d learn how Starfleet and the United Federation became the powerhouse forces they are by the time the 2009 Star Trek movie begins. But even setting aside the fact that this doesn’t need to be classified as a Kelvin timeline exclusive-story since again, such events would have happened the same way in both realities, would this make for a compelling enough cinematic event? With talent like Haynes and Grahame-Smith behind it, I hope so.

My second concern with this Star Trek origins movie is what this means for Star Trek 4 , i.e. the Star Trek Beyond follow-up. We’re coming up on 10 years of this project trying to get off the ground, with various behind-the-scenes creative talent boarding and exiting it, including director Matt Shakman, who left to helm The Fantastic Four . It seems like Star Trek 4 can’t catch a break, and I’m worried that this origins movie will result in it being shelved for good.

Now to be fair, when this origin story’s existence was revealed, it was mentioned that Star Trek 4 was still in “active development’ and is intended to be “the final chapter of the series.” So on face value, Paramount reportedly intends to give this version of the USS Enterprise crew a proper farewell, but given how many attempts to move Star Trek 4 forward have failed, will prioritizing the Star Trek origins movie will once again result in the other movie falling by the wayside? At this point, if Star Trek 4 does get made, it’s not coming out until well over a decade after Beyond . Is it even worth being remotely optimistic about its chances anymore?

As a longtime Star Trek fan, I’ll end up seeing this origins movie regardless, but these concerns will keep weighing on my mind until more information comes to light. Naturally we’ll pass along any major updates that come in, but for now, you can look through our 2024 movies schedule to stay on top of the cinematic entertaining coming out later this year.

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Adam Holmes

Connoisseur of Marvel, DC, Star Wars, John Wick, MonsterVerse and Doctor Who lore, Adam is a Senior Content Producer at CinemaBlend. He started working for the site back in late 2014 writing exclusively comic book movie and TV-related articles, and along with branching out into other genres, he also made the jump to editing. Along with his writing and editing duties, as well as interviewing creative talent from time to time, he also oversees the assignment of movie-related features. He graduated from the University of Oregon with a degree in Journalism, and he’s been sourced numerous times on Wikipedia. He's aware he looks like Harry Potter and Clark Kent.

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Screen Rant

Star trek origin movie officially announced by paramount for 2025 release.

Paramount Pictures officially announces the next Star Trek movie at CinemaCon, which will arrive in movie theaters in 2025.

  • Paramount Pictures announces new Star Trek movie for 2025, directed by Toby Haynes and written by Seth Grahame-Smith.
  • Chris Pine-led Star Trek 4 remains in development, while the new film is an origin story set decades before Abrams' 2009 movie.
  • Alongside the Star Trek origin movie, Paramount reveals a packed slate of exciting films for 2025-26 at CinemaCon in Las Vegas.

Paramount Pictures officially announces the next Star Trek movie, which is scheduled to arrive in theaters in 2025. As reported in January, the next Star Trek movie isn't the long-delayed, Chris Pine-led Star Trek 4 produced by J.J. Abrams, which remains in development at Paramount. Rather, the next Star Trek movie is an origin story directed by Toby Haynes ( Star Wars: Andor ) and written by Seth Grahame-Smith (A braham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter ).

Screen Rant' s Rob Keyes (@rob_keyes) is at CinemaCon in Las Vegas where Paramount Pictures confirmed the next Star Trek movie , currently called Untitled Star Trek Origin Story , to be released in 2025. J.J. Abrams is also producing Untitled Star Trek Origin Story, which takes place decades before Abrams' Star Trek 2009 movie. See Rob Keyes' Tweet below:

Paramount also confirmed Untitled Star Trek Origin Story will begin production later this year for theatrical release in 2025.

Every Upcoming Star Trek Movie & TV Show

Star trek's new movies in theaters and paramount plus explained, star trek is finally making movies again.

After nearly a decade, Star Trek i s back to making movies. Star Trek on Paramount+ has created a television renaissance for the franchise, but the theatrical side of Star Trek overseen by Paramount Pictures has languished in development hell since Star Trek Beyond bowed in the summer of 2016. Toby Haynes' Untitled Star Trek Origin Story is yet another prequel, but as it's said to be set decades before Star Trek 2009, it could very well be set after Star Trek: Enterprise 's mid-22nd century voyages but otherwise be an origin story for both Star Trek 's Prime and alternate Kelvin timelines .

Meanwhile, J.J. Abrams' Star Trek 4 , which is the "final chapter" of the USS Enterprise crew led by Chris Pine's Captain James T. Kirk and Zachary Quinto's Spock, has seen some movement with a new screenwriter, Steve Yockey ( The Flight Attendant ), tackling the long-delayed sequel. Pine and his fellow Star Trek actors, including Quinto, Zoe Saldana, Karl Urban, and Sofia Boutella, have all expressed their eagerness to return if Star Trek 4 can come together.

It's a positive sign that Star Trek movies are finally coming back.

Paramount+ is making their own Star Trek movies, with the recently-wrapped Star Trek: Section 31 awaiting a release date. Starring Academy Award-winner Michelle Yeoh, Section 31 i s the first made-for-streaming Star Trek movie, and it is reportedly set during Star Trek 's "lost era" with connections to Star Trek: The Next Generation. Section 31 could get a sequel if successful, and the Star Trek: Picard spinoff dubbed Star Trek: Legacy may also become a streaming movie instead of a series. However all this shakes out, it's a positive sign that Star Trek movies are finally coming back.

Source: Rob Keyes Twitter

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Published Jul 10, 2016

TOS Original Scripts

lincoln enterprises star trek

Authentic scripts from Star Trek: The Original Series are great collectibles. In addition to them being historic pieces, they make fascinating and educational reading. With regards to this latter aspect, since different drafts exist of the scripts for the produced and unproduced episodes, you can learn about the Trek s that almost happened but didn’t. Furthermore, since genuine scripts are sometimes peppered with handwritten notes from the cast or crew, it’s possible to find nuggets of undocumented, inside information in them.

So, with that TEASER, let’s FADE IN on this article about the original scripts of TOS . Our ACTS here will present an overview of the types of scripts that were written and, consequently, the types that are available today. Our discussion in this STORY will also include the context in which the scripts were produced to help illustrate the relationship between the various drafts as well as some other characteristics of the scripts. However, before DOLLYING IN, we want to point out that our exposition will focus on scripts that were written in TOS’ s era. The process today, and the physical appearance of the resulting scripts, are a bit different. CUT TO:

Scripts, by the Numbers

As you know, TOS had 79 episodes and two pilots, which meant that it had to have at least 80 scripts (the two-part “ The Menagerie ” only had one script). We use the words “at least” on purpose because, if you count the first story outlines (which are technically not scripts, but for the purposes of this article we'll include them), the first drafts, the second drafts, the final drafts, the revised final drafts and so on, you’ll quickly discover that there were hundreds of different scripts prepared for the series. At this late date, it’s difficult to know exactly how many, but there were a lot. And when you realize that Gene Roddenberry, Fred Freiberger, Bob Justman, Gene Coon, Dorothy Fontana and the rest of the production company were cranking out episodes on a weekly basis, it’s no surprise that TOS had both good and bad episodes… like most television shows and movies.

The Outline

A potential episode of TOS started with an idea, of course, which was then committed to paper as a story outline. These outlines were typically short, from 2-25 pages, and were generally structured using TEASERS (the part before the opening narration designed to hook you) and ACTS (the four long parts in the middle of the episode separated by commercials). At this early stage, there were usually no scenes or dialogue in the outlines, but the stories were complete from beginning to end, and set and location changes were often indicated.

The physical form of the story outlines for TOS was pretty simple. They were typed on plain white paper or onion skin, had no formal covers and were usually stapled in the upper left-hand corner.

(Here are two pages from “The Aurorals,” an unproduced TOS story outline written by Frank Paris. Please note that we’ve joined the pages together vertically for ease of reading.)

lincoln enterprises star trek

Early Drafts

After an outline was approved, which meant that the production company, studio and network were okay with it (more on that in a moment), a writer – usually the writer of the outline, but not always – was tasked to write the first draft of the script using the outline as a guide. This first draft was usually 50-80 pages long, had cast and set lists, and scenes that were consecutively numbered, fully described and contained dialogue. The script was bound in a yellow cardstock cover using two brads. (A picture of the cover of a first draft script is presented towards the end of this article.)

Following the completion of the first draft, it was read by the principal cast members, department heads, studio and network, so that a decision could be made as to whether the basic story would work for TOS – e.g., that it would fit the format and could be done on budget – and the writer could do a good job. Everyone realized that this initial attempt was just a first shot and revisions would be necessary – no one expected it to be immediately shootable.

At this point in the process, the writer was frequently given extensive notes on the script and asked to make revisions. S/he went back to the typewriter (yep, no computers in the late 1960’s) and, if all went well, produced a final draft. It was not unheard of, however, for the writer to be asked to write a second draft, and then maybe a third draft, before proceeding to a final draft. Those second and third draft scripts, incidentally, also had yellow covers.

(The below excerpt is from the first draft script of “The Cage” written by Gene Roddenberry.)

lincoln enterprises star trek

Final Drafts

Final draft scripts weighed in at around 65 pages and were close to what the production team hoped to put before the cameras. Their format was similar to the first draft scripts, except their cover colors were gray; a few had blue covers, however, but these were the exceptions. The change of color on the cover signified that the script was locked for production, which meant that the various departments could start their serious planning and budgeting discussions. This did not mean, however, that changes weren’t made to the scripts. In fact, many were altered after they went to gray cover due to a variety of reasons, and any changes were handled through the use of colored pages to make sure that everyone could easily identify them. These colored “change pages” had dates at the top – called revision slugs – and each successive change was denoted by a different color. Their colors followed the standard scheme which started with white pages in the initial draft followed by blue, pink, yellow, green, etc. However, this scheme was not set in stone in TOS and we’ve seen exceptions to it.

(Shown below are examples of colored change pages from “ The Man Trap ” and “ Miri .”)

lincoln enterprises star trek

We should note that when significant changes were made to the script that required a lot of change pages, the script version was incremented to the next one, e.g., a final draft became a revised final draft, a revised final draft became a 2nd revised final draft and so on. Additionally, the cover color was often changed to red.

Finally, when the last revision of the script was as “done” at it could be, the episode was ready to be shot. If all went well, this final version was completed before the first day of filming. However, there are a few instances where the script was revised while the episode was filmed. Two examples of this situation include “ Mudd’s Women ” and “ The Enemy Within .”

We mentioned earlier that the scripts were written fast. To give you an idea of the speed at which they were, an average first draft script typically was turned into a final draft in 2-3 weeks and a final draft script (or higher revision) typically went before the cameras in 5-18 days following its completion.

(The below shows examples of authentic, production-used scripts – a yellow first draft, two gray finals, and one red revised final. Note the information on the covers, including the large “STAR TREK” written in shadow block font and the blue machine-stamped script number in the upper right-hand corner.)

lincoln enterprises star trek

Lincoln Scripts

Before concluding this article, we want to comment on the scripts sold by the mail-order company Lincoln Enterprises. We’ve examined many that were purchased from them and can attest that quite a few were production-used; they contained colored change pages and had crew names written on their covers. Others, the majority, were reproductions, some of which were high quality and similar to the studio scripts, while others were not. The higher quality reproductions were printed on mimeograph machines and collated with two brads to mimic what was done by the studios. These copies were also done in red cover cardstock with nearly identical printing as the originals. At some point though – we believe in the mid-to-late 70’s – Lincoln discontinued the red cardstock covers and used other colored, non-cardstock paper. However, all of these Lincoln copies contained all white pages with differing revision dates at the top, a clear indicator, one of several, that the scripts were reproductions. Additionally, the scripts that Lincoln sold were not always the “shooting drafts” as they advertised – they were whatever versions they got access to.

(An assortment of Lincoln Enterprises reproduction scripts, sold through the years, is shown below. Their covers are generally plain relative to the original scripts, and the words “STAR TREK” are written in a variety of different font styles. Also, the script numbers were most often written by hand, but some early ones were machine stamped in black ink.)

lincoln enterprises star trek

And with that, we’ll FADE OUT and say THE END. Until next time.

Biographical Information

David Tilotta is a professor at North Carolina State University in Raleigh, NC and works in the areas of chemistry and sustainable materials technology. You can email David at [email protected]. Curt McAloney is an accomplished graphic artist with extensive experience in multimedia, Internet and print design. He resides in a suburb of the Twin Cities in Minnesota, and can be contacted at [email protected]. Together, Curt and David work on startrekhistory.com. Their Star Trek work has appeared in the Star Trek Magazine and Star Trek: The Original Series 365 by Paula M. Block with Terry J. Erdmann.

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Star Trek Discovery: Guide to Seasons 1 and 2 Collector's Edition Book

Star Trek Discovery: Guide to Seasons 1 and 2 Collector's Edition Book

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When Star Trek: Discovery arrived on screens in 2017, it signaled the start of a new golden age for Star Trek. Go behind-the-scenes in this collector's edition with the cast and crew of the USS Discovery as they navigate a Klingon conflict, a mysterious angel, and go further in time than any man has gone before. Featuring interviews with stars Sonequa Martin-Green (Burnham), Doug Jones (Saru), Michelle Yeoh (Georgiou), Jason Isaacs (Lorca), Anson Mount (Pike), Ethan Peck (Spock), Anthony Rapp (Stamets), Wilson Cruz (Culber) Mary Wiseman (Tilly), and many more. Also including on-set reports, interviews with key creatives, explorations of make-up and prosthetics, and features exploring Discovery's place in the Star Trek canon.  

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Star Trek Discovery: Guide to Seasons 1 and 2 Collector's Edition Book

Star Trek: The Next Generation: Mirror Universe Collection

Go into the alternate "Mirror, Mirror" universe to meet the cold-blooded crew of the I.S.S. Enterprise and their captain, the ruthless Jean-Luc Picard, in this collection of three graphic novels! Space…The final frontier. These are the voyages of the I.S.S. Enterprise. Its continuing mission: to conquer strange new worlds, to enslave new life and new civilizations…To boldly go where no one has gone before! In the other-dimensional Mirror Universe there is no United Federation of Planets, only a cruel Terran Empire, where advancement comes through assassination, brutality is commonplace, and kindness is a weakness. In Mirror Broken, the Terran Empire is on its last legs in its war with the Klingon-Cardassian Alliance, but Captain Jean-Luc Picard has learned of a final chance for victory: a revolutionary new Galaxy-class starship that could turn the tide of the war. The ship is called Enterprise—and Picard intends to take it. In Through The Mirror, when the Enterprise-D discovers a burned-out, pillaged Andorian vessel, the search for the culprits leads to some startlingly familiar faces. But, how did the Mirror Universe crew find their way to ours, and what does Emperor Spock have to do with it? Plus, it's interstellar espionage aboard the Enterprise-D when the Mirror Universe crew infiltrates Captain Picard's ship! And in Terra Incognita, the Enterprise crew returns to business as usual, little realizing the serpent in their midst—one of their own has been replaced! Six stories focusing on fan-favorite crew members of the Enterprise-D—including Deanna Troi, Wesley Crusher, and Selar—each connected by the machinations of this sinister doppelganger.  

9781684057641

Star Trek: The Next Generation: Mirror Universe Collection

Star Trek Shipyards: Federation Members

The latest volume in the Shipyards series features ships of the United Federation of Planets, including Vulcan, Andorian, Tellarite, Bajoran, Trill, and Earth Civilian ships. Each vessel is illustrated in CG artwork, with original VFX models made for the TV shows, alongside a technical overview and operational history.Featuring 27 ships! Starships include the Vulcan D'Kyr, the Vulcan cruiser and the T'Plana Hath; the Andorian battle cruiser, the Bajoran solar-sailor, the El-Aurian S.S. Lakul; and Civilian Federation Ships The Festoon, the S.S. Xhosa, and Harry Mudd's Class-J starship, the Norkova. Federation Members is latest volume in the Star Trek Shipyards Encyclopedia series - the very first set of books to collect all of the ships from Star Trek film and television shows in chronological order. series - The very first series of books to collect all of the ships from Star Trek film and television shows in chronological order. Each ship profile features artwork from the original visual effects models, detailed technical specifications, service history, and annotated views of the ships features.  

9781858755762

Star Trek Shipyards: Federation Members

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine - Too Long A Sacrifice

Return to DS9 as death casts its shadow on the space station in this murder-mystery graphic novel. Constable Odo searches for truth amid a web of treachery and lies but everyone on the Promanade has a motive for this murder, be it vengeance, justice…or old-fashioned greed. With the murderer on the loose, the inhabitants of Deep Space 9 start to divide into factions, made even worse when the Ferengi government gets involved. Further complicating the issue, conflict between Constable Odo and the Federation's hand-picked criminal investigator threatens to derail the investigation itself! Get buried in this space noir from fan-favorite Star Trek writers Scott and David Tipton with artist Greg Scott. 

9781684057351

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine - Too Long A Sacrifice

The Star Trek Book New Edition

To boldly expand your Star Trek horizons. Re-engage! The new edition of The Star Trek Book takes readers even further into one of the greatest science fiction universes ever created. This unique, insightful, and comprehensive examination of an enduring, much loved franchise features every era of Star Trek in one volume, from the pioneering 1960s TV series to the latest movies and streaming shows, including Star Trek: Beyond, Star Trek: Discovery, Star Trek: Picard, and Star Trek: Short Trek. Written by Star Trek experts, this book is packed with stunning film and TV stills, illuminating infographics, and incisive, specially curated essays that unlock the mysteries of the ever-expanding Star Trek Universe. From new and legendary heroes such as James T. Kirk, Jean-Luc Picard, and Michael Burnham to iconic villains like Khan, Q, and the Borg, to fascinating alien species like the Vulcans, Klingons, and Ferengi, this book explores the central characters, technology, civilizations, and events that have shaped the complex, epic story of Star Trek. 

9780744036961

The Star Trek Book New Edition

Star Trek: Voyager: Seven's Reckoning

Join Captain Janeway and her crew on a mission full of shocking twists in the first new Voyager comics story in over a decade! A chance encounter with a reptilian alien race draws Seven of Nine and the rest of the U.S.S. Voyager crew into an ancient class conflict that's on the brink of exploding into all-out war! Set during Star Trek: Voyager's amazing fourth season, Seven finds her newfound humanity in conflict with her commitment to the Prime Directive. When she finally makes her choice, will it have the desired result? And will there still be a place for her aboard the Voyager once the dust clears? 

9781684058129

Star Trek: Voyager: Seven's Reckoning

Star Trek: The Wisdom of Picard : An Official Star Trek Collection

Discover all of Captain Jean-Luc Picard's sage advice, insight, and wisdom from the deck of the U.S.S. Enterprise and beyond in this ultimate collection of wise words from the esteemed Starfleet captain. Any Star Trek fan knows that Captain Jean-Luc Picard is renowned for his impressive oratory skills, preferring negotiation and diplomacy over violence and destruction. Now, you can finally ponder all of his wisdom in one place—from his thoughts on leadership and sense of duty to justice and the limitlessness of exploration—in Star Trek : The Wisdom of Picard. Journey with the Starfleet captain through his seven seasons on Star Trek: The Next Generation to the Star Trek movies to the current series Star Trek: Picard . Star Trek : The Wisdom of Picard boldly goes where no book has gone before to log Picard's timeless advice in one impressive collection, perfect for Star Trek fans everywhere! Make it so!

9781507214732

Star Trek: The Wisdom of Picard : An Official Star Trek Collection

Star Trek: The U.S.S. Enterprise NCC-1701 Illustrated Handbook

Captain James T. Kirk's Original Starship Enterprise! Everything you want to know about this iconic starship in the FIRST full color volume ever published. Featuring details from both TV series and the first six movies. This volume, featuring the U.S.S. Enterprise NCC-1701 and the U.S.S. Enterprise NCC-1701-A, is a detailed, illustrative account of the TV starship from the original 1966-1969 series, and the movie starship from STAR TREK: THE MOTION PICTURE (1979), STAR TREK II: THE WRATH OF KHAN (1982), STAR TREK III: THE SEARCH FOR SPOCK (1984), STAR TREK IV: THE VOYAGE HOME (1986), STAR TREK V: THE FINAL FRONTIER (1989), and STAR TREK VI: THE UNDISCOVERED COUNTRY (1991). Plus, Captain Pike's Enterprise from the hit TV series STAR TREK: DISCOVERY. With isometric illustrations of all the key locations, annotated plan views, detailed technical information, Starfleet equipment, and uniforms and insignia, the chapters follow the starships through time and provide an extraordinary reference guide to these iconic Federation vessels.  

9781858755786

Star Trek: The U.S.S. Enterprise NCC-1701 Illustrated Handbook

Star Trek: Year Five - Odyssey's End (Book 1)

Join the crew of the original Starship Enterprise in these all-new adventures near the end of their five-year mission. The crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise left Earth four years ago. They've traveled to strange new worlds, defeated impossible foes, and made universe-changing decisions. But now, with the end in sight, they'll have to face their biggest challenge yet. Step aboard the Enterprise with Kirk, Spock, Bones, Uhura, Sulu, Scotty, and Chekov as they begin the end of their original Five Year Mission and boldly go into an uncertain future in this new continuing Star Trek series!  

9781684055685

Star Trek: Year Five - Odyssey's End (Book 1)

Star Trek Picard: The Official Collector's Edition Book

A behind-the-scenes guide to the smash hit new Star Trek TV Show showcasing the further adventures of fan-favorite captain of the Enterprise-D, Jean Luc Picard! A deluxe collector's edition offering a behind-the-scenes guide to the brand new Star Trek: Picard TV show, featuring interviews with Star Trek legends Sir Patrick Stewart, Brent Spiner (Data), Jonathan Frakes (Riker), Marina Sirtis (Troi), plus the new castmembers Isa Briones (Dahj/Soji), Michelle Hurd (Raffi), Harry Treadway (Narek) and many more. Plus Showrunner Alex Kurtzman, Showrunner Michael Chabon and Director Hanelle Culpepper reveal behind-the-scene secrets.  

9781787731882

Star Trek Picard: The Official Collector's Edition Book

Star Trek: Discovery - Aftermath

Witness the Aftermath of the stunning conclusion to the second season of Star Trek: Discovery! An all-new graphic novel that ties directly into Season Two of the hit CBS All Access series! After the disappearance of the U.S.S. Discovery, Captain Pike and Chancellor L'Rell seek to forge a peace treaty between the Federation and the Klingons. But when a new enemy threatens to sabotage the negotiations, Spock must reclaim his place in Starfleet to save his friends and prevent the outbreak of a new war! Plus, a special short story featuring Saru! Soon after the events on Q'onoS, the Discovery receives a distress call from someone from Tilly's past. It's up to Commander Saru to lead the crew against this sinister alien threat in his first mission as acting captain!  

9781684056507

Star Trek: Discovery - Aftermath

Star Trek: Year Five - The Wine-Dark Deep (Book 2)

Join the crew of the original Starship Enterprise in these all-new adventures near the end of their five-year mission. The crew has a new Tholian passenger and just as they are finally able to communicate with them, the Enterprise runs into a new obstacle—a Tholian web! But as the crew works with other trapped ships to figure out how to escape, new questions about what the Tholian Assembly is planning darken the horizon. Step aboard the Enterprise with Kirk, Spock, Bones, Uhura, Sulu, Scotty, and Chekov as they begin the end of their original five-year mission and boldly go into an uncertain future in this new continuing Star Trek series! Collects issues #7-12.  

9781684056439

Star Trek: Year Five - The Wine-Dark Deep (Book 2)

The Art of Star Trek Discovery

The official Star Trek: Discovery art book. Star Trek: Discovery, the newest chapter in the Star Trek Universe, follows the exploits of Vulcan-raised science officer Michael Burnham and the crew of the U.S.S. Discovery as they boldly go where no one has gone before. The Art of Star Trek Discovery explores behind the scenes of CBS's hit show, with cast and crew interviews, set photography, concept art and storyboards. With exclusive content from the first two seasons, this book is a must-have for every Star Trek fan. 

9781789092592

The Art of Star Trek Discovery

Star Trek: The Artistry of Dan Curry

Hardback volume showcasing the diverse work of one of Star Trek's most talented alumni, Dan Curry, whose contributions to the TV shows and movies include visual effects, practical effects, title design and weaponry. With more than 50 years of history to its name, Star Trek is one of the world's most treasured popular culture institutions, and seven-time Emmy award winner Dan Curry is one of its most enduring talents. His amazing contributions have ranged from directing, title design and concept art to practical on-set effects and weapon design. From The Next Generation to Enterprise, Dan's incredibly diverse Star Trek work has resulted in some of the series' most memorable moments. Star Trek: The Artistry of Dan Curry reveals the many and varied techniques used to produce some of the most spectacular visual effects used in the various series, while Dan also goes in-depth to divulge the secrets of some of his own personal favorite creations. This is a book for all Star Trek fans to treasure!  

9781785659348

Star Trek: The Artistry of Dan Curry

Star Trek Shipyards: The Borg and the Delta Quadrant Vol. 1 - Akritirian to Kren im : The Encyclopedia of Starfleet Ships

Featuring ships of the Borg and vessels of the Delta Quadrant, the first of two companion volumes of ships from STAR TREK: VOYAGER. This volume begins with the ships operated by STAR TREK's greatest villains: the Borg, including the Borg Cube and Sphere, the Borg Queen's Ship, the Renegade Borg Vessel and the Borg Tactical Cube. From there, it profiles more than thirty-five ships operated by the species Voyager encountered in the Delta Quadrant, featuring ships from A - Akritirian to K - Krenim. With technical overviews and operational histories, the ships are illustrated with CG artwork - including original VFX models made for the show. The vessels include warships, fighters, transports, hospital ships, patrol ships, racing ships, and shuttles. Each ship is illustrated with CG artwork, including original VFX models made for the TV show, and is presented with its technical data and operational history. A size chart showing Borg ships to scale is included, and an appendix of listings for each ship's debut appearance, and of other appearances throughout the Star Trek series. After you read this, be sure to check out the companion volume - THE DELTA QUADRANT: Ledosian to Zahl, which profiles more than 50 ships of the Delta Quadrant species, among them the Lokirrim Warship, the Species 8472 Bioship, and the Vidiian Warships. With previously unseen artwork specially created in CG the two official volumes form the most comprehensive account of Delta Quadrant ships from STAR TREK VOYAGER ever produced.  

9781858759562

Star Trek Shipyards: The Borg and the Delta Quadrant Vol. 1 - Akritirian to Kren im : The Encyclopedia of Starfleet Ships

Star Trek: Year Five - Weaker Than Man (Book 3)

Join the crew of the original Starship Enterprise in these all-new adventures near the end of their five-year mission. The Enterprise and her crew finally make it back to Federation space, but the Federation they find isn't quite the same as the one they had left behind! Kirk grapples with a very personal Klingon threat, even as the Enterprise begins its homecoming victory tour, and the Federation's upcoming presidential election is upended when Harry Mudd enters the race! All this against the backdrop of a sinister malaise threatening to rot the Federation from within. Terrible secrets are revealed, among them the origin of Gary Seven and the grand designs of the shadowy AEGIS organization. Can Kirk and the Enterprise crew excise this corruption, or will the five-year mission end in failure? Collects issues #13-19 of the ongoing series by writers Jackson Lanzing, Collin Kelly, Jody Houser, and Jim McCann with artists Angel Hernandez, Silvia Califano, and J.K. Woodward.  

9781684057436

Star Trek: Year Five - Weaker Than Man (Book 3)

Star Trek Shipyards: The Delta Quadrant Vol. 2 - Ledosian to Zahl

Profiling more than 50 ships that Voyager encountered in the Delta Quadrant, this is the 2nd of two volumes that profile the ships from STAR TREK: VOYAGER. Featuring the Lokirrim Warship, the Species 8472 Bioship, and the Vidiian Warships, and many more. Including technical overviews and operational histories, the ships are illustrated with CG artwork, created using the original VFX models made for the STAR TREK: VOYAGER TV series. With previously unseen artwork, the two official volumes form the most comprehensive account of ships from STAR TREK: VOYAGER ever produced.  

9781858759739

Star Trek Shipyards: The Delta Quadrant Vol. 2 - Ledosian to Zahl

Star Trek Designing Starships: Deep Space Nine and Beyond

The inventive concept art behind Star Trek: Deep Space Nine's titular space station, U.S.S. Defiant and dozens more ships comes to life on the page! Deep Space Nine is considered by many Star Trek fans to be the best of all the Trek shows in the franchise's illustrious 55-year history, and Star Trek Designing Starships puts the spotlight on the show's space-faring vessels. The fifth entry in Hero Collector's ongoing series of Star Trek Designing Starships, Deep Space Nine and Beyond delivers original production art and extensive interviews with the award-wining artists who created the ships and helped bring them to the screen over the course of the show's seven-year run (1993-1999) and its 176 episodes.  

9781858759890

Star Trek Designing Starships: Deep Space Nine and Beyond

Star Trek: Starfleet Is... : Celebrating the Federation's Ideals

What is Starfleet? It is the universe's most famous and inspirational coalitions of all time. It has boldly gone where no pop culture franchise has gone before. It is the foundation for a thriving community of passionate fans. Creator Gene Roddenberry said Star Trek "was an attempt to say that humanity will reach maturity and wisdom on the day that it begins not just to tolerate but take a special delight in differences in ideas and differences in life forms…If we cannot learn to actually enjoy those small differences, to take a positive delight in those small differences between our own kind, here on this planet, then we do not deserve to go out into space and meet the diversity that is almost certainly out there." After more than 50 years, 11 television series, 13 movies, and countless fan conventions later, Star Trek fans of all ages continue to gather—in person or virtually—and enjoy, share, and live up to Roddenberry's optimistic vision of the future. Fully authorized and filled with full-color images spanning the entire canon, Star Trek: Starfleet is… celebrates of Roddenberry's vision. This commemorative book highlights 50 of the key traits of the Star Trek universe and demonstrates, through memorable images and beautiful artwork, how these ideals are personified by everyone from Kirk and Spock, to Picard and Janeway, to Burnham and Mariner, and their voyages to everywhere from Earth to Vulcan, from Q'onoS to the Delta Quadrant, and even to the Mirror Universe and back in time—and how they are actively and sincerely lived by the Star Trek fans themselves. What is Starfleet? Starfleet is fun. Starfleet is not always logical. Starfleet is adventure. Starfleet is brave. Starfleet is compassion. Starfleet is diverse. Starfleet is evolving. And it is by sharing their passions, supporting one another through difficult times, celebrating one another's successes, and boldly going into a bright and hopeful future that Star Trek fans show that, above all, Starfleet is family. Starfleet is forever. 

9781637740194

Star Trek: Starfleet Is... : Celebrating the Federation's Ideals

Star Trek: Picard: Last Best Hope

Every end has a beginning…and this electrifying novel details the events leading into the new Star Trek TV series, introducing you to brand-new characters featured in the life of Jean-Luc Picard—widely considered to be one of the most popular and recognizable characters in all of science fiction.

9781982142186

Star Trek: Picard: The Last Best Hope

Star Trek: Picard: The Dark Veil

A thrilling untold adventure based on the acclaimed Star Trek: Picard TV series! The Alpha Quadrant is mired in crisis. Within the United Federation of Planets, a terrorist strike on the shipyards of Mars has led to the shutdown of all relief efforts for millions of Romulans facing certain doom from an impending super­nova. But when the USS Titan is drawn into a catastrophic incident on the Romulan-Federation border, Captain William Riker, his family, and his crew find themselves caught between the shocking secrets of an enigmatic alien species and the deadly agenda of a ruthless Tal Shiar operative. Forced into a wary alliance with a Romulan starship commander, Riker and the Titan crew must uncover the truth to stop a dev­astating attack—but one wrong move could plunge the entire sector into open conflict!

9781982154066

Star Trek: Picard: The Dark Veil

Star Trek: Discovery: Wonderlands

An all-new novel based upon the explosive Star Trek TV series! In a desperate attempt to prevent the artificial intelligence known as Control from seizing crucial information that could destroy all sentient life, Commander Michael Burnham donned the "Red Angel" time-travel suit and guided the USS Discovery into the future and out of harm's way. But something has gone terribly wrong, and Burnham has somehow arrived in a place far different from anything she could have imagined—more than nine hundred years out of her time, with Discovery nowhere to be found, and where the mysterious and cataclysmic event known as "the Burn" has utterly decimated Starfleet and, with it, the United Federation of Planets. How then can she possibly exist day-to-day in this strange place? What worlds are out there waiting to be discovered? Do any remnants of Starfleet and the Federation possibly endure? With more questions than answers, Burnham must nevertheless forge new friendships and new alliances if she hopes to survive this future long enough for the Discovery crew to find her....

9781982157548

Star Trek: Discovery: Wonderlands

Star Trek: Designing the Final Frontier : How Midcentury Modernism Shaped Our View of the Future

Celebrate Star Trek: The Original Series and the show's distinctive Midcentury modern design that would change design– and television–forever. Star Trek: The Original Series (1966-1969) was the first installment of one of the most successful and longest-running television franchises of all time. Today, Trek fans champion its writing, progressive social consciousness, and aesthetic. Designing the Final Frontier is a unique, expert look at the mid-century modern design that created and inspired that aesthetic. From Burke chairs to amorphous sculptures, from bright colors to futuristic frames, Star Trek TOS is bursting with mid-century modern furniture, art, and design elements—many of them bought directly from famous design showrooms. Together, midcentury modern design experts Dan Chavkin and Brian McGuire have created an insider's guide to the interior of original starship Enterprise and beyond, that is sure to attract Star Trek 's thriving global fan base.

9781681885629

Star Trek: Designing the Final Frontier : How Midcentury Modernism Shaped Our View of the Future

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IMAGES

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  2. Lincoln Enterprises comic book ad! Star Trek!

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  3. STAR TREK: THE ORIGINAL SERIES (1966-1969)

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  4. STAR TREK: THE ORIGINAL SERIES (1966-1969)

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  5. My Star Trek Scrapbook: Star Trek postcards from Lincoln Enterprises

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  6. Presidents’ Day: Abraham Lincoln In ‘Star Trek’ TOS

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VIDEO

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  2. STAR TREK THE ENTERPRISE PROJECT

  3. Star Trek: Encounters

  4. Star Trek: 10 Things You Didn’t Know About Dax

  5. Star Trek (Full Instrumental)

  6. Star Trek: Voyager Main Title Extended Version

COMMENTS

  1. Lincoln Enterprises

    Lincoln Enterprises, formerly Star Trek Enterprises, was a mail-order company set up by Bjo Trimble and Gene Roddenberry to sell merchandise related to the American science fiction television series Star Trek. It was known for selling official scripts and film cells directly from Desilu Productions during the run of the series.

  2. Lincoln Enterprises

    Lincoln Enterprises, Inc. (originally known as "Star Trek Enterprises") is a mail-order catalog company started by Majel Barrett Roddenberry and Betty Jo "Bjo" Trimble in 1967.Lincoln Enterprises specializes in memorabilia pertaining to Star Trek.The company is subordinated under the later established umbrella corporation Roddenberry Productions, headed by Gene Roddenberry and Majel's son ...

  3. The Savage Curtain

    "The Savage Curtain" is the twenty-second episode of the third season of the American science fiction television series Star Trek. Written by Gene Roddenberry and Arthur Heinemann (based on an original story by Roddenberry) and directed by Herschel Daugherty, it was first broadcast on March 7, 1969.. In the episode, aliens force Captain Kirk and First Officer Spock to join forces with beings ...

  4. A look back at Lincoln Enterprises: Gene Roddenberry's Star Trek store

    Roddenberry originally called the company "Star Trek Enterprises" but since it was an independent from Paramount, Roddenberry changed the name (probably after getting a call from a lawyer) He was always a fan of Abraham Lincoln, so that is the name he picked. Ironically, the name changed back to Star Trek Enterprises in some ads in the late ...

  5. A Collector's Trek #5: Lincoln Enterprises Merchandise

    Lincoln Enterprises (originally known as "Star Trek Enterprises") came to prominence back in 1967. Originally set up to handle fan mail for Star Trek, the company quickly fell under Gene's direct control after a piece of misdirected mail from legendary Sci-Fi writer Isaac Asimov. Asimov had written a personal letter to Gene which had ...

  6. Lincoln Enterprises

    Lincoln Enterprises (originally known as "Star Trek Enterprises") was a fan run mail-order catalog company started by Bjo Trimble and her husband John in 1967, as a subsidiary of the Norway Corporation. It was shortly taken over and promoted by Majel Barrett as Lincoln Enterprises, specializing in memorabilia pertaining to Star Trek and other productions associated with Gene Roddenberry.

  7. "Star Trek" The Savage Curtain (TV Episode 1969)

    The Savage Curtain: Directed by Herschel Daugherty. With William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, DeForest Kelley, Lee Bergere. Kirk, Spock, Abraham Lincoln and Vulcan legend Surak are pitted in battle against notorious villains from history for the purpose of helping a conscious rock creature's understanding of a concept he does not understand, "good vs. evil".

  8. Gene Roddenberry

    Gene Roddenberry (19 August 1921 - 24 October 1991; age 70), sometimes referred to as the "great bird of the galaxy", was an American filmmaker and TV producer, best known as the creator of the science fiction television series Star Trek, beginning the long running Star Trek franchise. Roddenberry's remains (some of his ashes in a small capsule, about the size of a lipstick) were the first ...

  9. Rescuing Star Trek Treasures

    In 1967, Gene and Majel Barrett Roddenberry, along with Bjo and John Trimble, began a company called Star Trek Enterprises, known more commonly by its later name, Lincoln Enterprises, which brought fans exclusive merchandise, newsletters and an official fan club named The Star Trek Interstellar.For many fans, the products and publications of Lincoln Enterprises were a direct line to authorized ...

  10. Lincoln Enterprises: A Little Piece of Star Trek

    Lincoln Enterprises: A Little Piece of Star Trek was an interview with Majel Barrett Roddenberry published in Strange New Worlds #10. Some topics touched upon: Lincoln Enterprises, fandom and profit, Star Trek. ... [Lincoln] was merely set up for Gene to handle fan mail for Star Trek. Isaac Asimov had once written a very intelligent question to ...

  11. When did the First Lincoln Enterprises Catalog Appear?

    Star Trek Enterprises changed to Lincoln Enterprises in 1971 or 1972. At the same time, with the release of their catalog #4, they expanded their offerings and began selling non-TOS merchandise from Kung Fu, Questor, Genesis II, Spectre, and Search. alchemist, May 12, 2020 #9. StarCruiser Commodore Commodore.

  12. The Savage Curtain (episode)

    The Enterprise leaving orbit of Excalbia. Back aboard the Enterprise, Scott and Chekov report that the damage to the ship is reversing, for which they have no explanation. Kirk and Spock reflect on how real "Lincoln" and "Surak" seemed. Spock says it could not be otherwise, since the replicas were created "out of our own thoughts." Kirk feels he understands the effort on Earth to achieve final ...

  13. The Retro Interview: Majel Barrett

    Sitting behind her Lincoln Enterprises table at a convention dedicated to Star Trek: The Next Generation, Majel Barrett takes a break from signing autographs and talking with fans. Interested television viewers have joined diehard Star Star fans for the two-day event, eager to get their first glimpse of the show.

  14. Lincoln Enterprises Acquisitions

    This group is to showcase memorabilia acquired from Gene Roddenberry's company Lincoln Enterprises (originally known as "Star Trek Enterprises"), a mail-order catalog company started by Gene Roddenberry and Majel Barrett in 1967 as a subsidiary of the Norway Corporation. Lincoln Enterprises is still in business and specializes in memorabilia pertaining to Star Trek. Currently, the ...

  15. Star Trek: Enterprise (TV Series 2001-2005)

    Star Trek: Enterprise: Created by Rick Berman, Brannon Braga. With Scott Bakula, John Billingsley, Jolene Blalock, Dominic Keating. A century before Captain Kirk's five-year mission, Jonathan Archer captains the United Earth ship Enterprise during the early years of Starfleet, leading up to the Earth-Romulan War and the formation of the Federation.

  16. Star Trek: The Original Series (Series)

    Star Trek: The Original Series. "Space: the final frontier. These are the voyages of the Starship Enterprise. Its five-year mission: to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no man has gone before!" — Captain James T. Kirk, the legendary Opening Narration.

  17. www.trekplace.com

    The Star Trek Sketchbook: The Original Series suggests that the basic design of the "ring ship" may have originated during preproduction of the first Star Trek episode, "The Cage," as a possible design for the Enterprise.The Sketchbook has a section entitled "The Search for the Enterprise Exterior." The section, which spans pages 62 through 71, shows "some of the sketches Matt made to design ...

  18. Set of 94 35mm Film Clips

    Roddenberry and Bjo Trimbles Lincoln Enterprises, previously called Star Trek Enterprises, sold individual 35mm clips from the films and original series via mail order.ppThis set consists of 94 individual color 35mm film clips featuring various key characters and sets, as well as three wax paper baggies labeled 1330, 1334, and 1339.

  19. Star Trek's Most Mysterious Movie Is Coming Sooner Than You Think

    For 30 years — from 1979 to 2009 — the longest wait between new Star Trek feature films was seven years. And, for most of that period, from the release of Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979 ...

  20. A Star Trek Origin Movie Is Coming in 2025 From Director Toby Haynes

    A new Star Trek prequel film, an "origin story", is in development, at Paramount.; The Star Trek history before Kirk's missions on the Enterprise is largely unwritten, leaving room for creativity ...

  21. The Lost Film of TOS

    Lincoln Enterprises sold thousands and thousands of film clips worldwide and, fortunately for us historians, these work print "discards" were direct copies of all of the film that went before the cameras while TOS was being filmed. Thus, many film clips show things that never made it into the episodes, such as the bloopers, deleted scenes ...

  22. 'Star Trek: Strange New Worlds' Season 3 Will See Scotty Return

    A classic member of the Enterprise crew will return for the third season of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds.After debuting in the final episode of the show's second season, Martin Quinn will stay on ...

  23. The Star Trek Origins Movie Is Officially Moving Forward, But I Have

    If you have a Paramount+ subscription, you know full well how the Star Trek franchise has been thriving on TV again for many years now. Streaming has allowed the shows like Discovery, Picard ...

  24. Star Trek Origin Movie Officially Announced By Paramount For 2025 Release

    Paramount+ is making their own Star Trek movies, with the recently-wrapped Star Trek: Section 31 awaiting a release date. Starring Academy Award-winner Michelle Yeoh, Section 31 is the first made-for-streaming Star Trek movie, and it is reportedly set during Star Trek's "lost era" with connections to Star Trek: The Next Generation. Section 31 could get a sequel if successful, and the Star Trek ...

  25. TOS Original Scripts

    Authentic scripts from Star Trek: The Original Series are great collectibles. In addition to them being historic pieces, they make fascinating and educational reading. ... (An assortment of Lincoln Enterprises reproduction scripts, sold through the years, is shown below. Their covers are generally plain relative to the original scripts, and the ...

  26. Star Trek: The Motion Picture is a masterpiece! : r/TrueFilm

    Star Trek: The Motion Picture is an epic odyssey, with an effective love story anchoring it. Overall almost as great as Kubrick's 2001 (which is the greatest film of all time in my book). In some ways it even improves on the 1968 masterpiece: it offers a more coherent plot-development alongside the deep hard science-fiction ideas ...

  27. Books

    This volume, featuring the U.S.S. Enterprise NCC-1701 and the U.S.S. Enterprise NCC-1701-A, is a detailed, illustrative account of the TV starship from the original 1966-1969 series, and the movie starship from STAR TREK: THE MOTION PICTURE (1979), STAR TREK II: THE WRATH OF KHAN (1982), STAR TREK III: THE SEARCH FOR SPOCK (1984), STAR TREK IV ...