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Slowly Re-Watching Classic Trek


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I've not watched the original star trek in over 15 years.   I'm slowly working my way through it  again (I really only have like 2 hours a day max for this sort of stuff at the moment) one thing I'm noticing that never even hit me before is that the show really is just about three characters, Bones(Dr. McCoy), Spock and Kirk.  Everyone else either has such small roles (Scotty just fixes stuff, Uhura  just answers the phones, and Sulu just points out obvious shit) and then there are other characters that seem like they would become regulars, like McCoy has this what seems like his girlfriend in Galileo 7 and she just disappears after that episode.   I know there was some dark reason why Yomen Janice Rand who was a recurring character for like the first 10 episodes just disappeared.  (Kirk hints at it in his book Star Trek Memories, and so does the best book on star trek Star Trek: The Inside Story)  I assume it means she was sexually assaulted or something by someone on the set/crew/cast.

I'm a little more than halfway through the first season. 

Were Next Generation and all the following shows skip around a lot and each character has "their own episodes" and story arcs.   

Enterprise was more about all the characters together (generally).

Discovery so far is just about the main "good guy"  (the black woman that is also in The Walking Dead) and the main Klingon bad guy, and the rest are just there as seen through these two characters eyes. 

 

Also, I was like WOW that is more detail on the enterprise and other things that I remember! Then I realized they re-did the effects.  They did a good job too of not over-doing it to the point where the effects are something that would have been impossible in 1966.  Granted they didn't have CGI back then, but the effects could have been done the old fashion way (see Forbidden Planet & When Worlds Collide for examples of effects as good as this midrange CGI that they used). 

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Remember, Star Trek TOS was made in the 60's.  Most shows then had 1 to 3 central characters and the rest were supporting characters.  After season 1 Scotty took on a more major role.  At times he was in the center seat so the story bounced between planet fall and action on the ship.  When Next Gen came out in the 80's TV shows became more cast centric.  Basically the whole cast became equal for storyline.  Think of Battlestar Galactica, Seinfeld, Friends and shows like that.  Galactica started it in 78 and it continued from there.  Stargate SG1 did the whole cast as equal in storylines also.  It seems story arcs and cast use varied as to what the viewers would accept.

As for the new special effects.  I like what they did with Trek.  They didn't take it up to the level of Next Gen and the other Trek shows.  They kept it closer to 60's style but cleaner.  Sometimes the Enterprise seems transparent at times.  I like the cleaner look.  The reason they didn't do the effects like Forbidden Planet, When Worlds Collide and War of the Worlds was budget costs.  Movie budgets and TV show budgets are way different so they didn't have a large effects budget where they could get a financial return at the box office.

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On 11/15/2017 at 7:34 PM, Draco1958 said:

Remember, Star Trek TOS was made in the 60's.  Most shows then had 1 to 3 central characters and the rest were supporting characters.  After season 1 Scotty took on a more major role.  At times he was in the center seat so the story bounced between planet fall and action on the ship.  When Next Gen came out in the 80's TV shows became more cast centric.  Basically the whole cast became equal for storyline.  Think of Battlestar Galactica, Seinfeld, Friends and shows like that.  Galactica started it in 78 and it continued from there.  Stargate SG1 did the whole cast as equal in storylines also.  It seems story arcs and cast use varied as to what the viewers would accept.

As for the new special effects.  I like what they did with Trek.  They didn't take it up to the level of Next Gen and the other Trek shows.  They kept it closer to 60's style but cleaner.  Sometimes the Enterprise seems transparent at times.  I like the cleaner look.  The reason they didn't do the effects like Forbidden Planet, When Worlds Collide and War of the Worlds was budget costs.  Movie budgets and TV show budgets are way different so they didn't have a large effects budget where they could get a financial return at the box office.

5

That last part of the budget makes total sense.   I do remember, even with not particularly critical eyes seeing things like... uh... isn't that the SAME planet they were orbiting like two episodes ago?  (reused effects) which isn't the case now. 

Just finished watching the episode with the battle between the Gorn and Kirk  (damn its hard to get past that Gorn in the rubber suit but I get it) I read in  Inside Star Trek that they also made a female Gorn complete with skirt and vagina.  Apparently, it was in Robert Justman's office and some tourists came to the Desilu lot and were on a tour and the kid they brought with them was the only one that could see the female Gorn's... female parts.. and he pointed it out.  The wife was like "See! What did I tell you bob??  Hollywood people are dirt! Just dirt!" and they dragged the kid out and stopped the tour.  lol. 

Funny thing is after years of stalwartly being a Classic Trek fan and second place being TNG. I think I'm starting to just like all of them equally.  Even the widely disliked Enterprise.  They all have different charms to them.  Classic is honestly more of an emotional attachment to the characters rather than to the show itself per se. 

 

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