„Star Trek“ original series appreciation thread!

I’m starting this thread because I recently started to watch the original series once again. The last time I watched it was 10 years ago. Therefore I wasn’t able to understand the philosophical meaning of some episodes back then although I always loved series. Today I appreciate these intelligent parts of the series and I love to watch this TV masterpiece even more. Now I want to hear your thoughts about the original „Star Trek“ series

 

I don't remember what night it was on originally but it was the same night as the Boy Scouts meeting.
Something had to give. Whoever was in charge of the Boy Scouts thing initially refused to consider moving to another night but it was that or face a dwindling attendance of Boy Scouts because watching that show was an absolute must.

 

It is still my favorite series of all time. I use to watch the series when it was in syndication in the early 70's every day of the week. I have lost count on how many times I have seen each and every episode, but it is probably close to ten times. Gene Roddenberry was a true visionary and the trio of William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy and DeForrest Kelly had unbelievable chemistry together. I still never tire of watching the original series and I like the brand new series as well.

 

In my formative years late 80’s early 90’s a station out of Derry NH called WNDS (known for weatherman Al Kaprielian) played Star Trek reruns. I loved it immediately, cool stories, the right amount of camp, it had me hooked.

 

It had a fair share of mediocre episodes but the good ones were very good and remain totally rewatchable.

 

Back in the early fall of 1966, NBC bowed to pressure from the other networks and came up with a week of early premieres. STAR TREK was one of them. The TV GUIDE made it look somewhat interesting - it was about a space ship in outer space, so I gave it a look. That first episode was "The Man Trap". I remember thinking that the cast of this show was huge and when first viewed, I wasn't sure who was who and what did what. All I, or my friends who watched it too, got from the show was that the pointy-eared guy was kinda neat.



But my dilemma was that I was a huge fan of BEWITCHED, and ABC had that show scheduled during the second half of STAR TREK. So on week 2, I watched "Charlie X" right up until 9 PM and had to switch to ABC to see the new color premiere of BEWITCHED. And that was the pattern for most of the season. There were a few times when ABC had a special running and I was able to watch all of STAR TREK. If memory serves, I got to see all of "Shore Leave" during the Christmas holiday. Watching just a half-hour wasn't very convincing though, and I sometimes skipped a week here and there.

In April, though, I read a TV page summary of that night's STAR TREK, which was in the highly recommended section. The paper said that fans of THE TIME TUNNEL (which I was), would really enjoy that night's STAR TREK. It was "City On The Edge Of Forever", and I was totally won over. For the rest of the summer rerun season, I was tuned to NBC for all of STAR TREK, and I began to regret my time that I wasted watching BEWITCHED. Thankfully for Season Two, the show moved to Friday nights, so I could watch both shows.

I had to wait for syndication to see the episodes that weren't rerun, but faithfully watched them over and over - all throughout the 70s when the show really took off and became very popular. During that period, I used to send away to 'Lincoln Enterprises', the company set up by Gene Roddenberry to sell stuff from the series. I collected a number of film scraps that I would mount into slides and project onto a large screen. It was bigger and better than the TVs of the day!





In the 80s, I bought VHS tapes of the series. In the 90s, I started buying LaserDiscs of the series. In the 2000s, it was DVDs, and by the 2010s, we had the Blu-ray set with both the updated effects and the original effects. As I type this, I'm listening to the 15 CD set from La-La-Land of the entire music scores for the series, an excellent and welcomed set.

 

I could not imagine TV viewing without this series. I watched Star Trek (and Lost In Space) from the very beginning and would not trade those memories of waiting for each episode for anything!

 

I love the TOS and the six original crew films. I watch them all at least once a year, I have for decades. Not much of a fan after that. Sadly quite a bit of the social commentary from TOS is still relavent today.

 

I have loved Star Trek (TOS) ever since I saw it in syndication in the mid-70s. I try to watch a couple of episodes every weekend (Blu-ray steelbook collection). And, I will always be in love with James T. Kirk.

 

Ha!
"Starring William Shatner as Capt. James T Kirk ( Earthman)."

 

I feel the same about Janice and Uhura

 

Nicely timed thread. Just started the Bluray box series 1. Puzzled about “Miri” - what happened to the rest of that alternative Earth? Was it only that small midwestern town that was affected by the disease?
But loving this chance to appreciate a TV event I was too “wise” to enjoy back in the day.

 

Also fascinating to see who appears in these episodes. Kim Darby, Michael J. Pollard and the boy who played Dill in To Kill A Mockingbird all in “Miri”. Sally Kellerman and the 2001 Space Odyssey actor (name just gone out of my reach right now) in the episode about people achieving godlike powers.

 

TOS is probably my favorite Star Trek series. It's one of those shows I can go back to anytime and just enjoy. Most of the films were good too, with the exception of V.

 

I first watched this in the early '90s. It was on around 10.30 pm and I got hooked. A fantastic show.

 

I was too young to appreciate the series during its original run, but in the 70s, a station in the area ran re-runs at 11:30 each night. In the summer and on weekends, I would be able to stay up late and watch. I loved the show and have seen each episode many times. I bought a few of the VHS tapes, but not all of them. It has always been shown on multiple networks, so I never bought the DVDs or Blu-Rays. I continue to enjoy it along with most all the subsequent series.

 

What can one say, it's Star Trek. Life would just not be the same without it.

 

Second generation fan here, with my parents watching TOS since Sept. 8, 1966! It was actually a show that was always on in our house, as well as me watching The Animated Series when I was very little!

All of us went to see The Motion Picture when it debuted at our nearby theater, one of the special times that theater got a first-run movie!

From that point on, it's always been in my life, to the point of me having quite a bit of a Star Trek collection, mainly focusing on the 1970's Mego toys and mostly TOS memorabilia.

Been to conventions, as well, with me winning sound alike contests each time, doing my Kirk impression (when you have a room full of fans who are clapping and cheering for you, instead of wanting to kill you for it, you know you've done well!)

Yeah, Trek has always been a part of my life, mainly TOS and anything related. It actually helped me in dark times when I needed some kind of positive outlook. It also, through reading about how the series was made, helped form my part-time career as a musician, wanting to be in an entertainment field!

 

been a fan since the debut!
I own these;



the Blu-ray packaging (directly above) has to be the worst EVER...all of the discs are locked down and nearly impossible to remove! it took me hours and almost cracked a few BDs in my attempt to remove them.

 

The complete series box or the individual season sets? I have the individual boxes and never had a problem with those.

 

The one pictured above the comments...
this:

 

It's a shame they didn't get picked up for one more year.
Same with Gilligan's Island.

 

I missed out on that LA LA Land soundtrack set with huge regret - I found out about it only after it had sold out.

 

Ditto!