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The 40th Anniversary of Star Trek
Digitus1337 writes to mention the 40th Anniversary of the original Star Trek series. StarTrek.com's article has a look back at that first episode, and tries to explore the whys behind the popularity that followed it. From the article: "On the evening of the 8th of September, following Daniel Boone, this new NBC show premiered with an episode called 'The Man Trap.' The angle of the story was different, to say the least: It was a love story with a sci-fi twist, borne of a relationship from the doctor's past, featuring a monster that, in the end, just wanted to live. It was moving, tragic and anything but cheesy. The viewers -- at least the ones who were paying attention -- were hooked." Update: 09/09 16:16 GMT by Z : Just to be sure you're aware of it, Slashdot's own CleverNickName is celebrating the 40th anniversary by reviewing episodes of ST:TNG on TVSquad. He begins with "The Naked Now". You know, "You are fully functional, aren't you?"
It's . . . just a . . . TV . . . show!
What's the Klingon word for lonely?
Ghhhaa'rrrdhok!
...and it has prospered. Who could ask for more (besides the fans...)?
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The best captain was Picard. Then Janeway, Kirk, Archer and Sisco. In that order.
Now I really feel old. I remember watching the "New Season" promotional spots and being freaked out by the guy with the silver eyeballs...
http://www.khaaan.com/
I thought "The Man Trap" was an idiom for "Marriage"
Love story with a sci-fi twist.
This is why the ultimate downhill slide after TNG ended. Berman and pals were catering to the fans who wanted to know exactly how phasers worked rather than the fans who wanted to see hot Riker/Picard action.
The next Slashdot story will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and slashdot the links early!
Wasnt it the one without Kirk as captain??
One interesting way to put Star Trek back into the culture of its time is to watch the movie, "Forbidden Planet" and then Watch the first two, filmed, episodes of Star Trek: "The Cage" ie the original pilot, and , "Where No Man has Gone Before."
For a similar effect try "2001 a Space Odyssey" and "Space 1999" or "Star Wars" and "Battlestar Galactica".
SHATNER: Money.
NIMOY: Yeah. The big, the big bucks.
SHATNER: Money. The money gets you fired up.
TOGETHER: The biiiig bucks.
http://www.cnn.com/2006/SHOWBIZ/TV/09/06/star.tre
The problem with socialism is that they always run out of other people's money. - Margaret Thatcher
TVLand is showing four episodes tonight starting a 8PM:
Man Trap (the first broadcasted )
City on the Edge of Forever
Trouble with Tribbles
Platos Stepchildren
I think these are ones with new digital F/X, but not sure.
Star Trek
Enterprise
I was thinking about this the other day when I opened my Razr to make a call. And it suddenly occured to me how much my phone reminded me of the old ST communicators especially when I flip it open to make a call. Too bad I don't have the sound effect to go along.
Now if I could only figure out a way to turn my PDA into a fully functional phaser...
What if the Hokey Pokey really is what it's all about?
A good book to read.
"Boarding the enterprise: transporters, tribbles, and the vulcan death grip in Gene Roddenberry's Star Trek ISBN: 978-1-932100-87-7"
---
Just have a ball with your vehicle.
Below are the characteristics of each TV series based on "Star Trek".
1. Original Series: brash captain, hot-looking women, dangerous adventures in a ship designed for living but not for tourism
2. The Next Generation: refined captain who talks like an English professor, women who emphasize their intellect, adventures in a ship designed like a luxury hotel
3. Deep Space Nine: captain who talks like a high-school dropout, women who emphasize their intellect, adventures in a space hotel
4. Voyager: captain who emphasizes her intellect, women who emphasize their intellect, dangerous adventures in a ship designed like a luxury hotel
5. Enterprise: captain played by an actor who cannot act, women who emphasize their intellect, dangerous adventures in a ship run by characters played by actors and actresses who cannot act
Thank Buddha that your local CW television station will air the original "Star Trek", starting on September 16.
"Watch 'The Original Series', you will!" exclaims Yoda.
So many good Star Trek books are coming out, so little time. Wouldn't be too bad if the Temporal Authority didn't take away my time machine.
My DVR is currently trained to record all Star Trek and STNG shows. It's a blast scrolling through them and picking one to watch. I was hooked in 1976.
Where's the 0xBEEF
You forgot the animated series.
Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?
...and the guy who originally cancelled the series in the 60's,
kicks himself, *again*.
I lived near Lubbock Texas. The local station didn't carry the first season of Star Trek. The second season was rebroadcast the following Saturday afternoon.
They did carry the third season in prime time.
Not sure why.
> It stood outside of time, as it tapped into universal themes and epic struggles, and put the cosmos on notice.
Way to go, Star Trek. You've put us all On Notice. Let's hope Steve Colbert can forgive us, eventually.
It was actually the sixth episode, it was just the first one aired.
3. Deep Space Nine: captain who talks like a high-school dropout, women who emphasize their intellect, adventures in a space hotel I disagree, he enunciated every word like an oxford drop out.
I often have trouble remembering which way is out of bed in the morning.
1. Directing.
2. Writing.
3. Intro/Score.
Did anyone catch the roast on Comedy Central? It was hilarious, and even had some music by Warp 11, that Star Trek tribute band that was in the movie Trekkies 2 (great band!). Plus tons of obligatory homosexual jokes because George Takei was there. Funny stuff, check it out if you get a chance.
Cool links.
It was the ideal the show tried to put across. The idea of all the various ethnic groups working and living together as they brought peace and justice to the far flung corners of the Galaxy. Remember this was also the first inter-racial kiss on US television, Uhura and Kirk. Although they were under alien mind control at the time and the camera actually never registered the event. That episode was never shown in the South of course.
With hindsight the characters were a bit steriotypical. Scotty the Scotish engineer (what else). Nurse Christine Chapel and Spock as the token Alien.
And right in the middle of the cold war, there on the bridge was Sulu and Chekov, possibly the only Russian sounding name the viewer would be familiar with. Better that Svyatoslav Likhovtseva or that other guy perry stroika.
Ignoring the cardboard sets and the fact that all the alien planets looked the same it did make a huge impact. A number of scientists say they took their inspiration from it.
davecb5620@gmail.com
Why are there no arabs on the enterprise?
Gene was asked that question... $1 in goodwill to the first person that knows his response.
/\/\icro/\/\uncher
i still have my 25th anniversary Star Trek fan membership card and fondly remember the 25th anniversary NES game.
God, i feel old. and i'm only 24.
grey wolf
LET FORTRAN DIE!
Let's all celebrate by getting drunk and harassing Klingons!
The Star Trek New Voyages folks are using this anniversary for the premiere of their latest episode "To Serve All My Days". It was written by DC Fontana and guest stars Walter Koeinig. Check out all of the episodes and shorts do far at: http://www.startreknewvoyages.com/
Cheers, Xleeko
..."I don't think you are really Ricardo Montalban..."
Called How William Shatner Changed the World.
Another page goes into some detail about the show, and lists the next airing (in the US). November 13 at 8pm ET
If anyone needs me, I'll be in the Angry Dome.
It was moving, tragic and anything but cheesy.
Not to mention it made me wet my pants. I still have nitemares about that lady, especially as my wife likes to mess with my head and will grab my face with her fingertips in the middle of the night...
Thanks for reminding me that I'll be 40 next year !
Sung to the tune of "Saftey Dance", George Takei's words are in italics, as spoken by himself.
"S-U-L-U Sulu DANCE!"
You can dance like Sulu hello
And shake your little behind yes
You've gotta give it a chance when you do the sulu and dance and you're friends will say oh my
I say, jump around if you want to and move your arms like a machine yes
If you do the sulu dance while wearing tight pants some people may call you a queen
The sulu dance! Sulu! Sulu! Just fine! Sulu! Sulu! Now that's ridiculous!
Sulu dance is fun to do, well
but you're girl may get jealous no
cause if you abuse you'll girl will lose it and run up and say who is this?
ahhh, you can dance like sulu you know
but some may choose to not no
you gotta give it a chance when you do the sulu dance and you'll girl will give up the balloon knot
We are aware of society's problems. We just don't care.
If we eliminate the other side of an issue, the issue is fixed.
WE ARE THE GOP. YOU WILL BE ASSIMILATED. (or eliminated)
Why would Republican-ville care about a show that promoted awareness of society's problems?
Texas has traditionally elected more Democrats than Republicans to state offices. Only recently have Republicans won a majority.
Why would they want to watch some show that promoted equality among races, sex & aliens in 1966 Texas?
It was also one of the first states to elect African Americans and women to elected office.
Texas has had it's share of idiots and people who do bad things, but there are a lot of people who live there (over 22 million), so its not shocking that a few percent are idiots. Texas also has a large number of military institutions, and the military was WAY ahead of the rest of the population when it came to racial integration. Perfect? Of course not, but do your homework.
Hey, you don't like Texas, fine, don't visit or move there. But get your facts straight. It's like listening to Microsoft talk about why Linux is more expensive than Windows.
I always hated Star Trek. It creates such an unbelievable vision of the future. Everything is so pristine, but you never the the laborers or even robots to keep it that way. Even the actors (in the Next Generation and later) were stiff and spoke perfect emotionless english. Just a bunch of cold automatons moving through pristine sci-fi sets.
Contrast that with the original Star Wars trilogy. Everything is dirty, weathered and worn. The banter added to the credibility of the characters. Humans aren't living in some utopian vision with just the occassional evil alien to battle. I had the Star Wars RPG as a kid and their description of the Star Wars feel nailed it. Lucas' characters felt like they actually lived in their world. They weren't impressed with their own technology. I remember after the first shot of the Millenium Falcon (which is amazing to the movie viewer), Luke calls it a piece of junk. It's a small remark, but it tells you a hell of a lot about the setting the writer is trying to present.
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
"That episode made American (and perhaps world) television history with the first inter-racial kiss shown on television(Kirk and Uhura)."
This is one of those really annoying myths that seem to live forever.
That was NOT the first inter-racial kiss.
There was a TV show that pre-dates Star Trek and had not just many inter-racial kisses but an inter-racial marriage and a mixed race child.
Everyone seems to for get I Love Lucy.
Ricky Riccardo was Hispanic and Lucy was most certainly not.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
That's just super. How does Texas treat Mexicans?
My facts are straight, where I went to school, we were taught that the Alamo was a battle to liberate slaves being held by the Americans. Funny how history looks different on other sides of the boarder, isn't it?
When a captain could slap his short skirted
yeoman on the butt and say "Get me some coffee, honey."
When a giant space Lincoln could use words like 'nigress'.
They don't make them like that anymore...
Yeah, in 1966 in rural Texas, the GOP was in charge of two things: jack and squat. That was firmly Democrat territory until the late-70's to early-80's but nice pathetic attempt at trying to make censorship a party-centric issue.
In fact, the scene they aired did not have an actual kiss between Uhura and Kirk. It just looked like it. I heard Shatner talking about it on some talk show - he was disappointed that they didn't actually get the first interracial kiss on TV.
The joke would have been funnier if the title had been :Death by Random.
...why don't you marry him?
lets get drunk and harrass the federation!
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
So, I'm over at my friend's house and I want to watch...Lost in Space.
Yes, they were both in re-runs by that time, but still opposite each other on Channels 9 and 33 in Baton Rouge, LA.
Friend's got a much better show (what was I at the time? seven or eight?): Star Trek. And the first episode I ever saw was "The Man Trap"
I didn't sleep that night.
Years later, in college, I'm still playing "name that trek" (First person to name the episode wins. If nobody names the episode 10s after it starts, game's over, no winner).
I won more than not. At a hardcore geek school (RPI).
Yes, I realize Star Trek was crappy television played by mediocre actors with lame special effects.
Preachy and unrealistic, the writing was among the worst literature ever produced.
The stories were so derivative of themselves they became exponentially worse each time another ST series or movie was produced.
And I still love it.
Star Trek, B5, Logan's Run, Anderson, Vonnegut, Bear, Benford, Brin, Heinlein, Asimov, Bradbury, Niven (with and without Pournelle), Cherryh, Chalker, Leslie Fish, Le Guin, Van Vogt, Verne, Wells, Baen (let's not forget the BFL), Saberhagen, and a hundred others.
Either you're a SF fan or you're not.
And if you are, then you already know who's going to be in the spaceships when they land.
"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, it doesn't go away." - Philip K. Dick
Damn I'm feeling old...
Beam me up Scotty!
The race isn't always to the swift... but that's the way to bet!
Remember Remember the Eighth of September
The Enterprise, phasers, and Spock
I know of no reason that Star Trek's first season
Should ever be forgot
Sorry, I couldn't resist.
About a year ago I tried to generate interest in having them fired -- out of a cannon -- but it didn't seem to go anywhere (at least not anywhere that no one has gone before...)
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he's not gonna have any luck picking up the hot alien chicks (that is, if Riker doesn't get to them first)
Riker is about a good with the ladies as the guy who wrote nmap. My wife and I were watching an episode on G4 the other night. An alien chick was thowing herself at Riker. He was standing there going "Hammina, Hammina, Hammina." If that was Kirk, he would have had her nine ways to Sunday before the next commercial.
Heh. My captcha word was "dainty." Just like Riker.
Three words: Needs more rasslin'.
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What's it called when you have too much irony in your blood....
Let's get drunk and harass the Browncoats!
Please, for the good of Humanity, vote Obama.
So let me get this straight - you're claiming that Avery Brooks talks like a high school dropout? Dropout from which high school, Phillips? All I can think of is the scene from Hollywood Shuffle when an actor shouts out "I can do it in iambic pentameter!!!"
I recall getting mono-color polyester long sleeve shirts in 1967, just like the ones on Star Trek.
Come to think of it, when I would wear the red(*) one, the kids at school would beat me up.
(*)Inside joke. Ordinary crewmen wore red shirts. You knew if they beamed done to the planet with the officers, the red-shirt guy got killed.
Hmmmm,
.5mm behind the hole you made, inside the case. Fasten it there with some crazy glue or epoxy. NO WOOD GLUE FOR GODS SAKE. Someone once tried it with wood glue, now they have a crater named after him. Elmer's Crater they call it.
Well, first dig the universal translator out of your arm and pry that little piece of dilithium out of it. Careful not to damage the transtators, you're gonna need those later.
Next you need to crack open your PDA. Drill a hole in the leading edge of the PDA. This is where your emitter element will go. Dont worry too much about getting the size right. The first test firing will finish the hole quite nicely.
Next place the dilithium chip about
Ok, now, reroute the plasma flow from the PDA's reservoir through one of the transtators from the translator. Direct the output at one side of the dilithium chip so it acts as a lens for the output of the transtator....
What do you mean, you dont have a plasma reservoir in your PDA? Then, how do you power it? What? Chemical BATTERIES?
Ugh. Stone knives and bearskins....
Dude, the reason why Star Trek is on hold right now is due to Berman. Paramount is waiting for their contract with him to run out before continuing with the franchise. Watch the YouTube video where Marina Sirtis, Garret Wong, and Robin Curtis talk about this (though it's rather brief).
What's so bad about being lazy? What if there was a war and nobody showed up?
Women emphasizing their intellect? I was probably watching other shows...
... of ... nine ... if _that_ outfit was emphasizing her intellect, _I_, for one, wasn't paying attention correctly.
2. Tasha Yar (doin' it with Data!!!) and Deanna Troi (Riker and Worf)...
3. Jadzia Dax (doin' it with Worf!!!)
4. Seven
5. Hoshi Sato (doin' it in Risa, and with the mirror Capn'), T'Pol (doin' it with Trip -- and in occasion, imaginarily or alternative-realityly, with Reed, with the Capn' and with the Doc!!!), and _Three_ Green Babes. Don't forget Erika Hernandez (doin' it with Archer!)
It's better to be the foot on the boot than the face on the pavement. ~~ tkx Kadin2048
The best captain was Sisko. He punched Q in the face.
Kirk and Picard are a tie IMHO. Good captains.
Janeway and Archer, on the other side...
But, really, vim rocks, debian (kubuntu) is the best distro, and I own the truth.
It's better to be the foot on the boot than the face on the pavement. ~~ tkx Kadin2048
What does this say about the poster: He's afraid of smart women.
Please, for the good of Humanity, vote Obama.
Give me an adventure in space. Stop taking the thing so seriously. Quit trying to make bullshit technology sound like it was meant to work in the real world. I don't believe that transporters could work any more than I think being bitten by a radioactive spider will make me able to shoot webs. I'm not interested in a crew that can wank on about philosophy or captains chosen for their ability to "look concerned" and quote shakespeare. ST was an adventure show, it may have originally had a bit of philosophical and technological "spice", but it wasn't a deep show, and I wish they'd go back to that style rather than the current "soap opera" thing. I want a soap opera, I'll watch a soap opera.
ps happy birthday or some junk.
I have a printout of this hanging on the wall.
Top 10 things likely to be overheard if you had a Klingon on your software development team:
1. "This code is a piece of crap! You have no honor!"
2. "A TRUE Klingon warrior does not comment his code!"
3. "By filing this bug you have questioned my family honor. Prepare to die!"
4. "You question the worthiness of my Code?! I should kill you where you stand!"
5. "Our competitors are without honor!"
6. "Specs are for the weak and timid!"
7. "This machine is a piece of GAGH! I need dual Pentium processors if I am to do battle with this code!"
8. "Perhaps it IS a good day to Die! I say we ship it!"
9. "My program has just dumped Stova Core!"
10. "Behold, the keyboard of Kalis! The greatest Klingon code warrior that ever lived!"
Enjoy,
It's just the normal noises in here.
Right. Just like if you don't want gay men touching your penis, you're probably homophobic. Maybe the guy isn't afraid of smart women, maybe he just wants to see some hot ass.
With the abomination of the *entire* second half of the Star Wars sexology, it's safe to come right out and say it: Star Trek is the more successful franchise.
It was a love story with a sci-fi twist, borne of a relationship from the doctor's past, featuring a monster that, in the end, just wanted to live.
This sounds like the episode with creature that took human form but when alone with someone would revert to alien form and suck all the salt from their body. Can anybody confirm whether that's the same one?
re: 3. You think all high school dropouts can succintly explain the concept of linear time? Whoa.
Buddha isn't Santa Claus. You are apparently substituting Buddha for the Christian God, who most *treat* like Santa Claus (e.g. Thank God that your local...). Poor form.
Everything is so pristine, but you never [see] the laborers or even robots to keep it that way.
Peon Trek: Tues 8:30pm: Title: "Klingons Cling, Part 2", Description: "R2D2 finds gum jamming the towel dispenser while an Endorian janitor scraps Klingon excretment from the top of the ceiling."
Table-ized A.I.
Avery Brooks sounds like a high school dropout? And Captain Kirk is wimpy! What in the world could make you say such an obviously, extremely false thing? Perhaps you meant to say he sounded like a Shakesperean actor out of one side of his face, and a high school dropout out of the other? Fans of the original series should get my point, which isn't very pretty.
Hide all sigs: Click HELP+Prefs (top), VIEWING (last on right), DISABLE SIGS (3rd on left) and SAVE (hidden at bottom).
Per the Wikipedia, the kiss wasn't real.
I have seen other sites that claim it was. I dunno.
I agree. The earnest optimism is painful - though today the old series is enjoyable precisely because it is a dated artifact of its time. The story in which the crew deduce an alien blob of light must be female because it cares for a man marooned on a planet stands out for its hilarious casual sexism.
TNG is another matter. Here society and culture are static. Even on a ship with hundreds of civilian family members, art, music, fashion, and literature are frozen in time. When the crew enjoy art, it is always Shakespeare and classical music. Our lives today are awash in culture; TNG's Federation is dead by comparison.
The underlying assumption in so many episodes is that people can agree if only they understand each other: the stories were famous for building up to a crisis only to defuse it. But in a truly free society, the diversity of perspectives and opinions will give rise to genuine conflicts with no simple way out (the debate between pro-choice and pro-life positions, for example). The utopian "optimism" of TNG is that of a totalitarian society in which real differences have been eliminated.
I remember watching the first episode of TNG with such enthusiasm when I was a kid. My interest soon faded; to me, Star Trek's future was - and is - a kind of man-made hell. (In fairness, this may have been somewhat remedied in DS9 et. al., of which I have seen very little.)
That's exactly what I want to see too, when I watch sci-fi movies. Some pr0n involving hot chicks doin' it with nerds. That's the '-fi' part that i'm searching for.
Sisko punched Q in the face. Sisko absolutely rules. He defended DS9 with a handful of photon torpedoes using the sensor shadow trick, and when the klingons came thinking he was repeating himself, he served them a whole can of whoopass.
It's better to be the foot on the boot than the face on the pavement. ~~ tkx Kadin2048
Oh my god, people, I've read "Sisco" nearly 40 times already! It's SISKO. Benjamin SISKO. Go check StarTrek.com if you need to. Every single one of you just lost your right to be called a Trekkie. Turn in your combadges and your phasers immediately!
1. Original Series: brash captain, hot-looking women, dangerous adventures in a ship designed for living but not for tourism
If by "brash," you mean "talentless ego-maniac," then yes. Also, I dispute your claim of the women being "hot-looking".
2. The Next Generation: refined captain who talks like an English professor, women who emphasize their intellect, adventures in a ship designed like a luxury hotel
Spot on.
3. Deep Space Nine: captain who talks like a high-school dropout, women who emphasize their intellect, adventures in a space hotel
Wait, what? "Captain who talks like a high-school dropout"? Sisko speaks perfectly well. He was typically a little more jovial than the other captains, but I don't see anything wrong with that. I think you accidentally let some of your racism show through.
4. Voyager: captain who emphasizes her intellect, women who emphasize their intellect, dangerous adventures in a ship designed like a luxury hotel
Just what is it you have against shows that portray females as intelligent people? The whole "women-as-set-pieces" concept should have died along with the original series, what a shame it lives on in the form of you.
5. Enterprise: captain played by an actor who cannot act, women who emphasize their intellect, dangerous adventures in a ship run by characters played by actors and actresses who cannot act
I can handle inexperienced actors, the real travesty here was the writers. "Oooh, I know, let's create a new Star Trek to predate the others, but instead of writing new material, let's just rehash all of the characters, places, and technology from the other series' whilst excusing the overall sheer implausibility of it with a bit of hand-waving!"
Other comments;
* You cannot really appreciate Dilbert unless you've read it in the original Klingon.
* Indentation?! I will show you how to indent when I indent your skull!
* What is this talk of 'release'? Klingons do not make software 'releases'. Our software escapes, leaving a bloody trail of designers and quality assurance people in its wake!
* Klingon function calls do not have "parameters" - they have "arguments"- and they ALWAYS WIN THEM.
* Debugging? Klingons do not debug. Our software does not coddle the weak.
* I have challenged the entire Quality Assurance team to a Bat-Leh contest! They will not concern us again.
* Our users will know fear and cower before our software! Ship it! Ship it and let them flee like the dogs they are!