Today Marks The 50th Anniversary of 'Star Trek' (ew.com)

Dave Knott writes: Today marks the 50th anniversary of the first television broadcast of Star Trek. The first episode of the science fiction series was aired on September 8, 1966. From its humble beginnings, Star Trek has gone on to become one of the best-loved and most successful television concepts of all time, an enduring pop culture touchstone that changed science fiction forever and spawned multiple series and movies that continue to this day. What does Star Trek mean to you? Are you a trekkie/trekker? What are your best memories of the series, and how has it affected your life?

Comments

Re:Before the reboot

[irrational_design]

I'm the opposite. I watched some episodes from each of the Star Trek TV series and I think I saw most of the movies, but it never really caught my fancy. But I've _really_ enjoyed the rebooted Star Trek movies. Speaking to other I've found that most Trekkies really don't like the Star Trek reboot, while those who were not Trekkies before like the rebooted movies. Maybe that indicates the rebooted movies aren't "real" Star Trek. I don't really know since I've never been a Trekkie ;-)

It was the day science fiction got real

[hyades1]

As a very young boy, I exhausted the children's area of our small-town library in no time. With my parents' permission and a wonderful librarian, I was allowed to start getting books from the Adults' floor. I was a complete science fiction addict. I went through the whole section. I was even allowed to read stories like Farmer's "The Lovers" and Sturgeon's "Venus Plus X", which at the time were considered very definitely not for children.

I was thoroughly familiar with concepts that are now almost trite, but at the time were pretty much limited to the science fiction community: preserving time lines to preserve reality, the implications of faster-than-light spaceships, matter transmission, parallel universes and a lot more. Television science fiction (except Outer Limits and Twilight Zone) bored me to tears, and Lost In Space made me sick. My parents couldn't figure out why I loved SF books so much, but had no time for "Fireball XL-5".

Then, just as summer was winding down, the networks started promoting the new TV shows for the coming season. And there was Star Trek. Even the very limited "trailers" made it clear this was going to be something different. It delivered in spades. All of the stuff I'd been reading about was brought to life, and I got to watch my family and friends catch onto the same things that had held me spellbound for a good part of my short life. And most important, Star Trek made it clear that we'd get through all the evil and ugliness we saw around us...Vietnam, the assassinations, the Cold War. It was looking pretty bleak there, for a while.

And it also did what science fiction was supposed to do: hold up a mirror to problems in our own world we didn't often discuss openly. Plus (huge bonus) some of the seriously imaginative science fiction writers whose work I loved were writing episodes. My mother, who was a tough, capable woman, cried like a baby at the end of "The City at the Edge of Forever", and my dad was very quiet. They'd both lived through WWII (my dad served with the RAF), and they both knew just how close Hitler came to winning.

But it was that first view of the first promo I remember best...when my sister and I were sitting on the living room floor playing a card game and I looked at the TV and just couldn't believe what I was seeing.

All these years later, I know how lucky I was to see it happen through a child's eyes.

What was once uncool, becomes cool.

[AbRASiON]

I'm very close to 40.
When I was a kid I watched reruns of ToS on TV and some of my dads VHS tapes he got suckered into buying at $30 a pop from some subscription, with only 3 eps per tape. I loved it and I enjoyed sporadically watching TnG as it aired.
Eventually I became a dumb angsty later teen and thought Star Wars was what's cool and Trek was dumb / lame.

As I've gotten older (well 20 years later) and every god damned movie and TV show has taken on a "dark edgey tone" and I've finally started to not give a shit if someone calls me a dork! or nerd! I can accept Star Trek as god damn cool, because it was so out there, it's camp, it's silly, it's great. The humour can be fantastic and the nerdiness I don't need to feel ashamed about. When Star Trek is funny I laugh with it, when it's bad I laugh with it "oh that silly old Star Trek!"

At the core of Star Trek though is that Roddenberry philosophy of an almost utopian future. I can respect that, more and more as I age. As I see the world around me slip in to eventual chaos, the environment becoming a disgrace, capitalism, greed and globalization becoming more intense, the world is becoming a very very dark place and I think it's not going to end well, Star Trek is a welcome, fantasy relief of what would happen if almost all humans all did the right thing, for humanity and the universe not just for themselves.

Heck when I see a 1966 show talk in metres and kilometres and not have smoking on the show despite the lost potential revenue from product placement because that's how it would be in the utopian future, I can see why Gene is so lauded as a visionary.
A great show that I'm finally proud to say I'm a big fan of.

Re:Before the reboot

[Oswald McWeany]

Star Trek: Usually explores morality at it's core. Plot built around a moral conundrum. May be fleshed out with action and explosions at times, but really, the show is about exploring humanity more than it is exploring space.

Reboot Star Trek: Just string a bunch of action sequences together and add a bunch of computer generated graphics. Plot optional.

I don't have a problem with action movies. Look at how popular the super-hero movies are. Star Trek was never about action and explosions; it was a more thoughtful show. This may have made it rather niche (TNG was criticized as being a show about people sitting in meetings making decisions) and sometimes Star Trek blows chunks (like anytime they try and do romance)- but JJ's Star Trek was simply not Star Trek- it was spiderman in space..