Star Date: Season 1 Episode 3

Charlie X

"We're at the hands of an adolescent." Spock

The Enterprise meets Charlie Evans courtesy of the cargo ship, Antares. Charlie is an adolescent boy suffering some serious teen angst and need for approval. Unfortunately he's lacking any and all social skills due to spending almost his entire life growing up with on other humans on the planet Thasus. Wouldn't be such a big deal but... Charlie has some wicked mind powers dunh-Dunh-DAHHH! After a few frustrated efforts at friendmaking Charlie starts acting out and crewman start vanishing.

That's Telekinesis KIRK!

Click for more.

CASUALTIES:

Captain Ramart
(the "t" is silent. duh)

Lieutenant Tom Nellis

and the entire survey ship...

Antares
Crew of 20

It could have been worse folks. Charlie raised all hell on the Enterprise before the Thasians interceded and returned the ship to normal. They couldn't save the Antares though.

PERFORMANCE DEVELOPMENT:
  Shat-Attack!  It could be me, but this episode seems to show off for the first time all the fantastic William Shatner school of acting techniques we love.  Unpredictable and varied timed pauses. Impish grins. Volume veering all over the place. Right hand flourishes.He even takes Charlie to Fight-School!

Bones! He is on it once again. Comedic delivery is tight. Balletic strides on-camera. DeForest Kelley is my hero.

The Romance Escalates! So... Spock is warming to Uhura. Love is in the air as Uhura improvise a little Ode de Spock as our favorite Vulcan provides Vulcan-Harp accompaniment. Nichelle Nichols kills it in this scene as well. I am jealous of every pair of eyes there that day.

REACTION:
As I type I am watching this episode for the sixth time. I'm not going to say this is the episode where I GOT Star Trek - that seems to overstate it - but this is the point where something happened. So much in this episode. Telekinesis. Melodrama. Spock/Uhura. Bones humor. Shat-Attacks. Then the Themes! The dangerous youths. Juvenile Psychology. Crime and Punishment. Does it take a village to raise a child or just one good father figure? And an extra special amount of crossed eyes courtesy of Robert Walker Jr. And finally the great problem-solving of Captain Kirk.  If you can, take a moment and check minute 41:42 to see the very first all-out William Shatner brainstorm performance. You'll be treated to simultaneously wonderful and and awful moments just crammed together so close it can't be anything but delightful. Kelley and Nimoy doing the camera friendly stage-glide at 41:45. Thank you for that director. Thank you.

Well, I'm all in now. This is entirely too much fun.

Star Date: Season 1 Episode 2 The Man Trap

THE MAN TRAP

Captain Kirk, Dr. McCoy and Creman Darnell make a stop to planet M-113 to deliver supplies and offer routine medical check-ups. One catch though: one of this planet's inhabitants is none other Bones' ex-Special Lady Friend, Nancy. Turns out, Nancy's quite the looker. As in, she'll look like whatever she feels like - dunh-Dunh-DAHH - Nancy's a shapeshifter who sucks all the salt out of her victims! And now the show starts taking off... cuz some crew is gonna die. For more details click.

INTRODUCING:

William Shatner as Captain James T. Kirk

Deforest Kelly as Dr. Leonard McCoy

Nichelle Nichols as Lieutenant Nyota Uhura

George Takei as Lieutenant Hikaru Sulu

CASUALTIES:

Crewman Darnell

Crewman Sturgeon

Crewman Green

Crewman Barnhart

Dr. Crater and the Salt Sucker Creature both went down as well.
A bloody first episode.

TECH:

Bluetooth!

Looks almost as silly now as it did then!

Reaction:

Billy Shat's here people! Now we're rollng! Show does sort of pull me in. But admittadly I'm not sure if it's the show right now or just the knowledge of what this show becomes. Regardless, I admit a little thrill when Captain Kirk starts in with "Space, the final frontier...." The music is fun. These first few episodes have a Twilight Zone vibe as well that I sort of dig.

Questions:

Who is Yeoman Rand and where did she go?

Where the hell is Scotty? I want Scotty!

Star Date: Season 1, Episode 1, Pilot: The Cage

Synopsis: Captain Pike and the crew receive a distress signal from Talos IV, a remote planet where another ship is thought to have crash landed 18 years ago. Pike doesn't want to investigate, believing the crew likely dead. Besides, he's still reeling from losing some crew on the last planet. Spock, realizing this would make for a very boring pilot episode, looks quite concerned.

Frankly, Pike's pretty bummed out. He'd like a horse and a pasture. He tells his doctor about it. Is this the tiny seed, a man in a powerful position who makes life and death decisions and ponders the ethics of his profession, that would later bloom into another groundbreaking series: HBO's The Soprano's? Certainly.

Well... looking to spice up the show Spock locates readings of life on the planet and Captain Pike brings down a small crew to investigate. And our famous Star Trek formula really get rolling.

The crew investigates the planet ____________. Some sort of alien excrement hits the ScyFy fan. The crew has to _________________________ and they learn ___________________.

In the pilot:

The crew investigates the planet Talos IV. They discover some groovy old Trekkers who actually turn out to be illusions projected by aliens with giant heads, bad teeth and telepathic powers. The aliens kidnap Captain Pike and the rest of the crew has to help Captain Pike escape The Mind Prison



Things are already very confusing.

I have no idea who most of these people are. We have Mr. Spock.
But no Captain Kirk, no Dr. McCoy, no Scotty.
No Scotty?!!!!

So... I did some research. This episode never aired.

It was considered too cerebral.