Who knew? It was 50 years ago tonight that the original Star Trek premiered on NBC, and strange as it sounds now, it wasn't a big success. As explained at variety.com, initial reviews were iffy and the show only lasted three seasons:
“And
away we go to another planet for the sci-fi buffs to lick the plate clean,” Variety‘s
Sept. 8, 1966 review of the premiere episode, “The Man Trap,” declared. “But
there had better be a hefty cargo of them or the Nielsen samplers may come up
short.” Predicting doom, it continued, “The opener won’t open up many new
frequencies after this sampler.” So not exactly boffo.
The
review was typical of the initial response to Gene Roddenberry’s science
fiction drama. After a troubled development that saw the initial pilot scrapped
and a new one with mostly new characters — the only holdover being Leonard
Nimoy’s Spock — created from scratch, “Star
Trek” hung on for a short while, renewed for a second, then a third season
before being cancelled.
The
run was just long enough to create a library that would catch fire years later
in syndication, finding a popularity it never achieved in its first window. A
TV show that had at best been a moderate success for NBC would spawn four
live-action spinoff series — soon to be five with the addition of CBS All
Access’ “Star Trek: Discovery” — 13 movies, one animated series, comic books,
postage stamps, documentaries, tell-all books, conventions and untold units of
prosthetic ears sold. When Nimoy died last year, the White House issued a
lengthy statement from President Obama in which he wrote, “I loved Spock.” Read the article here.
People.com has a fun article featuring "19 things you never knew" about the original show, including the fact that Captain Kirk was partially modeled on Horatio Hornblower, nope didn't know that; Klingon is the most widely spoken fictional language, didn't know, don't care; and Leonard Nimoy's father owned a barbershop. Apparently kids would come in and request a "Spock" haircut, with no idea the barber had a real-life connection to the character. Read it here.
I'm also celebrating a personal milestone today. One year ago I went under the knife and got a new left hip, and I'm happy to report that it's working just fine.
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