Although it undoubtedly goes without saying at this late date, the original
Star Trek is the most popular and influential science fiction series ever seen on American network televsion--and as far as many people are concerned, it remains absolutely the best TV series of any kind. The weekly, hour-long
Star Trek was conceived as "
Wagon Train in outer space" by its creator,
Gene Roddenberry, who had long labored in the TV-western mills before his pet project made its NBC debut on September 8, 1966. Describing space as "the final frontier" in the opening narration, Captain James T. Kirk (
William Shatner), commander of the starship U.S.S. Enterprise, informed the viewer that his vessel's five-year mission was to "seek out new life forms and new civilizations", and "to boldly go where no man has gone before." The series was set in the 23rd century, a time in which most of the various intergalactic civilizations (with the notable exception of the warlike Klingons!) had forged a lasting peace and formed the United Federation of Planets, for whom the Enterprise was the flagship. While the heroic, self-sacrificing Kirk was the leading character and primary plot motivator, the series' most famous character was the Enterprise's pointy-eared first officer/science officer Mr. Spock (
Leonard Nimoy). Born on the planet Vulcan and the product of a Vulcanian father and human mother, Mr. Spock was cool, unflappable, unemotional, meticulously logical--and to thousands upon thousands of female
Star Trek enthusiasts, irresistable. Other members of the multiethnic crew included Dr. Leonard "Bones" McCoy (
DeForest Kelley), the ship's short-tempered chief medical officer ("Dammit, Jim, I'm a doctor, not a mind-reader!"); chief engineer Montgomery "Scotty" Scott (
James Doohan); Lt. Uhura (
Nichelle Nichols), the African American communications officer; Lt. Sulu (
George Takei), the Asian helmsman; nurse Christine Chapel (played by {Majel Barrett, later Mrs.
Gene Roddenberry); and, beginning in the second season, Russian-born ensign Pavel Chekov (
Walter Koenig). Another principal character, Yeoman Janice Rand (Grace Lee Whitney), appeared sporadically during the first two seasons. Unlike so many other sci-fi/fantasy programs,
Star Trek favored strong characterizations and solid story values over gadgetry and monsters: indeed, it was originally touted as "TV's first adult science fiction series." As such, the program attracted the best writers of the genre, among them
Richard Matheson, Theodore Sturgeon,
Robert Bloch, David Gerrold and
Harlan Ellison, and the series' prolific story consultant, D.C. Fontana). Even so, there were still plenty of special photographic effects, which may seem a bit primitve when seen today but were sufficiently