It begins…

My name is Chris Scullion, and I’ve never seen Star Trek in my life.

Actually, that’s not entirely true: I saw the 2009 movie directed by JJ Abrams and was a wee bit lost because I didn’t know what was going on.

But that’s it. I’ve never seen a single episode of any Star Trek TV series or any of the other movies. I couldn’t even tell you how many of them there are.

I don't know enough yet to properly illustrate this article so I just googled 'Star Trek' and this picture came up
I don’t know enough yet to properly illustrate this article so I just googled ‘Star Trek’ and this picture came up

Recently it came to my attention that Netflix UK has added every series of Star Trek to its library. I realised this is my chance to finally see what I’ve been missing out on. Or, indeed, to see if I’ve even been missing out at all.

Being a bit of a collectophile though, I’m not content with just watching a couple of episodes. If I’m going to start watching Star Trek, I’m going to want to make sure I see all of the bastard.

That’s where Star Trek Virgin comes in. My goal – and it’s one that I expect will take me a long time, to be clear – is to watch every single Star Trek TV episode and movie in the order they were aired.

I sure hope I eventually get to find out what they're looking at
I sure hope I eventually get to find out what they’re looking at

After I watch an episode, I’ll then write up a short 150-200 word review and post it on here, explaining my thoughts on what I just watched and my evolving opinion of Star Trek in general.

The hope is that if you’ve never seen Star Trek either you’ll watch each episode alongside me, and if you have you’ll get to experience it all over again through the eyes of someone completely new to the whole thing.

I’ll post another article tomorrow explaining the schedule (once I’ve done a bit of research), but for now here’s a comical fake Q&A bit answering some of the questions you may have.


Who are you then?

My name is Chris Scullion. I’ve been a video games journalist for a decade and am currently freelancing. I’ve got a gaming website called Tired Old Hack and a website dedicated to bad movies called That Was A Bit Mental.

Have you really never seen any Star Trek episodes or movies other than the 2009 film?

I promise I haven’t. I’ve always been a Star Wars man and when I was younger Star Trek always seemed too dull to me.

Why are you watching it now, then?

A lot of my friends and people I follow on Twitter mention it a lot, and seem to be fond of it (in particular The Next Generation, for some reason). I trust their judgement on other things so I’ve decided that maybe it isn’t as boring as I thought it was.

I googled 'Star Trek' for this one too. I'm concerned that the lad on the left is in blackface. Hopefully it all makes sense and he's had an accident with some spaceship exhaust oil or something
I googled ‘Star Trek’ for this one too. I’m concerned that the lad on the left is in blackface. Hopefully it all makes sense and he’s just had an accident with some spaceship exhaust oil or something

How much Star Trek knowledge do you have just now?

This is pretty much everything I know about Star Trek from what I’ve gleamed over the years:

• William Shatner is Captain Kirk
• Leonard Nimoy is Spock
• The ship is called the Enterprise
• The guy who plays the Asian one is gay in real life, and there’s a black woman called Uhura which was a big deal in the ’60s or whenever it came out because it was good to see a black woman in a strong role
• There’s a guy called Scotty who may or may not be Scottish, I don’t know
• They ask Scotty to beam them up sometimes
• Spock does a hand thing that looks like a gang sign but actually means “live long and prosper”
• There was the original series, an animated one, The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine and some other ones I can’t remember the name of without Googling them
• There are baddies called Klingons and they talk a different language
• That’s it

That really isn’t a lot.

I know. In fact, the most I’ve ever been involved with Star Trek is when William Shatner blocked me from Twitter for telling a joke about him:

I don’t get it.

That’s probably just as well.

So you’re really going to review every episode? That’s going to take you ages!

Yup, it probably will. This isn’t a six-month project or anything, I can genuinely see it taking years. Or hey, maybe I’ll realise after a month that I fucking hate Star Trek and will scrap the project altogether. That’s part of the excitement. Probably.

Either way, the reviews will only be short ‘capsule’ reviews of 150-200 words each. I can’t commit to big 1000-word efforts, especially when I’ve got other stuff going on what with my games site, my B-movie site and the little matter of my 9-to-5 job. This way, at least, updates should be regular.

Are you really a virgin?

A Star Trek one, yes.

But I mean, are you…

It’s a figure of speech. I’m happily married, you cheeky prick.

How will I know when you’ve posted a new episode review?

You can follow me on Twitter, where I’ll post a link every time I watch a new episode. Alternatively, there’s a button on the top of the right-hand column that lets you follow the site: every time I post a new review you’ll automatically get an email telling you about it.

Hey, you never know, I might end up reviewing the games too
Hey, you never know, I might end up reviewing the games too

Anything else I can do?

Yup. Please do spread the word, especially in the future if one of my reviews particularly tickles you (my writing style on other sites involves a lot of bad jokes, and that isn’t going to change here).

My other request is that you don’t be a dick and spoil what’s coming up. Since this is all new to me I want to discover it for the first time (as does anyone else who’s watching the episodes at the same pace as me).

Finally, please don’t start telling me which series or episodes are better than others. I do appreciate that you mean well and are trying to help but since I plan on watching absolutely everything and doing it in order, telling me Deep Space Nine is your favourite isn’t really much good to me if I’m not going to get round to that one until a year or two from now.

Fair enough. So do you have a schedule or something?

Well, like I say, I know next to nothing so to be honest I don’t even know what every series is and what order I should watch it all in.

Tomorrow night after work I’ll investigate and write up a plan for the order I’ll watch each series and each movie. I’m aiming to watch them in the original air date / release date if possible.

Good luck, and may the Force be with you.

That’s Star Wars.

Mate, I’m you, I don’t know any Star Trek quotes yet.

Aye, true enough.

"NANU NANU"
“NANU NANU”

One thought on “It begins…

Leave a comment