Star Trek: The Original Series
Season 1 Episode 1
Original airdate: 8 September 1966

“We’re all aware of the need for salt on a hot planet like this, professor. But it’s a mystery, and I don’t like mysteries. They give me a bellyache and I’ve got a beauty right now.”

The very first shot that greeted me when I started the first episode of Star Trek on Netflix was a CGI spaceship (presumably the Enterprise) flying past a planet.

I’d imagine this means at some point in the past someone went all George Lucas and made special editions of all the old Star Trek episodes, replacing old shots with CG ones. Either that or the ‘60s had some real fucking special effects warlocks.

The episode opens with Kirk, Dr McCoy (who it turns out is called Leonard, which must be confusing with Leonard Nimoy around) and some other random prick landing on a mysterious planet to examine the couple living there, one of whom is McCoy’s former lover Nancy.

When McCoy sees Nancy she looks the same as she did over a decade ago, but when Kirk looks at her he sees an older woman. And to Crewman McNoname she looks like a young blonde bombshell.

Before long, said anonymous crew member is found dead, covered in mysterious circle marks. Either he’s been cupping like Michael Phelps or some mysterious shit is going down on planet… whatever planet it is.

Turns out this is some sort of creature who can transform its appearance to suit whoever it’s interacting with and kill them with big suction cup hands. Immediately I thought of the Red Dwarf episode ‘Psirens’, where the same thing happens.

I’d imagine this “TV show X did that too” situation is going to pop up with great regularity as it’s clear Star Trek was to sci-fi what The Beatles were to music. So many of these plots are going to be familiar to me because they’ve since been copied by other TV shows or movies.

One aspect that hasn’t been imitated, though, is the creature’s inexplicable love of salt. This addiction ends up being its undoing, as Kirk tempts it over with some salt tablets and it’s forced to reveal its true self, a weird combination of Bigfoot and Birdo from Super Mario Bros 2.

In all, as a first taste of Star Trek this was entertaining enough. Not sure I’m a fan of the 50-minute runtime when it comes to simpler plots like this one, but it looks like it’s something I’m going to have to get used to.

Other thoughts

• My first impression of Spock is that he’s a fucking sap. He gets his arse booted twice in this episode.
• There’s a weird scene in a plant lab where there’s an alien plant on a table. It’s clearly an elaborate glove puppet.
• I love the weird whistling noise the intercom type thing makes when someone’s making a call. I may have to investigate making it my text message tone on my phone.
• That monster suit was a bit elaborate considering it’s only shown for less than a minute.

Up next – Star Trek episode 2: Charlie X