 "Why aren't the episodes in order?" | 2009-10-06 |
| - Reviewed By User: A3EBI7BWH8AXS4 |
| My wife and I are a couple of Trekkies and couldn't wait for the series to come out on Blu Ray. You can tell the people who worked on this project put a lot of love and respect into their work. The picture is awesome! I like just looking at the restored and enhanced Enterprise. We have just one quibble; why aren't the episodes in order. We collected the series on VHS and each tape had two episodes with original air dates on them. The episodes in this set don't coincide. What's up with that? |
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| "only two bad things about it." | 2009-09-25 |
| - Reviewed By david_slater |
there is only two bad things about it.
its a full screen show thats not full.
i have side bars on a full screen tv... whats up with that?
other then that its not in the right order.
the singles was in the right order.
if it had not been for the great cleanup on the show i would of stayed with my singles.
at least they was in order.
but they did a great job cleaning it up.
so i had to keep them.
looks funny going from old screen to newer screen then back to old screen on the ship.
come on guys... what was you thinking? O.o
you had it right the first time.
thats why it was the last one i got as a box set.
i have all of the shows and the original series was the last i got as a box set.
and almost did not then being out of order.
but i just could not pass the the great cleanup job yall did.
so for you that can live with that i say buy them for sure.
as for the rest of the info on the show everybody else here covers that part well.
hope this helped. :) |
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 "A perfect Blu Ray release" | 2009-09-16 |
| - Reviewed By andarielhalo |
Everything that is advertised in the adverts for this set (featuring prominently in the Blu Ray Star Trek Movie collection) is absolutely true.
Painstaking effort was put into the digital mastering and restoration of the series, as evidenced in one of the documentaries on the first or second disc, which actually shows what I've never seen before: exactly HOW footage is "digitally mastered" or restored. They show them doing such disgustingly brutal and time-consuming things such as rubbing out and scrubbing scratches, dirt, dust, and other imperfections from film footage. They also show how all the music was re-recorded EXACTLY as it had been in the original show.
For a low-budget TV series in the 1960s, the picture quality is stunning. It never falls below DVD quality, though true Blu Ray perfection is elusive, as many shots suffer from some minor scratching that escaped notice, or blurry or scratchy bits that could not be fine-tuned any further. There are still hundreds of shots and moments that are in perfect Blu Ray detail, and perfect colors and contrast. You can see perfectly now that, keeping true to his green blood, Spock's skin almost always has a greenish tint.
One of the great things about it that always appeases people like me is that you can choose BOTH the original episode or the Remastered versions, separated only by the option once starting an episode, or switching with the previously completely useless "Angle" button.
The show itself utterly astounds and blows me away by just how mature and ahead of its time it is in storytelling and morality. Almost no episode has a clear cut "black and white" context, and there are very infrequently any real villains who are evil simply because script demands it to be so.
Some of the highlight episodes include "Where No Man has Gone Before", the second pilot episode, which features Gary Lockwood (Frank Poole in "2001: A Space Odyssey") playing Gary Mitchell, a navigator on the Enterprise who suddenly gains godlike powers and silver-covered eyes after the ship attempts to blow through an Electromagnetic barrier at the edge of the galaxy.
Rather than explaining anything, it's a complete mystery just what has happened to Gary. We are told and explained how it involves ESP and his psychic response to it, but we never KNOW if his mind was permanently changed, or if an energy creature took control of his mind, or if he was genuinely becoming corrupted. There are scenes where he is struck with extreme energy, causing his silver eyes to disappear, and he looks to Kirk with his normal eyes and calls out weakly "Jim...", only a moment later to have his silver eyes return, and his attitude returning to the haughty "A God am I" sort, leaving Captain Kirk AND us wondering whether Gary could truly be saved, or if it was a trick.
A great many episodes follow this format of morality, and conflicts between what is right and what is logical, and even between two different versions of right. One of the most jarring and mind-blowing episodes for me involved the Enterprise attempting to establish diplomatic relations with a peaceful planet, only to discover they've been at war with their neighboring planet for 500 years... and have fought the war entirely on computer (like video games), and when people die in the computer, they report to suicide booths in real life, in order for the war to progress. No one likes it, but they accept it, because if they do not, they break a treaty, and invite REAL war that could destroy both planets.
And then the episode with Khan, "Space Seed". What I found truly wonderful about the end is how Kirk understands that Khan is not truly evil; he is simply himself. He knows nothing else but to dominate others, and lead them. So rather than imprison Khan for the chaos he caused on the ship, he 'exiles' him and his crew to Ceti Alpha V to form his own little Kingdom, and test his strength and intelligence in surviving the harsh conditions of that world. Khan joyfully accepts the challenge, though "Wrath of Khan" shows us just what became of that 'exile'.
All the discs except one have bonus documentaries on them, with the only questionable one I think being an ego-service one focused entirely on William Shatner, who spends the entire documentary talking about his love of horses and horseriding.
The only flaw with the set involves the sound. The sound quality is superb, but the sound effects and music are INSANELY loud compared to the softness of the dialogue. It is a serious unbalance between the two that causes a constant need to be at the helm of the remote control's volume level.
Aside from that, the set is huge with the episodes, original version or remastered version, extra features, select episode commentaries, and documentaries on a wide variety of subjects, including interviews with Gary Lockwood, Ricardo Montalban, the entire original cast, and Billy Blackburn, who not only was an extra in many episodes, but provides home video footage from the set of some episodes. |
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| "One of the best" | 2009-09-07 |
| - Reviewed By User: A3K73URHOEN4SE |
| I wasn't much of a trekkie before I bought this, but I am a true believer now! With the improved picture, improved sound, and new special effects, this will help bring in those who shunned Star Trek previously. The picture quality is spectacular, and I have been extremely impressed with the clarity of the sound. The new special effects also help eliminate some of the show's cheesiness. Star Trek is a great series, and this is easily one of the best blu-ray releases thus far. If you're sitting on the fence on this one, and you're wondering if it's worth the money, it definitely is. I can't wait for season 2 and 3! |
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| "Very Impressive" | 2009-09-02 |
| - Reviewed By User: A13P2J8HXMBQZZ |
| The picture quality is excellent, never been better. And you have here the both versions of the series the original and the remastered version with the new digital remastering scenes of the enterprise and their universe, and let me tell you this new digital effects are totally awesome, they give to the series a sense of more reality! |
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| "Perhaps the definitive presentation of one of TV's seminal series" | 2009-08-16 |
| - Reviewed By robertwmoore |
I frankly had not watched these episodes in very, very long time. I had seen all of them several times each as a kid, but I never really qualified as a Trekker. I never understood the obsession the show drew for many of its fans. So I was curious to see what my reaction to them would be as a more experienced, adult viewer. I suppose the best way to express my reaction is that I'm aware both of the show's many virtues and many flaws, its achievements and shortcomings. It is true that it is more impressive once you factor in what other American shows at the same time were doing, but despite that it compares rather poorly with what was happening in movies at the time and it has not managed to age very well. A great deal of this stems from the fact that TV had not yet matured as a medium in the late 1960s, partly for technological reasons and partly because of the limitations that the networks placed upon the kinds and complexity of stories that were permitted. Story arcs were always expected to be wrapped up entirely in a single episode, which prevented any kind of sophisticated long term story telling. It was only in the 1990s that networks and studios allowed the kind of extended narrative story telling that makes watching quality TV today more rewarding than seeing even the best movies, while only in the late 1990s did the full range of technologies develop that makes contemporary TV so wonderful (steadicams, stunt techniques depending on wire work, high def video, and a wide range of CGI programs). So yeah, it is great for its time, but it is still very much a product of its time.
One of the most interesting things about rewatching the early episodes is how STAR TREK had not, at that point, become STAR TREK. McCoy is just another character. Sulu is a minor character. Uhura is completely undeveloped. Scottie someone who isn't clearly going to be important in the future. Chekhov not even a part of the show. Gradually the pieces start to fall into place. While Kirk and Spock were almost instantly the characters we associate with them, only gradually did the others become the crew of the Enterprise that we know and in some cases love.
The one thing that stands out to me in rewatching it for the first time in ages is just how outrageously awful William Shatner is as an actor. He carries off the role with great aplomb, but his acting technique is so bizarre that the show can easily - if you choose to see it this way - a comedy. Shatner's business, the timing of his lines, his physical posture. Shatner's outrageousness as an actor can be observed in almost every episode. Heck, almost any line! My favorite moment might be in an early scene in the famous episode "The Arena," where Shatner has to run across an open field. His dodges and feints as he runs are among the funniest things I've ever seen on TV. And let's not even talk about Shatner's bare chest! Though I want to ask, was there some contract signed somewhere stipulating that Capt. Kirk had to either appear without a shirt or with a seriously ripped one each episode? And who wanted to see him in such a state? Potential female viewers? Guys? (Oh my. After saying that we shouldn't talk about Kirk's bare chest, we went ahead and did it.) I will confess that Shatner is so utterly horrible as an actor that he actually passes over into the realm where he is funny as hell. In fact, at times he is so funny that I have to tune his antics out so that I can focus on the more serious events in the show.
The show is famous for breaking a number of barriers on TV. They originally wanted Majel Barrett to be the second in command, and would thereby have given a woman a leadership role unseen in the previous history of television except for Annie Oakley and Emma Peel in THE AVENGERS. Even as it is, the show had women in a number of positions that previously would have been held only by men (though women were not allowed to wield phasers). The ethnic diversity was unheard of. Blacks, Asians, Indians, various Europeans, and all of those both male and female. And in Season Two one of the most prominent characters was a Russian, and this at the height of the Cold War. There was still some latent sexism, such as the function of women as military noncombatants and the appalling miniskits all the female crew had to wear, and the women who threw themselves on Kirk each week. Still, given the era, the role given to women outstripped almost everything that had come before. And this was all in a season before the one in which television's first interracial kiss took place.
The writing on the show was extremely limited by the episodic format that dominated the age. My personal belief is that television didn't really begin to come of age before the development of the serial format in the 1980s and its perfection in the 1990s. There is only so much that you can do in a format that limits all that you are able to do with the narrative to 50 minutes. With that limitation, the writing on the show is as strong as you could hope. Many episodes are regarded as "classic" but really don't hold up very well. Many others are just so-so. Some - like the abominable "The Alternative Factor" are miserably awful. But there are a number that still hold up quite well and are a lot of fun to watch. Again, they are not great by today's standards, but they hold up pretty well.
I'm not a Trekker (nor the more derogatory Trekkie) and frankly didn't become a fan of TV Sci-fi until serial narrative shows started to make their way onto TV (ST DS9, B5, and especially FARSCAPE, FIREFLY, and the new BSG). So I've never been emotionally or imaginatively invested in the world of ST, even though I've seen the shows. Still, I had a great time rewatching these after so many years. |
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