A Brief Guide to Star Trek

talk about how much action was in there, not about any content.’
    Scheimer’s partner in Filmation, Hal Sutherland, directed the episodes, while Don Christensen and Bob Kline designed the animated characters. Norm Prescott handled the voice recording, and most of the original cast reunited to voice their characters. The only character missing was Walter Koenig’s Ensign Chekov, supposedly due to budgetary restrictions – however, Koenig was hired to script an episode. James Doohan, a practised voice artist, would supply the voice not just for Scotty but also for new, semi-regular alien character Lieutenant Arex, as well as many other incidental voices. Majel Barrett returned to the series to voice Nurse Chapel, alien Lieutenant M’Ress and the
Enterprise
computer, beginning an association with
Star Trek
spin-offs that would continue up to her death (and even beyond, with 2009’s
Star Trek
movie). Only the first three episodes saw the core trio of Shatner, Nimoy and Kelley reunite as a group to record their dialogue: subsequent episodes would be constructed from individual recordings made at times that suited the artists’ availability. Nimoy had also made a successful argument for the continued involvement of George Takei and Nichelle Nichols when Filmation initially proposed using Doohan and Barrett to play their roles. Nimoy recognised the growing iconic nature of the characters and the fact that the original actors should continue to play the roles, effectively laying the ground for the later
Star Trek
movies.
    Scheimer set out to make his animated
Star Trek
a match with the original series. Unlike most animated shows, it would not beaimed at children, with comedy characters and simple storylines. He wanted Roddenberry’s
Star Trek
to essentially carry on where it left off, but in animated form, even though it would be appearing alongside the rest of the cheap and cheerful, child-focused animated fare on Saturday mornings. Speaking to
Show
magazine in the early 1970s, Roddenberry said: ‘That was one of the reasons I wanted creative control. There are enough limitations just being on Saturday morning. We have to limit some of the violence we might have had on the evening shows. There will probably be no sex element to talk of either. But it will be
Star Trek
and not a stereotype kids’ cartoon show.’
    Several of the episodes were sequels or follow-ups to episodes of
The Original Series
, including David Gerrold’s ‘More Tribbles, More Troubles’, ‘Once Upon a Planet’ (a follow-up to ‘Shore Leave’) and the Harry Mudd-featuring ‘Mudd’s Passion’. Koenig’s episode, ‘The Infinite Vulcan’, had ties to the original series’ ‘Space Seed’ (itself inspiration for the movie
The Wrath of Khan
). D. C. Fontana scripted ‘Yesteryear’ (a source heavily tapped for the young Spock sequences in 2009’s
Star Trek
movie), which went on to win an Emmy Award for Excellence in Children’s Programming. Great efforts were made to ensure that the animated series looked, felt and sounded like original
Star Trek
. The bridge of the
Enterprise
looked similar in drawn form (with the addition of an extra turbolift), as did the major characters, while the episodes used the same distinctive sound effects as the original series. Although the animation was limited and shots were often repeated within episodes, the series succeeded because of the serious stories it was telling. Fans who had come to
Star Trek
through the syndication reruns now had brand new episodes to call their own, and new sources to fuel their own fan fiction that was continuing to expand the storytelling of the
Star Trek
universe.
    The Animated Series
had several advantages over the previous live-action series. It was easier for writers to be sure that their outlandish notions could be realised in the medium of animation in a way that simply couldn’t be achieved in live-actionphotography with 1960s resources. If it could be drawn, it could now be shown. Locations, aliens, monsters and starships were only limited by the writers’ and artists’ imaginations, the strictures of the
Star Trek
universe – and, of course, deadlines. It undoubtedly gave a new lease of life to
Star Trek
in a most unexpected way.
    The animated show also managed several
Star Trek
firsts that would recur in later TV series or movies. The holodeck, so much a part of
The Next Generation
and subsequent series, was first portrayed in ‘The Practical Joker’,