The Center Seat: 55 Years of Star Trek

Loved this Star Trek 55 anniversary documentary! I am not sure how I missed this when it was first released, but I am happy I found this recently. It is a lovely summary of 55 years of Trek with new tidbits of info I never had heard before. I am so glad to add this to my Star Trek DVD collection. I like the layout starting with the beginnings and then covering each show. I hope they do something similar in the future when the 60th anniversary rolls around. There have been new shows since thiw doc was made. Specifically ST Strange New Worlds comes to mind. And I felt that Gates did a great job narrating.

With all of the thousands of actors over the years, it's difficult to get interviews and comments from everyone who is involved. It was quite the coup to get Leonard Nimoy to talk. But Why they didn't interview William Shatner, who is still alive, is beyond me. Maybe he wouldn't do it? Gates McFadden was a good choice as a narrator - I've always liked her character and her as a person. Not interviewing Avery Brooks was kind of odd because Deep Space 9 was such a different groundbreaking part of the Star Trek universe. However, one character is conspicuously absent from any mentions, and you only catch a glimpse of her face once or twice. And that is Gene Roddenberry's one time Wife: Majel Barrett , WHY? She was nurse Chapel in the original Star Trek, and Counselor, Troy's mother in Star Trek next generation. And the fact that she was the voice of the computer in many of the series, and a few movies gives her more exposure than anyone, other than perhaps, Michael Dorn . Jealousy because she was once the wife of the creator? I guess we'll never know. Otherwise, even with that slight, it was enjoyable to see. Reviewed by a true Trekker.

Overall it had a lot of ground to cover so kudos there. I did not care for the short takes and goofy approach - whoever decided to take that tack I think a bit over used.

One thing that I noticed after the last episode was besides mentioning the music themes was the lack of the music scoring in general - specifically TOS incidental music - name any show you can recall the music during the episodes (maybe outside of Mission Impossible) that you can, years later, recall the music... Klingon theme, Doomsday/Immunity Syndrome theme, 'spore' music, etc.

Other than that not addressed, it was a decent show. Gates did good job narrating.

And yes Enterprise theme stunk - made me not want to watch.

It's obvious that the interviewees spoke at some length, but the editors appear to think that the audience has no attention span. So their responses and recollections are clipped to show clips from the various shows. Much is left on the virtual cutting room floor.

Gates McFadden is a great narrator, though.

Star Trek deserves a Ken Burns style documentary, not this.

I can't say that I'm happy with my assessment and I'm sure most others won't be as well, but the pace and editing of this first episode are so bad that I'm having trouble finishing it and may not watch the other three I've recorded.

In Philadelphia, there is the Franklin Institute, a center for science, scientific history, science demonstrations, and industrial scientific testing. It's quite a place and I've gone there since I was very young. It's been a while since I visited, but the last time I was there, drinking in the exhibits around me, I watched as schoolchildren too immature to understand what they were seeing absolutely raced from exhibit to exhibit trying to find the button to push to make the display do something. They would rush up to it, frantically hammer away at whatever initiated the demo, and hunted to see what would happen. If it moved, lit up, make a sound or whatever, they watched for five seconds. If pushing the button didn't result in an INSTANT payoff...two seconds, then on to the next exhibit. Nobody stopped to look, wonder, read, or try to understand what was happening.

I am sure that the editor of this series was one of those kids.

Hyper-fast cuts, contributors flashed on the screen for so short a time that you can see what they look like, what their name is, or what they are saying, pick any two, cut-ins of scenes from shows that might well be funny but go by so quickly that they are blips...this bears all the hallmarks of someone too young to know how to edit for an audience who is seeing the material for the first time, not someone who has been spending hours with each scene. It's an absolute mess. No attention span whatsoever. No depth of examination. No desire to discover, just to get to the next bullet point.

I'm going to boldly go back to the TV now. I think there may be 15 painful minutes left of the fist episode. There are other "history of Star Trek" films and videos that are not frenetic and juvenile that tell the same story.

Harlan Ellison; story of how unhappy he was with the rewrite of, "City on the Edge of Forever" is mentioned. I can only imagine how irate he' d be if he was around to see this mess.