With Star Trek being the huge franchise it is, it’s hard to think that there was once a time when it wasn’t a world renowned piece of fiction. Today we have a dozen television series, and even more movies, as well as several new projects on the horizon. There are video games, board games, and roleplaying RPGs. Conventions happen all around the world, with stars from the franchise meeting fans and celebrating the series; they even have a Star Trek cruise! But there was a time when it was still considered quite niche, when Star Trek was just an odd, often looked down upon, television series that you’d get mocked for liking. The original series found more love over time, but when it first came out it was not something that many people made a big thing about liking.
It wasn’t really until series creator Gene Rodenberry got a second shot at things that it really started to take off as a franchise to take notice of. Thanks to the success of Star Wars every studio was trying to find the next big sci-fi hit, and it’s how we’ve gotten some great franchises. Star Trek was one of these attempts to cash in on the sci-fi high, and the cast of the original series were brought back together for some big screen outings, the popularity of which helped to launch a whole new show, Star Trek: The Next Generation. This is where the franchise really took off, and Star Trek became the cultural juggernaut that it is today.
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Tom Salinsky, a long time fan of the franchise, was introducing his housemate Steve to various pieces of entertainment media since he’d moved to the UK from Syria. He’d shown him Doctor Who, Columbo, Singing in the Rain, and Fawlty Towers, but realised that he’d not really introduced Steve to one of his oldest loves: the Star Trek franchise. So Salinksy became inspired to watch through all of Star Trek in order (I assume with Steve), watching one episode a day as he made his way through every single show. Contained within the pages of Star Trek: Discovering the TV Series are his experiences with the original series, the animated series, the original series movies, and Star Trek: The Next Generation.
The book is split into segments for each of the shows and movies, making it easier to digest. From here Salinsky gives us a brief description of the episodes, who starred in them, and a star rating, before launching into his thoughts on the episode. Each episode is given anywhere between half a page and a full page, depending on how much there is to say on each one, and covers anything from Tom’s previous experiences with the episodes when he first saw them, his changing view of them over the years, or his fresh experience of them if this is his first time viewing. For those who are familiar with the episodes, these dives are likely to bring fond memories of the show, and might remind you of certain episodes that you haven’t seen in years. And Salinsky writes in a very relaxed, almost conversational manner that makes these segments feel less like a breakdown from an academic and more like a friend just chatting about the show.
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However, perhaps the biggest flaw in this format, and with the book in general, is that it’s not friendly to those who haven’t seen the episodes. The plot is maybe mentioned in a sentence, and then only in the broadest of terms. And on occasion Salinsky will only mention small parts of the plot in such ways that you might hear a part of the resolution, but don’t know why things are happening. For example (picked from a randomly opened page), in the discussion of the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode ‘The Long Goodbye’ it mentions that Picard is in the holodeck playing detective. A crewmember gets killed. Wesley saves the ship.
Why is the crewmember killed? Why does the ship need saving? How does Wesley do this? All of this information is missing. This is fine if you’ve seen the episode, but if not, or if you can’t remember it that well, it does leave you a little lost. If you’re reading through the book and you either haven’t seen the episode, or may not have seen it recently enough to remember the plot, discussions end up pointless, and can lead to you having to skip over things, or be left with no context for portions.
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The book isn’t bad by any means, and when you have that knowledge of the episodes it makes for fun, if brief breakdowns of them from Salinsky’s point of view. Perhaps the best way to enjoy the book is either to watch the show as you read it, perhaps doing an episode a day system the way the author did, or to have Wikipedia open along with the book so that you can read the episode description to get a refresher before reading Salinksy’s thoughts on it.
For the hardcore Star Trek fan who’s looking to add something a little different to their collection, or to be inspired to have yet another watch through of the series, this will be a great companion piece to add to their shelf. For casual fans, or perhaps those who’ve never seen the show and are interested in learning more about it, it’s perhaps not the best choice to start with.
Star Trek: Discovering The TV Series is out on 15th April from White Owl.
