Celebrating latex couture from a fetish model’s shoot, or when a catsuit adorns a modern pop diva is all well and good. But shouting loud for the anniversary of the most popular science fiction television show’s 50th anniversary, a show that went on to influence popular culture like few others and spawn a dynasty, is a necessity.
Hooray for Star Trek.
The Shatner-fied Trek as we have come to know and love it, saw its original full season official first show airing on this date, Sept. 8th 1966. Though not the first time audiences had seen Star Trek, “The Man Trap” would reveal the cast, ship design and themes we’d come to know. An earlier stab at a pilot with actor Jeffrey Hunter and Susan Oliver (infamously painted green for a very sexy dance mid-show) had been met with criticisms of “too cerebral” by the network. Mr. Spock, played by Leonard Nimoy, was kept though-moved into the first officer position-the interior of The U.S.S. Enterprise revamped and Shatner came ‘aboard.’
For sexy sartorial purposes there is too much to love about Trek’s costume design. The fetishistic military array of the crew uniforms with their different colored shirts indicating The Enterprise’s various different disciplines, the short mini’s the women wore and the imaginative costumes for ‘aliens’…again, tending toward quite revealing stuff for the ladies of the shows (Bill Theiss, head costume designer on the show was obviously heterosexual) made Trek a treat for the eyes as well as the intellect.
Trek also gave us “phasers,” “communicators” and other gadgets in abundance, along with lots of sci-fi tropes. But looking at the original series one also notices an integrated crew, with an African American woman and an Asian man in places of prominence on the bridge and in the cast.
The Creator of Star Trek Gene Roddenberry said he envisioned his show as a “Wagon Train To The Stars.” But the enduring quality of this visionary television serious that spawned movies, many other Trek series, product tie-ins, cosplay and conventions became so much more than the adventure yarn its creator wanted it to be.
Happy 50th Star Trek.
