Your agonizer, Mr. Boy.
I’m not arguing the truth of your statement but, to nitpick, neither of Kirk’s Enterprises was ever the flagship of the fleet. Only the D and E were ever referred to as such.
And even they weren’t too hard to hijack. See TNG “Rascals” and “Starship Mine,” and the movie “First Contact.”
and 011001101, and easily 4 or 5 Datacentric episodes, (I swear, if my sentient android ever took over my ship a first time, even more so if its based on hidden root code that he has no control over, it’s out the space lock for him)
I thought it was me! I swear to God as kid I’d watch Trek on some obscure channel, and it must have been on once a week! I thought I was going to kill as small kitten every time I was that painful episode come on!
Yes, all good replies - but I’m curious which episode y’all think was the most sexist. Now, that’s a tough call. There are so many. When I was a little girl teenager watching the original series when it was originally on, I was most offended by the episode where a woman wanted to become Captain and this was supposed to be all so horrible. Gah.
I actually still like Spock’s Brain – those of you expecting hard SF from TOS are going to be disappointed at a lot more than just the marionnete vulcans and miraculous acephalic metabolism in this episode.
It’s a comic book. On film. With actors instead of cartoons.
You’ve gotta judge the plot and characterization, not the believability of the tech. And remember the context – these were the days of Lost In Space , Land of the Giants, and perhaps the worst of them all, Time Tunnel. Star Trek was a revolutionary step forward in SF TV.
Not to say that ST didn’t have some groaners and snoozers. I’m thinking of episodes like Turnabout Intruder and The Mark of Gideon, where the conflict wasn’t engaging, or the plot was just slow and plodding, or the premise was just uninspired. Or all of the above.
At least the plot in Spock’s Brain was driven by a science-fictional premise.
My favorite part about that episode is how the brunette eyemorg, Kara, becomes 10x sexier when she’s “smart.” It proves that 90% of “sexy” is attitude.
Well, one way in which Star Trek was revolutionary was even the inclusion of women at all in a military context. You have to remember that the USA was just on the verge of the progressive movement of the late 60’s. The fact that a black woman served as a bridge officer was quite forward thinking for its time.
And coincidentally, I think I just mentioned the episode to which you refer: Turnabout Intruder.
Myself, I think the most blatantly sexist episodes were the two Harcourt Fenton Mudd episodes: Mudd’s Women and I, Mudd, in which women (or female androids) are depicted as nothing more than sexual objects.
Would sex with a robot, a girl robot, be more akin to masturbation or bestiality?
That depends on if you knew it was a robot.
A girl robot, heh heh.
There’s a scene in “Miri” (I think) where Yeoman Rand is crying because she’s starting to show the physical signs of contracting the disease they’ve been exposed to on the planet. She even tells Kirk that she used to try to get him to notice her legs (they’re now covered with dark blotches). That always struck me as one of the most sexist moments on the show; that she’d be more concerned about her appearance than that she’s going to die, and that joining Starfleet was just a way of trolling for a husband.
Despite the skimpy-costumes-and-eye-candy approach, most of the other women (and androids) in the original series seemed to know what they wanted and what they were doing; sexy does not always mean sexist.
Yes, that is what I meant by saying that I wasn’t arguing his point.
Yea, there’s that, too. But iirc, Miri was written early on, and the writers/producers were still working out characterization. If that’s any defense.
Rand always was depicted as an object of desire, though, as in Charlie X, The Enemy Within, etc.
Perhaps that’s why they decided to drop her from the cast after Season 1.
IIRC, we never saw an exposed belly button of a female. Nor were we allowed to see the underside of a woman’s breast. On this latter point, a book about TOS at the time offered a comment that the censors were afraid moss grew under there.
Yup. DeForrest kept walking up to whatshername (the one who says “Brain and brain! What is brain?”), pulling down the flap on her pants that covered her bellybutton and saying, “What time is it?” (Obviously, we know how he got his nickname of “Bones”.;)) Barbra Eden didn’t even get to show off hers on I Dream of Jeanie. It’s a testament to the ability of the costume designers that most people don’t notice this until it’s pointed out to them.
UNfortunately, she had a drinking problem. I think she is a fine actress.
Also, they didn’t want to tie up Kirk’s womanizing abilities with a permanent romantic liason.
Nor did NASA want to cramp the Saturn V’s style by letting astronauts carry canceled stamps to the moon. 
Ah no.
Grace Lee Whitney was allegedly raped by a studio executive at a cast party at the end of Season One. Whether her alcohol and drug addiction manifested itself as a result, or was already present, may never be known.
The one with Lincoln (Savage Curtain ?), was as bad as any.
But let’s be honest. TOS episodes, with VERY few exceptions, were poor. Very poor. Out of the 78 or so, there are fewer than 25 that are decent. Usually, you have trouble coming up with the good ones; the bad ones, well, they are legion.
No one’s mentioned the one from near the end (next to last?) where they all go back in a planet’s past through the Library. I can’t recall the name of it (thank goodness for 25 years of not entering trivia contests!), but it was pretty bad, too. Spock goes all nutso over Mariette Hartley (IIRC) because he’s in his past? What, the DNA changes?? Oh, god, I just recalled they called this All Our Yesterdays. Now I’m depressed. 
Gotta go with whoever posted that it all wasn’t as bad as Jonathan Winters on Stork and Mindless…