# Star Trek's pilot episode **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 6, 2002, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-treks-pilot-episode/127313 "2002-09-06T18:02:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Ethilrist](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ethilrist/32/4604_2.png) [@Ethilrist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ethilrist)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2002, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-treks-pilot-episode/127313/1 "2002-09-06T18:02:57Z")
The Cage. Right? Do I win valuable prizes? ---
**Author:** ![Ellen\_Cherry](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ellen_cherry/32/3600_2.png) [@Ellen\_Cherry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ellen_Cherry)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2002, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-treks-pilot-episode/127313/2 "2002-09-06T18:12:35Z")
Is that the title? The two-parter, with Christopher Pike and the aliens with the throbbing veins in their foreheads? What do _I_ win? That’s the important question. ---
**Author:** ![Berkut](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a88e57/32.png) [@Berkut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Berkut)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2002, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-treks-pilot-episode/127313/3 "2002-09-06T18:27:48Z")
It isn’t a two parter. The original was “The Cage” with Christopher Pike, Spock, the female first officer, etc. The two parter was “The Menagerie”, which had the normal cast looking back on the pilot episode as part of Spocks trial. ---
**Author:** ![Ellen\_Cherry](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ellen_cherry/32/3600_2.png) [@Ellen\_Cherry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ellen_Cherry)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2002, 6:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-treks-pilot-episode/127313/4 "2002-09-06T18:28:27Z")
Is that the title? The two-parter, with Christopher Pike and the aliens with the throbbing veins in their foreheads? What do _I_ win? That’s the important question. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2002, 6:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-treks-pilot-episode/127313/5 "2002-09-06T18:30:15Z")
Which pilot episode? Star Trek had two: _The Cage_ (with Jeffrey Hunter) and _Where No Man Has Gone Before_ (with William Shatner) NBC didn’t like the Hunter version but asked Roddenberry to try again. Further, the premiere episode of the show was _The Man Trap_. “Where No Man” was broadcast third and “The Cage” turned into “The Menagerie.” ---
**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2002, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-treks-pilot-episode/127313/6 "2002-09-06T18:31:05Z")
**Reality Chuck** wins. ---
**Author:** ![Cliffy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/59ef9b/32.png) [@Cliffy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cliffy)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2002, 7:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-treks-pilot-episode/127313/7 "2002-09-06T19:16:29Z")
All I have to say about it is that Sally Kellerman sure was a hottie back then. –Cliffy ---
**Author:** ![kingpengvin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/9dc877/32.png) [@kingpengvin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kingpengvin)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2002, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-treks-pilot-episode/127313/8 "2002-09-06T19:28:49Z")
Apparently she had a problem with the tightness of her pants and how much they revealed her… ahemm unmentionables. If you watcher her she tends to keep her hands placed in the same location when she hasn’t got anything to do with them. ---
**Author:** ![jab1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ee7513/32.png) [@jab1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jab1)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2002, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-treks-pilot-episode/127313/9 "2002-09-06T22:54:54Z")
Okay, now I have to watch that episode again… ---
**Author:** ![Tars\_Tarkas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Tars\_Tarkas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tars_Tarkas)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2002, 11:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-treks-pilot-episode/127313/10 "2002-09-06T23:19:43Z")
Anyone have the video with the black and white scenes spliced in? I’ve just seen it in 100% color. ---
**Author:** ![teela\_brown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d9b06d/32.png) [@teela\_brown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/teela_brown)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2002, 12:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-treks-pilot-episode/127313/11 "2002-09-07T00:03:37Z")
I would have liked Jeff Hunter to continue as captain. He was a babe. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2002, 5:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-treks-pilot-episode/127313/12 "2002-09-07T05:15:17Z")
_Where No Man…_ was a much better episode and, I thought, one of the best episodes of the original series overall. In any event, both it and _The Cage_ were thankfully free of the sanctimony that would infect NextGen’s pilot. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2002, 6:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-treks-pilot-episode/127313/13 "2002-09-07T06:27:22Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Tars Tarkas \* > \*\*Anyone have the video with the black and white scenes spliced in? I’ve just seen it in 100% color. \*\* The DVD of “The Cage” comes with both the original full color version, and the patchwork reconstruction mixing black and white and color footage. Why anybody would want to see the mongrel second version when the original has now been found puzzles me. ---
**Author:** ![Tars\_Tarkas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Tars\_Tarkas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tars_Tarkas)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2002, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-treks-pilot-episode/127313/14 "2002-09-07T20:41:43Z")
Maybe they are crazy Wizard of Oz fans that claim that the Talosian planet was really Oz and that is why they kept going from Black and White to Color… ---
**Author:** ![Love\_Rhombus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/love_rhombus/32/10694_2.png) [@Love\_Rhombus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Love_Rhombus)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2002, 5:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-treks-pilot-episode/127313/15 "2002-09-08T05:40:06Z")
Stupid hamsters ate my OP. I was trying to ask what you all thought of the pilot and if you thought it would have remained successful if Pike had stayed Captain? I personally liked him better than Kirk; he seemed a lot harder. As for prizes, I had not intended to award any, but I shall anyway. You each get a “Smilin’ Spock” cookie and your very own electronic “Pulsating Forehead Vein” with which to amaze your friends and neighbors. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2002, 6:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-treks-pilot-episode/127313/16 "2002-09-08T06:35:54Z")
Leonard Nimoy, in his book _I Am Spock_, said that there was not enough contrast between the brooding Pike and the taciturn Spock as there was between Kirk and Spock. I agree, although I like Jeffrey Hunter as an actor. Too bad Majel Barrett’s Number One character was dropped after the first pilot. For all the ribbing she gets in “The Cage” about being sexually frigid, she was a lot more interesting – and sexy – than Majel Barrett’s Nurse Chapel on the series. More about “The Cage”: [http://www.testermanscifi.org/JeffreyHunterPart1.html](http://www.testermanscifi.org/JeffreyHunterPart1.html) In 1999, I briefly came into possession of the excursion jacket Captain Pike wears in “The Cage”, as seen here: [http://www.jeffreyhuntermovies.com/images/ST4bluehi.jpg](http://www.jeffreyhuntermovies.com/images/ST4bluehi.jpg) ---
**Author:** ![Hail\_Ants](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/dc4da7/32.png) [@Hail\_Ants](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hail_Ants)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2002, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-treks-pilot-episode/127313/17 "2002-09-09T02:19:52Z")
Just to add another little tidbit: Jeffrey Hunter did not play the crippled Capt. Pike in The Menagerie. ---
**Author:** ![Tars\_Tarkas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Tars\_Tarkas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tars_Tarkas)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2002, 7:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-treks-pilot-episode/127313/18 "2002-09-09T07:53:22Z")
Pike is lame. Kirk Rules, Picard Rules, Sisko Rules, Janeway Drools, and Archer seems to be on the path to ruledom. He just needs to be bald or score with a green chick to push him over the edge. ---
**Author:** ![SolGrundy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bbce88/32.png) [@SolGrundy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SolGrundy)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2002, 10:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-treks-pilot-episode/127313/19 "2002-09-09T10:05:09Z")
Janeway was my favorite captain. I’ve thought she was a bad-ass ever since she was Mrs. Ironside. Actually, I guess that’s more to the point; I dunno if the character was as cool as Kate Mulgrew seems to be. One thing that impressed me in every interview I’ve seen with her; she seems to have taken the part and run with it instead of looking on it as just a job or making fun of it. You’d probably never see her doing that “Get a Life” sketches on SNL. And I thought Pike was pretty cool, too. But yes, Kirk was more interesting. Walloon had the right idea – combine Kirk with Number One and you’ve got a series. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2002, 12:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-treks-pilot-episode/127313/20 "2002-09-09T12:05:37Z")
Sol: If Kate Mulgrew is your idea of “cool” then I won’t be visiting your house in the summer because your air conditioning will probably be set at 84 degrees. I would have greatly preferred Lyndsey Wagner or Genevieve Bujold in that role. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-treks-pilot-episode/127313.md?page=2)