It’s one of the most bizarre episodes of the original Star Trek, filmed in a way that you could cut out all the Star Trek scenes and be left with a short pilot episode of this “Gary Seven” spinoff. Did it belong in the Star Trek universe? Would it have even worked?
When I watched it again recently, it almost felt like a Doctor Who rip-off (with the time-traveling genius, sonic screwdriver, and young female sidekick), but after looking into it some, apparently there isn’t any evidence that it was influenced by Doctor Who (which wasn’t all that big at the time, and was only shown in the UK).
All that aside, it’s a fun episode, and I think Gary Seven made for an interesting character to watch. I can’t help but wonder if we missed out on another classic series.
Yes. I would have watched it. And if they made a new version today, I’d give that a try too.
I would love to see a remake of The Questor Tapes, one of Roddenberry’s pilots that never got picked up. It was about an android trying to find his creator. There was a very stupid scene in it that was made stupid by network executives- Questor had to get information from a woman. Originally, she only agreed to give it if he had sex with her (which Roddenberry said would have been suggested tastefully). They changed it to being friends with her.
Other than that, it was really good.
I’d have watched it for a bit to see if it was worth it. I liked the Assignment Earth episode.
Great question! I would have really enjoyed it. I don’t think it’s really all that much of a Doctor Who ripoff because Gary was still human and I believe he was operating under orders. The concept of Isis was great and we’d get to see Terri Garr in a weekly show!
I wouldn’t mind if it only had that one link to Star Trek either. I don’t think every Star Trek spinoff needs to be about Starfleet, the Federation or any of that. It can be a springboard for all kinds of stories in all kinds of places and times.
we’d get to see Terri Garr in a weekly show!
I had no idea that was the same actress as Inga from Young Frankenstein!
She is indeed. She was also in an episode of The Monkees, she was in Close Encounters of the Third Kind and she was in my favorite Scorsese film, After Hours.
I’ve always really liked her.
She’s a national treasure.
Well, apparently they were really close to doing an actual crossover with Doctor Who but it never happened. I could see this episode being a reworked script of that crossover episode.
I totally don’t remember this, but it’s on Memory Alpha:
In 2024, during his encounter with the watcher Tallinn, who also described herself as a supervisor, Jean-Luc Picard recalled how “Kirk’s Enterprise crossed paths” with Gary Seven. Picard explained that Seven, like Tallinn, “was recruited by superior beings as an agent who would, in [her] words, protect the tapestry of history.”
I found this Quora (I know, I know) post about that TOS episode:
https://www.quora.com/Was-Gary-Seven-just-Roddenberry-s-response-to-Doctor-WhoIt just seems so similar in retrospect! I guess a lot of scifi shows back then had devices that looked like the science fiction version of magic wands.
If anything, Gary Seven seems more like an interstellar James Bond, with his own Miss Moneypenny in Roberta Lincoln.
I was thinking exactly that earlier, but I didn’t feel like editing my post.
I don’t know… taking the “Star” out of Star Trek, especially in the 60s might not have been that great.
I recall enjoying his appearance in the Eugenics Wars novels, but either aging or COVID has done a number on my brain and I can’t remember any specifics about him or the books…
This had to have been the studio’s reasoning too. I don’t know if it would have the same broad appeal without space-travel.
I don’t know about that. It was the era of shows like Mission: Impossible and The Avengers. Plus, James Bond was in the theaters. It was that plus sci-fi.
