Star Trek - The Animated Series

[JSngry]

15 bucks at Amazon, 4 DVDs.

I've completed TOS and the VI original cast movies, and am NOT going to move on to Next Generation until I get through these. Much better than I was expecting, although, still, yeah, Saturday Morning Cartoon visually and at times, vocally (but far less often than expected).

Fascinating to think of this not in terms of "canon" but in terms of reality of existence in 1973 - original series four(?) years gone, cultdom still in the building stage (correct?), no budget/production interest for ANYTHING except, apparently, a cheap cartoon. But they took it and freakin' RAN with it, Star Trek Franchise in EXILE, baby. Survival move executed brilliantly.

The booklet contains a few paragraphs about whether this stuff is "real" or not, which is pretty dam funny to somebody who's in no way a Trekkie, just enjoying the shit out of discovering it all, but as far as "canon" and shit goes, hell, who was involved here and/or what was done that would in ANY way render this "invalid" and/or "un-real"?

Serious Trek fans who agree or disagree, input appreciated.

[JSngry]

No fans of The Animated Series?

[mjzee]

I had never heard of this series before.

[gmonahan]

I've had the set for some time.  Packaging is screwy, but the cartoons are definitely "canon."  The holodeck originated in the cartoon series, among other things, and the cartoons also made it much easier to introduce various alien species without having to worry about make-up (which becomes a comical issue with the blu-rays of the original series!).  The original actors AND writers took part.  The animation was about as low-class as one could get, but the stories were great.

 

gregmo

[JSngry]

Yeah, the stories are really kicking ass...some are a lot better than some of the live-action  shows of Season 3.

The one where Spock is removed from time and then goes back to Vulcan to save his own life as a child do he can return to the present as himself, if that had been done live-action, it would be legendary, I think.The writing was top-shelf, and Nimoy brought real feeling to the voice-over. That's been true of almost all of them I've gotten to.

You can almost watch it like a radio show, just listen to the audio, since the animation is so rarely relevant and you already know all the voices so well.

[xybert]

Not a big Star Trek fan (don't hate it, don't love it) but i'm a huge fan of cartoons. Hadn't watched it before, just checked out a clip on youtube. I like it! The animation is basic however IMO it still looks good. Dig the voice acting and the general atmosphere.

Here's the clip i watched: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T-EoyUtdLdc

 

[Soulstation1]

This series is streaming via Netflix

[ghost of miles]

Passionate Trekkie as a kid in the 70s--used to stay up late to watch reruns on the local station (and always enjoy telling people about how the station's news team would "beam out" at the end of the newscast as the ST episode started).  I do recall watching the animated series in the mid-70s and enjoying it, but didn't realize that so much of the original TV show folks were involved in its production.  It would be fascinating to revisit those shows... life ain't long enough, I tell ya!

[TedR]

Not a Trekkie but, after watching the YouTube xybert linked to, I could watch more. I wasn't aware the actors from the series did the voices for a cartoon version. The animation was very Johnny Quest like but that was a favorite of mine as a kid. 

[duaneiac]

I was never a Trekkie, but I watched this show on Saturday mornings as a kid.  I'd seen some of the original series shows in syndicated reruns ( a local channel would usually show ST for half the year and then Lost In Space in that timeslot for the other half of the year -- I liked the cheesiness of the latter better as a kid).  The animation of this series was kind of bare bones at times and they often just reused footage to pad out the runtime it seemed, but yeah the stories were good and not really "dumbed down" to a Saturday morning kid's show level.

"The one where Spock is removed from time and then goes back to Vulcan to save his own life as a child do he can return to the present as himself, if that had been done live-action, it would be legendary"

I'm not sure now, but I think that was the episode used for the View-Master set for this series.  I still have it (and all my boyhood View-Master reels) stored somewhere in the closet.  I'll have to check and see one of these days.

[B. Clugston]

I remember seeing this in the '70s. George Takei and Nichelle Nichols weren't originally supposed to be part of the show, but Leonard Nimoy refused to do it unless they were involved, so they got added.

[JSngry]

That's interesting. One of the early episodes has Uhura taking command of the ship because all the men have fallen under the influence of a seduction  wave from an all-female planet, or something like that. and Kirk, Spoc, & Bones are all being held hostage on that planet, where they're aging rapidly. That's it, roughly.

Anyway, Uhura takes command and saves the Enterprise, and the entire crew

[HutchFan]

I wasn't aware that this even existed. I'll check it out. 

[Shawn]

I saw the animated series before I ever saw the original series, in fact I'm pretty sure I saw Star Trek: The Motion Picture prior to watching it.  It was actually the film that inspired me to seek out reruns of the original series and I had become a major fan by the time Star Trek II came out a couple years later. 

Haven't seen the animated series since the 70s.  

[duaneiac]

As one of their featured "Daily Deals", for today only Deep Discount has the 4 disc DVD set of the Star Trek Animated Series on sale for only $6.89!!

http://www.deepdiscount.com/star-trek-the-animated-series/032429233615