Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating: 
Summary: Spectre of the Gun - Surreal, Brilliant
Comment: I was channel surfing one night and inadvertently stumbled upon an episode of the old Star Trek. The colorful sets caught my eye so I put the remote down. I had already missed the first 25 minutes of the hour episode but watching the remainder of "Spectre of the Gun" was, for me, a mind blowing experience. I don't remember seeing this episode when I was 10 years old (season three, 1968...right?) but to see it now at age 50 was an unexpected treat.
After taping the last 35 minutes of the episode and watching it over and over, I noticed that the sets looked bare. But, the content was far from lacking. The colors they used made me feel as if I were looking at a moving surrealist painting. I loved it! The character actors were fantastic, true craftsmen and women. The bar tender, the sheriff, the woman who fell in love with Chekov, Doc Holiday, the fourth evil sheriff, and those irresistable pair of actors who played the Erps, all played their roles so well I can't get enough.
And the concept of having the crew thrown into the role of the Clanton gang is so far out I can't help but love it. What fun they must have had! The dialogue was brilliant. The producers had a limited budget (I had no idea that the budget for season three was slashed until I began reading the reviews here), but not only did they side step this potentially disastrous problem, they pulled it off with artistic flare! By making this western town a product of alien imagination, the writers were able to make those cheesy set pieces work. They made the best with what they had. Bravo!
It is because of the fine work by all the actors and writers in this episode that my interest in Star Trek has been renewed. That's why I'm here: I was looking for the episode I saw that night and found out that it was called "Spectre of the Gun." I intend the buy the boxed set containing the first three seasons now that I've found my gem. I can't wait to watch all the original Star Trek episodes. It takes a lot of talent to pull off what these people did, playing make believe with such conviction. Love it!
Customer Rating:
Summary: Old Trekkie
Comment: I'm an Old Trekkie and I don't know what to do...should I hang on to the old or should I grab on to the new???
The product is great...digital quality is excellent. I'm able to see the original Star Trek series with today's technology. Order yours now.
Customer Rating:
Summary: If you love Star Trek, the DVD series is a must have
Comment: Outstanding idea to come out w. the original series on DVD. I own all 3 seasons. Well written, great plotlines and characters - this show was ahead of its time in addressing social issues such as prejudice, custom and tradition, disaster, grief, power, gluttony, etc.
The special effects are not so bad in the 3rd season, as per the first, but this was the way that things were done back in the day. The series does not have to hang its hat on explosions and such to carry itself.
Customer Rating: 
Summary: Too Far Ahead of Its Time
Comment: After the first two seasons of Star Trek: The Original Series, the show was set to be cancelled by its network. However, after receiving a flood of letters from devoted fans that wanted to keep the show on the air, the network renewed it for one more season. Of course, since the show was not the culutural phenomena that it has now become, the network buried it in a late-night time slot and forced creator Gene Roddenberry to operate on a shoe-string budget. As a result, the special effects or sets that are needed in a show which regularly shows viewers spectacular events are severely hampered in this season. One episode takes place in an empty Enterprise, one is set in a pitch-black room much of the time, and another takes place in a deserted old West town (as no money existed to pay extras).
Yet, for fans of the first two seasons, this Third Season still delivers some great action, mind-bending drama, and little doses of humor. It is only the physical environment of the scripts that go downhill...not necessarily the scripted material itself.
Here are what I consider to be the highlights of this Third Season:
Day of the Dove: The Enterprise continues its battle with the Klingons.
All Our Yesterdays: Kirk, Spock, and McCoy are thrown into different periods of past galaxies and forced to survive while trying to find a way home.
Turnabout Intruder: A body-switching tale that, while common fare now, had probably never been seen on TV to that point.
To conclude, the Third Season of Star Trek: TOS continued to produce some great dramatic TV hours, but was severely hampered by budgetary issues. Is it still worth your time? An emphatic "Yes"! Essentially, the show was so far ahead of its time that viewers did not know how to handle the "mature" (by 1960s standards!) themes it presented (i.e. many people boycotted the show because they thought Spock represented Satan due to his long ears!), thus its viewerships problems. It wouldn't be until the release of the major motion pictures in the 1970s and 1980s (after space travel was a well-established reality in this country) that Star Trek become the phenomena it is today.
Customer Rating:
Summary: .....much maligned and misunderstood
Comment: No one seems able to write a positive, straight forward review about Star Trek's much maligned Third Season. As the media seem incapable or unwilling to run articles about Birmingham without the need to accompany absurd pictures of Sphagetti Junction, so Season Three is forever handicapped by the casual image of Mr Spock lobotomised without a single loss of hair!
Most observers tend to agree that the majority of the episodes in Season Three are ultimately lacking and the season's unbelievable opener (Spocks Brain) was certainly indicative of the substantial drop in quality to come. But the real betrayal was to sacrifice Star Trek's literary format, continuity and characterisation by foolishly exploiting Spock's box office potential at every opportunity and in doing so, the final season suffered a dreadful lack of plausibility and credibilty. And yet despite this, there remains an artistic voice about Season Three which few observers readily identify. In episodes such as "The Tholian Web", "Spectre of the Gun" and "All Our Yesterdays" you will find delicious, thoughtful scripts to rival any storyline from the revered First Season. Sadly, these gems are buried deep inside a mass of bland mediocrity, which is such a shame as Season Three contains some of Star Trek's greatest adventures (possibly as many as three of the all-time Top 10). Despite the obvious inadequacies, the final season is still in parts an enjoyable experience and worthy of repeated viewing.
The 7-disc DVD boxset is nicely packaged with all the bells and whistles you would expect - featurettes, retrospectives and commentaries. The discs are easy to navigate through with on screen menus resembling perspectives of the Enterprise bridge - a nice touch, but screen characters appear highly pixelated and lack smoothness around the edges.
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