We'll get back to the stories soon enough, where Steffan is curiously poised after that interview with Master Octavius in 'The Glove', and the smooshed up version of 'Wordspace' heads into the middle third after a sickness-induced hiatus. This is instead going to about the much loathed third and final season of 'Star Trek', that aired over 1968/69, and how ready fans seem to be to jump straight to hatred. Who do so many professed 'fans' of things seem so ready to hate? Well, 'fan' isn't a shortened term for 'fanatic' without reason.
The third season of 'Star Trek' was made under ridiculously horrible circumstances, with little money or time, and minimal access to the creative writers and directors that made the first two seasons such a monumental success. Despite all that, the third season isn't that bad, except for a couple of debatable and monumental turkeys. In fact, it's a miracle that the season is actually good at all. However, and this is puzzling, if you ask almost any 'Star Trek' fan they will respond with the trained response that it's utterly dreadful, abominable, and equivalent to a crime against humanity. This is odd, when you consider that even in its diluted state, 'Star Trek' was still one of the smartest shows on television (See 'Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea' and 'The Man From UNCLE' for examples of series that plumbed real depths, falling from sublime grace in the second instance), and still rather well shot in places. Working through the season now, it's fascinating to see how much more experimental and interesting the photography is. It may even be better in that respect.
The problem is that the fans react disproportionately, as they do in so many other arenas, or take the entrenched and accepted view that it's all rubbish. How strange it must be to just accept the opinions of others and not make your own from the evidence at hand. It's very much like accepting the newspapers and newscasters as purveyors of factual truth rather than biased interpreters with their own agendas. As any researcher will tell you, you must go the source! The worst part is the fandom, though, those apparent haters of all things they profess to love. It's a strange thing indeed. Right now, I'm watching the first episode I ever did see ('For The World Is Hollow And I Have Touched The Sky'), and it's a great highlight of the season, but you'll have trouble finding someone who will admit it. Could it be that I'm incredibly more tolerant of flawed television than everyone else? It's a theory, at least.
There's no question that the third season is less good than its predecessors, and less nuanced in it's writing, but it's still interesting and smart with occasional bursts of brilliance. It's not hate-worthy, and if you don't believe me then check out 'For The World Is Hollow And I Have Touched The Sky', 'The Tholian Web', 'The Enterprise Incident', 'All Our Yesterdays' or even 'Is There In Truth No Beauty?'. Some of the others are pretty watchable too!
O.
Subsequent note:
In production order, some of the last six could be considered just plain awful, which is a shame. However, it's still not a season that should be written off! Oh, and 'Plato's Stepchildren' is just plain horrid.
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