Views/Reviews - Star Trek Remastered. Gilded Cage, Part 1

I've been watching Star Trek: Remastered here in Hollywood, the first time I’ve regularly watched the series since the mid 1980s. So with more than a hint of nostalgia, fresh eyes, and curiosity about the new CGI visual effects, I present these Views and Reviews, complete with Star Trek Fumetti.

Star Trek Remastered. The Menagerie, Part I.

Boy, the syndication cuisinart-editors chopped this one up all to heck! They cut out the Spock smiling at the plastic space flowers scene! (a-holes) Nice new purpley cgi starbase planet in the beginning, with new matte painting (day and night views) at Kirk and party's beam down (they also added some extra folks in the bg of the matte too). They made a new Starbase Shuttlecraft, with all new markings, for the scenes of Kirk and El Commodore chasing after the Enterprise.

Also they fixed that shot from The Cage where the camera goes from outside the Enterprise right through the bridge dome. That correction rocked! The commodore's female assistant who meets Kirk and company at beam down is stoned. Seriously. They also do some weird editing where she speaks a line, they cut to Kirk's line, then they come back to her blank face. They do this in two different scenes. Stoned, I tell you.

http://tos.trekcore.com/hd/albums/1x11hd/themenageriepart1hd008.jpg This one shot of Spock from The Cage could be mistaken for one from Star Trek TMP. http://tos.trekcore.com/hd/albums/1x11hd/themenageriepart1hd361.jpg

Man, I was really digging this episode. Some great scenes between Kirk and McCoy discussing Spock's various loyalties (watching scenes like that after serving in the military and, well, just getting older and thinking about such things gets me all teary-eyed). I love that it got so heated they were SHOUTING at one another! I think DeForest Kelley really came into his own with this episode. Leonard Nimoy as always in top form here. I wish that Nimoy didn't retire from acting and that someone like David E. Kelley would have come up with a role for him late in his career, like Kelley did for Shatner on Boston Legal, to showcase just how good of an actor this man really is.

Gene Roddenberry clearly forgot about this episode when he was re-jiggering Star Trek with Phase II, TMP and later with TNG and all their perfect utopia feelings. I love that here traveling to Talos IV is the only DEATH PENALTY on Starfleet's books. Some utopia, that -- everything is GREAT, but if you gas up at this one planet, we'll kill you.

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Thanks to Trekcore.com for the Star Trek screencaps.