The Influence of Stingray on Star Trek?

[M'Sharak]

But why would you ask about that date? The original question that started the thread was whether Stingray could have influenced the original concept of Star Trek or the design of the bridge. All of that was already settled before 1965, so what happened after has no bearing on the matter.

The only specific thing mentioned in the original post that was initially conceived after that date was the design of the Klingons, and as I said, that was just based in generic '60s Orientalism. Fred Phillips and John Colicos improvised the Klingon makeup on the first day of shooting and went for a "space Mongol" theme.

Well golly, @Christopher -- coming from someone who for so many years has been prone to haring off on tangents in order to make an ostentatious display of just-gleaned trivia only faintly related (or, often, utterly unrelated) to the original topic, your sudden shift to Rigid Adherence to The Question Posed in the OP (and ONLY That Question) is a bit perplexing.

Why would I ask what I did? Because I wanted to know the answer, and thought I might be able to learn it here. Why else?

I was part of the viewing audience (not to mention the target age group) at the time you said the show aired, yet I had no recollection whatsoever of Stingray (nor of Thunderbirds, for that matter.) Is it such a monstrous thing, really, to want to know why?*


* Rhetorical question -- whether or not you in fact believe it to be a monstrous thing is something you may feel free to keep all to yourself. I don't need to know.

TTFN

 

[Christopher]

^Sheesh, I was just wondering what the connection was between your question and the original question. I didn't ask "why did you want to know" as a rhetorical question, but as an actual question seeking an answer. Given that we've already established that Stingray couldn't have been an influence on Trek's origins, I suppose you must be wondering about it for some other reason, and I was confused as to what that was. If you did want to pursue a tangent, that's fine, but I couldn't tell whether that was what you were doing, because I'm not sure where you're going with your question.

 

[Ssosmcin]

@Christopher Agreed, the majority were variety/game shows/ specials at 30 and the Westerns remained the largest genre overall, which was a standby from the beginning. But it’s not so much that SF/spy/Fantasy was in the majority, but that they boomed to such a degree that year and a number of them hung around in syndication after the other shows faded into history (and the boom faded just as quickly while Westenrs hung around). Star Trek, at least two of the Irwin Allen shows, Jeannie, Bewitched, The Wild Wild West, Batman, Get Smart, Mission: Impossible and I, Spy were all over the dial when I was growing up. Shows like The Fugitive and 12 ‘Clock High and a lot of other dramas/westerns were nowhere to be found. The comedies, like F-Troop were around, as was The Big Valley. Anyway, I was just saying that season is unique in the number of SF/fantasy/SpyFi on the schedule. Even when Star Wars made SF hot again, we didn’t see that much. It was enough to know that I would have had a really hard time choosing which shows to watch. Probably whatever my parents want to.

 

[Maurice]

The “fantasy” sitcom boom appears to have been touched off by My Favorite Martian, which was a top-10 show in its first season, and the following year you had a pile of similarly fantastical sitcoms. Imitation is the sincerest form of television.

Speaking of My Favorite Martian ... (LINK)

 

[mb22]

Right after Star Wars (and Close Encounters) there were a number of shows like Quark, Project UFO, Logan's Run, Man From Atlantis, and of course Battlestar Galactica and Buck Rogers. None of them lasted very long, though.

 

[Christopher]

The “fantasy” sitcom boom appears to have been touched off by My Favorite Martian, which was a top-10 show in its first season, and the following year you had a pile of similarly fantastical sitcoms. Imitation is the sincerest form of television.

I didn't realize that one came first. I would've guessed Bewitched, but that was a year later.

Speaking of influences, when I read Gene Roddenberry's 1966 pilot script for the original half-hour version of Assignment: Earth, it felt like it was intended to be a sitcom in that genre, just a very unfunny one. There was even a detective character suspicious of Gary Seven and humorously outwitted by his high-tech tricks, a near-clone of Martian's Detective Brennan.

 

[BK613]

The “fantasy” sitcom boom appears to have been touched off by My Favorite Martian, which was a top-10 show in its first season, and the following year you had a pile of similarly fantastical sitcoms. Imitation is the sincerest form of television.

Speaking of My Favorite Martian ... (LINK)

Or, IDK, maybe just Jekyll and Hyde with a transporter....

 

[Maurice]

Or, IDK, maybe just Jekyll and Hyde with a transporter....

The point of these tweets and articles is to revisit the historic record of the show. Someone inside the production (Theiss) pointed out some similarities, and there are other similarities in other works. No one is saying it was any sort of direct lift. Maybe coincidence, maybe influenced by well-known properties like All About Eve.

 

[BK613]

The point of these tweets and articles is to revisit the historic record of the show. Someone inside the production (Theiss) pointed out some similarities, and there are other similarities in other works. No one is saying it was any sort of direct lift. Maybe coincidence, maybe influenced by well-known properties like All About Eve.

Just struck me as odd that arguably the most well-known property that examines the good/evil dynamic was absent from your article.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adaptations_of_Strange_Case_of_Dr._Jekyll_and_Mr._Hyde

 

[Noname Given]

I have only the vaguest recollection of Stingray, or of Thunderbirds. (In the case of the latter, why on Earth did they name a children's TV series after a cheap wine?) They weren't exactly my taste at the time.

When I was six in 1969 I LOVED the Thunderbirds show . I had no idea it was produced in England, I just thought it was great and loved Thunderbird One.

I found Thunderbirds before I found Trek at that age.

 

[Lord Garth]

I just watched some Stingray in this YouTube Video. Some of it is similar to TOS, but I don't think that's TOS being inspired by Stingray so much as both were made in the '60s and that's just how things looked.

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But I like what I saw. If I'm ever in the mood for it, I'll see if Stingray's available somewhere to watch.

 

[Maurice]

Just struck me as odd that arguably the most well-known property that examines the good/evil dynamic was absent from your article.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adaptations_of_Strange_Case_of_Dr._Jekyll_and_Mr._Hyde

Jekyll and Hyde is always the first go to on stories like this and the one most analyses of the episode start and stop with, so it simply didn't occur to me that it was important to mention, especially because the memo specifically referenced My Favorite Martian. In my mind, the conclusion of Jekyll and Hyde is rather the opposite of "The Enemy Within" or All About Eve, which are the restoring/finding the personality who is the balanced combination of the good and the bad, which isn't the point of Stevenson's story. But perhaps we'll amend the post.

 

[Christopher]

In my mind, the conclusion of Jekyll and Hyde is rather the opposite of "The Enemy Within" or All About Eve, which are the restoring/finding the personality who is the balanced combination of the good and the bad, which isn't the point of Stevenson's story.

It's not unprecedented for a story to be inspired by an earlier tale but present a different message. For instance, I've heard Keith R.A. DeCandido complain about the many Rashomon homages out there (like TNG's "A Matter of Perspective") that show various different recollections of an event but finally have someone come along and explain the definitive, "correct" version of events, when the real point of the movie is that everyone's memory is equally unreliable and there is no definitive answer.

 

[Maurice]

It's not unprecedented for a story to be inspired by an earlier tale but present a different message. For instance, I've heard Keith R.A. DeCandido complain about the many Rashomon homages out there (like TNG's "A Matter of Perspective") that show various different recollections of an event but finally have someone come along and explain the definitive, "correct" version of events, when the real point of the movie is that everyone's memory is equally unreliable and there is no definitive answer.

Well obviously. People borrow the "gimmicks" from other things all the time.

 

[Maurice]

re Jekyll and Hyde, we decided to address @BK613 's comment in the Fact Trek blog. See this post for the skinny (LINK).

 

[Neopeius]

I've never seen any mention of the 1964 TV marionette show Stingray being an influence on Roddenberry, but I just started watching it and I think it is unmistakable. I vaguely remember seeing Stingray as a kid but hadn't thought about the show until I noticed it was available on Amazon Prime. After watching the first 3 episodes I started noticing all sorts of things that seem familiar from TOS, but knowing that Stingray came first. The timing in '64 vs TOS in '66 is just right for it to have been a source of inspiration to Roddenberry. Has anyone ever seen a quote or story where Stingray is cited? It would be fun if some others watch a few episodes and see what you notice. I'll mention 3 things: One is the acceleration rate numbers used in Stingray rather than speed, as an inspiration for warp factors. A second, visible in episode 3, is the visual of the 2 ship drivers in the foreground (ala Sulu, Chekov) with the boss and beautiful babe in the background (Kirk, Chapel). The third is the general look of the aliens vs look of Klingons. There are many other things such as music style and controls. What do you think? Is it obvious to you too or is there an earlier common source that I'm not thinking of?

Serendipitously, our Australian correspondent just covered Stingray, which recently completed its run there.

As has been noted, Fireball XL5 (which we also covered) made it to the States, but I don't think Stingray had -- certainly not before Trek happened.

As we speak (June 1965), they're about to start filming the second pilot!

 

[Doc Mugatu]

I've never seen any mention of the 1964 TV marionette show Stingray being an influence on Roddenberry, but I just started watching it and I think it is unmistakable.

For "those in the know," a more valid question would be "the influence of 'Rocky Jones, Space Ranger' on Star Trek?"

The original Star Trek series was Rocky Jones for an older audience.

 

[marlboro]

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those 60s kids shows had amazing intros. My favorite was Jonny Quest:

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[Neopeius]

@Christopher Agreed, the majority were variety/game shows/ specials at 30 and the Westerns remained the largest genre overall, which was a standby from the beginning. But it’s not so much that SF/spy/Fantasy was in the majority, but that they boomed to such a degree that year and a number of them hung around in syndication after the other shows faded into history (and the boom faded just as quickly while Westenrs hung around). Star Trek, at least two of the Irwin Allen shows, Jeannie, Bewitched, The Wild Wild West, Batman, Get Smart, Mission: Impossible and I, Spy were all over the dial when I was growing up. Shows like The Fugitive and 12 ‘Clock High and a lot of other dramas/westerns were nowhere to be found. The comedies, like F-Troop were around, as was The Big Valley. Anyway, I was just saying that season is unique in the number of SF/fantasy/SpyFi on the schedule. Even when Star Wars made SF hot again, we didn’t see that much. It was enough to know that I would have had a really hard time choosing which shows to watch. Probably whatever my parents want to.

The sci-fi/fantasy surge starts in 1964-65 with Jonny Quest, Bewitched, Addams Family, Munsters, Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea and My Living Doll (and the second seasons of My Favorite Martian and The Outer Limits.) Lost in Space starts Fall 1965. There's also hour-long Danger Man (Secret Agent) which starts in the US in April 1965. And Planet Patrol, a marionette (but not Andersons) show.

12 O'Clock High is off the air by the time Trek debuts, sadly. They should have kept Lansing.

 

[Noname Given]

12 O'Clock High is off the air by the time Trek debuts, sadly. They should have kept Lansing.

I've been watching 12O'Clock High on MeTV and what I finding interesting is it has a number of musical riffs and cues that sound akin the the Star Trek theme music. so it sometimes makes me wonder in Alexander Courage was consciously or subconsciously ripping off something from Dominic Frontiere - the later who also did excellent music on/for the original Outer Limits and The Invaders.