Most vivid color episode of TOS

[Ssosmcin]

Director Ralph Senensky implied in his write-up of "The Tholian Web" that Al Francis was not as skilled a cinematographer as Jerry Finnerman. Whatever the issues were, they are not apparent at my end. As a layman only seeing the finished product, I think the Francis episodes look great.

I know they were done with the special lighting for woman by then. But that seemed to phase out over the second season.

Al Francis' work was more crisp. I found it to be pleasing.

Senensky also said Wallerstein's portion of Tholian Web was less imaginative than his. Maybe, but the episode doesn't feel like the work of two directors. I think he was just nursing that grudge. Like Richard Donner who never got over Superman II.

 

[Mudd]

I'd nominate "Journey to Babel" or "Amok Time."

 

[Vger23]

"The Immunity Syndrome" gets some obvious points here.

 

[Rowdy Roddy McDowall]

I'd nominate "Journey to Babel" or "Amok Time."

Still, surely blood-red beats bottle-show.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

"Journey to Babel"

Right out of the gate, the dress uniforms make it pop.

 

[ZapBrannigan]

Senensky also said Wallerstein's portion of Tholian Web was less imaginative than his. Maybe, but the episode doesn't feel like the work of two directors. I think he was just nursing that grudge. Like Richard Donner who never got over Superman II.

Well, Senensky didn't just lose The Tholian Web that day. His phone stopped ringing altogether for a long time. It probably wrecked his finances, and it was through no fault of his own. He had no control over Theiss taking forever to make spacesuits. The studio's stupidity in blaming Senensky would be hard for anyone to swallow.

That said, I feel much worse for Herb Wallerstein. He was evidently murdered by "the help," and to top it off, they beat the rap. That really sucks.

 

[Vger23]

I know they were done with the special lighting for woman by then. But that seemed to phase out over the second season.

Al Francis' work was more crisp. I found it to be pleasing.

Senensky also said Wallerstein's portion of Tholian Web was less imaginative than his. Maybe, but the episode doesn't feel like the work of two directors. I think he was just nursing that grudge. Like Richard Donner who never got over Superman II.

I think "The Tholian Web" is a great example of a colorful episode

 

[David cgc]

Incidentally, Ralph died recently, at 102, and I don't know if anyone is paying the rent on his blog, so you might want to read it while you can. I've found that "wayback machine" stuff to be very hit and miss.

There's a panel that lets you manually force the Wayback Machine to archive a specific page. I've got a bookmarklet that lets me to it with one click from any site. Drag this up into your bookmarks bar: Save in Archive.org

It's made for, like, ensuring academic citations are preserved correctly, not hand-crawling a site, but if you see something that isn't saved there but is still on-line, you can make sure it gets picked up.

 

[Ssosmcin]

Well, Senensky didn't just lose The Tholian Web that day. His phone stopped ringing altogether for a long time. It probably wrecked his finances, and it was through no fault of his own. He had no control over Theiss taking forever to make spacesuits. The studio's stupidity in blaming Senensky would be hard for anyone to swallow.

Yeah you're right about that, he was stuck doing comedies for the longest time.

That said, I feel much worse for Herb Wallerstein. He was evidently murdered by "the help," and to top it off, they beat the rap. That really sucks.

I always think about that when I see his name come up. He was a regular director on I Dream of Jeannie and I read about his murder in the book about the series.

 

[CoveTom]

I know they were done with the special lighting for woman by then. But that seemed to phase out over the second season.

Al Francis' work was more crisp. I found it to be pleasing.

Senensky also said Wallerstein's portion of Tholian Web was less imaginative than his. Maybe, but the episode doesn't feel like the work of two directors. I think he was just nursing that grudge. Like Richard Donner who never got over Superman II.

Except that Donner was right in that Lester's work on Superman II was of lower quality and hurt the film, whereas with "The Tholian Web," at least IMHO, you can't tell that there were two different directors involved. It feels like it comes together as one cohesive whole, so I didn't think Wallerstein did a worse job than Senesky.

 

[Christopher]

Except that Donner was right in that Lester's work on Superman II was of lower quality and hurt the film

I don't think Lester's work was inferior, per se; it just had a very different sensibility and approach that wasn't as good a fit for that particular film. Also, coming in mid-project to take over and restructure another director's film is difficult for even a skilled director to do well, as we saw with Justice League.

Of course, it's different in series TV than in feature films. In features, the director in in charge and defines the content, tone, and style of the film, so changing directors can mean a radical change in approach. But a TV director's job is to come into an existing series and create something in the established house style defined by the showrunner. Also, on a TV schedule, a replacement director wouldn't have time to rework the script and would just have the job of completing the existing script, so it wouldn't be that different from the previous director's work.

 

[Ssosmcin]

Except that Donner was right in that Lester's work on Superman II was of lower quality and hurt the film,

I don't agree. The Lester version is a terrific, if flawed, movie. While the released Richard Donner Cut is the best they could do with that they had, there are a number of awful over the top ideas that would not work for me in a finished film. Lois jumping out the Daily Planet window after wide-eyed mugging and elbowing Clark was horrible (I can only hope that was planned to be reshot). Lois was manic. At least the Niagara Falls jump was quieter, in private and took place later in the film.

TBH, there are as many gags in idiotic moments in Donner's version. And yes, Lester (and the Newman's) had a more slapstick approach to humor that may not have fit as well. But Superman II is still a great follow up that I've loved since it was released. Take away the weird gags in the hurricane breath scene and it's not any more ridiculous than what was proposed.

A judicious combination of both films would actually be amazing. Brando's scenes are great and I do miss a few Luthor jokes. The released RD Cut is merely an approximation, they worked with what they had, and Michael Thau's editing is not great, but some of the planned scenes were rightfully redone.

whereas with "The Tholian Web," at least IMHO, you can't tell that there were two different directors involved. It feels like it comes together as one cohesive whole, so I didn't think Wallerstein did a worse job than Senesky.

Obviously, I don't think Lester did a worse job than Donner either, but this is all viewer opinion. But either way, Donner had decades to get over it and had the Lethal Weapon series success after that.

 

[Methuselah Flint]

I guess with The Tholian Web, the second director simply came in and finished the job, so a different approach would not happen, with time, schedule etc. Plus as others have said, with a TV series there's established elements that stick whatever director is in charge.

 

[Christopher]

I don't agree. The Lester version is a terrific, if flawed, movie. While the released Richard Donner Cut is the best they could do with that they had, there are a number of awful over the top ideas that would not work for me in a finished film. Lois jumping out the Daily Planet window after wide-eyed mugging and elbowing Clark was horrible (I can only hope that was planned to be reshot). Lois was manic. At least the Niagara Falls jump was quieter, in private and took place later in the film.

I was going to offer a counterargument, but since this is a Star Trek thread and the wrong place to talk about a Superman movie, I'll just link to my old blog review of the Lester version.

 

[Ssosmcin]

I was going to offer a counterargument, but since this is a Star Trek thread and the wrong place to talk about a Superman movie, I'll just link to my old blog review of the Lester version.

I could just respond there as well, but let's just say I don't agree with you and leave it at that.

 

[Mudd]

Lester's Superman II isn't a very good movie.

 

[Maurice]

TMP's warp effect remains my favorite to this day. It is so much more visually interesting than the "rubber band" effect that became the standard starting with TNG. Unfortunately, that was one of those things that was really in Doug Trumbull's wheelhouse and that the ILM team really couldn't effectively duplicate -- the couple of attempts they make in TWOK were pale imitations, and then they ultimately settled on the "color blur" variant we saw for the rest of the TOS films.

ILM used different techniques than Trumbull, but there's no reason they couldn't have a closer-to-TMP warp effect had they wanted and had the budget to do so. There may have been a bit of a "not invented here" mentality.

Incidentally, Ralph died recently, at 102, and I don't know if anyone is paying the rent on his blog, so you might want to read it while you can. I've found that "wayback machine" stuff to be very hit and miss.

There's a panel that lets you manually force the Wayback Machine to archive a specific page. I've got a bookmarklet that lets me to it with one click from any site. Drag this up into your bookmarks bar: Save in Archive.org

It's made for, like, ensuring academic citations are preserved correctly, not hand-crawling a site, but if you see something that isn't saved there but is still on-line, you can make sure it gets picked up.

The best way to use the Wayback Machine (WBM for short) is to install the WBM browser extension (links), which runs on Firefox, Opera, Safari and Chromium based browsers. With it, when you're on a page you think should be preserved, you can click on it in the toolbar and then click on the calendar and see how many captures there are (or oldest or newest), and poke around those to see how complete on incomplete a page is. If you don't see the page saved, you just pull the menu down again and click Save Page Now.

 

[CoveTom]

Regarding the discussion of the Superman films, the important thing is that we can all agree none of them are as good as Superman IV.

To bring this back to Trek and not just be a debate about Superman movies, the point really was that "The Tholian Web" feels like a cohesive whole, where as Superman II does not, IMHO, particularly when you consider that the first and second films are supposed to be part one and part two of a singular story. When Wallerstein was brought in to finish "The Tholian Web," he didn't try to reinvent the wheel and put his own stamp on it. He finished what had been started, as has been mentioned here. I think that is the superior approach when you are taking over for someone else in the middle of a project. YMMV.

 

[Christopher]

To bring this back to Trek and not just be a debate about Superman movies, the point really was that "The Tholian Web" feels like a cohesive whole, where as Superman II does not, IMHO, particularly when you consider that the first and second films are supposed to be part one and part two of a singular story. When Wallerstein was brought in to finish "The Tholian Web," he didn't try to reinvent the wheel and put his own stamp on it. He finished what had been started, as has been mentioned here. I think that is the superior approach when you are taking over for someone else in the middle of a project. YMMV.

As I said, on a TV schedule, there wouldn't have been time for any other approach. It's apples and oranges.

 

[CoveTom]

As I said, on a TV schedule, there wouldn't have been time for any other approach. It's apples and oranges.

No, it's not. While it might be true that Wallerstein would not have had the opportunity to do it a different way, that doesn't change my assessment of which outcome is preferable. And the outcome we got with Wallerstein on "The Tholian Web" is preferable to the outcome we got with Lester on Superman II.

Of course, the other issue is that in both cases, the original directors should never have been fired, but that's another conversation altogether.