Operation Annihilate

[Trekfan12]

I just watched this ep on ME TV and I have to say that they are really butchering the broadcast. They cut out some parts of the show. I remember the station that used to broadcast it in NY, where I used to live, way back before cable used to cut parts out of the reruns. But ME TV was doing, what I felt, was a pretty good job of showing the entire ep. But tonight I noticed that they cut the whole argument that McCoy and nurse Chapel were having when they were examining Spock's back. They cut parts of Spock's dialog when he awakes in sickbay. Was rather frustrating.

One of my pet peeves with this ep, which is one of my faves, is why they didn't wait for the results of the tests on the creature's remains. it would have shown that they didn't need to throw the entire spectrum of light at the creature to kill it. Then Spock wouldn't have been blinded (then of course we wouldn't have known about the different eye arrangements in Vulcans. )

 

[Captain Rob]

I was struck by that also. The emergency wasn't that urgent. They still had plenty of time to do more research and develop a plan of action. If any ships tried to leave the planet, the Enterprise could easily stop them.
And apparently nobody ever tried to shoot the things with phasers on full power or with the phaser rifle.
Or the most obvious, do what Spock did. put them in a locked box. Unless they multiply like tribbles.

 

[Mytran]

I just watched this ep on ME TV and I have to say that they are really butchering the broadcast. They cut out some parts of the show. I remember the station that used to broadcast it in NY, where I used to live, way back before cable used to cut parts out of the reruns. But ME TV was doing, what I felt, was a pretty good job of showing the entire ep. But tonight I noticed that they cut the whole argument that McCoy and nurse Chapel were having when they were examining Spock's back. They cut parts of Spock's dialog when he awakes in sickbay. Was rather frustrating.

Could they be using the old syndicated versions from the 1970s? Those eps were cut down to 44 minutes (instead of the original 48)

 

[Trekfan12]

Could they be using the old syndicated versions from the 1970s? Those eps were cut down to 44 minutes (instead of the original 48)

They are using the remastered versions of the episodes.

 

[Mytran]

But re-edited to the style of the syndicated versions, it seems! I'll have to dig out my Nitpickers Trek books; Phil Farrand listed all the edits in there for each episode

 

[scotpens]

Could they be using the old syndicated versions from the 1970s? Those eps were cut down to 44 minutes (instead of the original 48)

The full running time of each TOS episode (including opening and closing credits) was actually 51 minutes, give or take a few seconds. That was standard for prime-time shows at the time.

 

[Mytran]

Really? My PAL DVDs clock in at around 48,20 an episode

 

[trynda1701]

The UK used to be bad for this, we got the edited versions until the broadcast run on BBC in the early 90's.

We had things like in "Amok Time" with McCoy announcing to Kirk that he has to get Spock to Vulcan in seven days or he'll die, without the dramatic music cue, fade to black, then new music cue and Kirk asking "Why?" It just had one dramatic note and no fade out, and it's obvious! Or in the Cheron episode, I first saw the scene where Lokai talks to Sulu and Co in the Lounge on that broadcast run. It was advertised as an uncut broadcast run, so I taped them on VHS.

In fact, only a few weeks ago, watching a remastered repeat of "And the Children Shall Lead", I don't ever remember the scene where Kirk and Spock go into the cave before beaming back to the ship and Kirk gets the panic attack, so I can't have watched my VHS recording of the unedited episode back when I recorded it!

 

[feek61]

The TOS episodes here (U.S.) are over 50 mins long.

 

[MacLeod]

Really? My PAL DVDs clock in at around 48,20 an episode

That's more likely down to the fact that when converting from NTSC to PAL there is a 4% speed up.

Of course PAL does have the advantage of higher resolution 576 vs 480 for NTSC (not that's lines)

Each system had it's pros and cons.

 

[Trekfan12]

The UK used to be bad for this, we got the edited versions until the broadcast run on BBC in the early 90's.

We had things like in "Amok Time" with McCoy announcing to Kirk that he has to get Spock to Vulcan in seven days or he'll die, without the dramatic music cue, fade to black, then new music cue and Kirk asking "Why?" It just had one dramatic note and no fade out, and it's obvious! Or in the Cheron episode, I first saw the scene where Lokai talks to Sulu and Co in the Lounge on that broadcast run. It was advertised as an uncut broadcast run, so I taped them on VHS.

In fact, only a few weeks ago, watching a remastered repeat of "And the Children Shall Lead", I don't ever remember the scene where Kirk and Spock go into the cave before beaming back to the ship and Kirk gets the panic attack, so I can't have watched my VHS recording of the unedited episode back when I recorded it!

Yeah, I saw that cave scene with Kirk having a panic attack on the DVD, I don't remember seeing that before on broadcast Television

 

[johnnybear]

There are numerous scenes that I've seen for the first time perhaps on DVD that I've never ever seen on BBC transmissions in 78,84 and later on! Court Martial with Kirk and Cogley, Arena with Gorn and Kirk, Day of the Dove with Chekov and Mara, Kirk and Spock in Cave in And the children...! The BBC cut these shows to bits and left us with raised eyebrows and dialogue that didn't make sense! The Alternative Factor is impossible to follow when you watched it in 1981 on BBC1 but then again even with the added bits it's kinda hard to follow anyway!
JB

 

[MacLeod]

Perhaps in the case of the BBC the cuts where down to the 18:00 timeslot it used on re-runs in the 80's.

 

[OtherGene]

Perhaps in the case of the BBC the cuts where down to the 18:00 timeslot it used on re-runs in the 80's.

I used to bloody love watching Star Trek at that time, it was often the last program I was allowed to watch before beddy byes.

 

[trynda1701]

Perhaps in the case of the BBC the cuts where down to the 18:00 timeslot it used on re-runs in the 80's.

Good point.

Another annoying thing about that slot was Trek getting booted for Wimbledon or other sport in the summer! BBC never timed it so that it was a season break before Wimbledon arrived.

 

[MarsWeeps]

Could they be using the old syndicated versions from the 1970s? Those eps were cut down to 44 minutes (instead of the original 48)

I believe the original episodes were 52 minutes long, before being hacked to bits.

 

[MacLeod]

Good point.

Another annoying thing about that slot was Trek getting booted for Wimbledon or other sport in the summer! BBC never timed it so that it was a season break before Wimbledon arrived.

Well in the case of TOS re-runs in the 80's there was no mid-season break. As for TNG given that they started in 1990 there was once again no season break.