Original Reviews in 1960s

[Panem et circenses]

I was just wondering if anyone knew where Star Trek would have been reviewed when it was originally airing?
Through reading Cushman's book it seems to have been TV Guide, Variety, The Hollywood Reporter, TV Key Previews, and TV Scout.

Does anyone know where else the episodes were reviewed at the time? And is there any way of getting hold of these reviews (for free if possible)?

 

[Kor]

The Google news archives might have something. Even though the project is no longer active and is far from complete, there's still a good deal of historical info there.

Kor

 

[mb22]

Does your library have access to a good news database? If so, you might be able to find at least some of the larger city papers.

 

[BlueshirtGuard]

Shatner's Star trek Memories book had some. The only one I remember was the man trap review because it was the first episode. It got pretty bad reviews.

 

[ZapBrannigan]

I was just wondering if anyone knew where Star Trek would have been reviewed when it was originally airing?
Through reading Cushman's book it seems to have been TV Guide, Variety, The Hollywood Reporter, TV Key Previews, and TV Scout.

Does anyone know where else the episodes were reviewed at the time? And is there any way of getting hold of these reviews (for free if possible)?

Where else? If you have all the reviews you mentioned, you're in pretty good shape. At the time, there just weren't that many places reviewing TV shows. It was nothing like the Internet era. In the 1960s, you might have two daily newspapers and a few magazine subscriptions, and that was it.

I'll just post this one in case anybody missed it:

I love the bit about the "rather hazy girlfriend," a reference to Jerry Finnerman's trusty diffusion filter.

 

[UnknownSample]

Well, that was awfully non-committal...

 

[Panem et circenses]

Thanks! That was quite interesting, and yea, almost completely on the fence. I've not actually managed to track down the actual reviews in Variety etc.

It seems strange that some episodes in Cushman's book seem to have reviews particularly for that episode, rather than the series as a whole. It seems more difficult to track these ones down.

And, unfortunately, since I live in the UK, my library doesn't have access to a backlog of US newspapers.

 

[Balok's Decoy]

Where else? If you have all the reviews you mentioned, you're in pretty good shape. At the time, there just weren't that many places reviewing TV shows. It was nothing like the Internet era. In the 1960s, you might have two daily newspapers and a few magazine subscriptions, and that was it.

I'll just post this one in case anybody missed it:

I love the bit about the "rather hazy girlfriend," a reference to Jerry Finnerman's trusty diffusion filter.

"Some scheming girl yeoman."

"He yeomeans it."

Let's all give a resounding groan to 1967.

 

[dahj]

Let's all give a resounding groan to 1967.

Uhm... don't read my episode intros in the rewatch thread.

 

[Christopher]

Does your library have access to a good news database? If so, you might be able to find at least some of the larger city papers.

Do libraries still have microfilm/fiche collections of old newspapers?

 

[CrazyMatt]

I seem to remember thinking that Cleveland Amory was a blowhard. Good to see my memory is not totally misplaced.

 

[mb22]

Do libraries still have microfilm/fiche collections of old newspapers?

I assume some of the older/larger ones might if they don't have digitized versions.

There is also a website newspapers.com that has a large (though certainly not complete) collection of newspaper page scans. It is not free though, although there is a one-week free introduction.

 

[Warped9]

Where else? If you have all the reviews you mentioned, you're in pretty good shape. At the time, there just weren't that many places reviewing TV shows. It was nothing like the Internet era. In the 1960s, you might have two daily newspapers and a few magazine subscriptions, and that was it.

I'll just post this one in case anybody missed it:

I love the bit about the "rather hazy girlfriend," a reference to Jerry Finnerman's trusty diffusion filter.

Very representative of what many in the mainstream thought of SF in those days.

 

[Christopher]

Very representative of what many in the mainstream thought of SF in those days.

Right. TOS was pretty much the first non-anthology SFTV series aimed at adult audiences, so it struggled to overcome the perception that it was a kids' show. Heck, it still hasn't entirely overcome that perception. I was at an authors' event just a year or two ago when I encountered an author who thought that I was writing children's books when I said I wrote Star Trek fiction. Although the author in question was an older person, so their perceptions were probably formed back in the day when it was still a prevalent assumption.

 

[mb22]

I believe that some science fiction writers look down at media tie-in novels in general.

 

[Christopher]

I believe that some science fiction writers look down at media tie-in novels in general.

And non-genre writers look down on science fiction writers. It's a whole hierarchy of condescension. Anyway, the person I was talking about was not a science fiction author or fan, IIRC.