When The Roddenberry Vault project was announced to the world earlier this year at Comic-Con, it was a huge surprise to the legions of Star Trek: The Original Series fans. The Original Series is 50 years old this year, and fans thought that whatever there was to see from TOS had been seen; after all, for the 40th anniversary it had been given a proper HD scan, which meant digging all the film out of the CBS/Paramount archives. So what else is there? Read on to find out…
So where did this new source of alternate takes, deleted scenes, and more come from? The answer to this probably won’t surprise long time Star Trek fans. Majel Barrett and Bjo Trimble started Star Trek Enterprises (later named Lincoln Enterprises) to sell Trek merchandise towards the end of the production of TOS. They grabbed discarded film “dailies” along with other extra footage and sold segments of the film to ravenous fans. Jump forward to 2007, Gene and Majel’s son Rod is going through his family’s assets and realizes there’s a warehouse filled with old film canisters.
Quietly, he and the Okudas check through these canisters as time allows over the next few years, hoping there’s enough worthwhile content to make something out of them. With the 50th anniversary coming up, Rod, the Okudas, and documentarian Roger Lay Jr., work with CBS Home Entertainment to form a plan for a new TOS Blu-ray set that will showcase the found footage. The people who put this together are all Star Trek fans as much as we all are, and it really shows. The work on The Roddenberry Vault feels like it was done by people who love the show and wanted to do right by the discovery of all this footage.
A look at the unique “vault” packaging motif
The Roddenberry Vault is a rather unique home video release in that most people aren’t as interested in what’s considered the “main” content, the episodes themselves, as they are the “bonus” content, where all the found footage resides.
What’s included on each disc
Disc One:
Episodes
The Corbomite Maneuver
Isolated Music Track
Arena
Isolated Music Track
Space Seed
Isolated Music Track
This Side of Paradise
Isolated Music Track
Audio Commentary by Dorothy “D.C.” Fontana and Gabrielle Stanton
Special Features
Inside the Roddenberry Vault (Part 1)
Star Trek: Revisiting a Classic
Disc Two:
Episodes
The Devil in the Dark
Isolated Music Track
The City on the Edge of Forever
Audio Commentary by Roger Lay Jr., Scott Mantz and Mark A. Altman
Operation – Annihilate!
Isolated Music Track
Metamorphosis
Isolated Music Track
Special Features
Inside the Roddenberry Vault (Part 2)
Strange New Worlds: Visualizing the Fantastic
Disc Three:
Episodes
Who Mourns for Adonais?
Isolated Music Track
Mirror, Mirror
Isolated Music Track
The Trouble With Tribbles
Isolated Music Track
Audio Commentary by David Gerrold and David A. Goodman
Return to Tomorrow
Isolated Music Track
Special Features
Inside the Roddenberry Vault (Part 3)
Swept Up: Snippets from the Cutting Room Floor
Episodes
Each of the 3 discs includes four episodes that the producers of the set felt reflected TOS and enough new footage to be specially highlighted.
The episodes themselves are same as the 2009 TOS Blu-ray sets, you get a choice between the newer CG VFX or the original.
A new option included with the episodes, except for “The City on the Edge of Forever”, is an isolated music track. For folks interested in the music this is a unique feature of the set; hard core TOS fans who know the episodes by heart probably don’t need the dialogue to enjoy the episode anyway.
Commentaries
Three new commentaries were recorded for this set:
This Side of Paradise – Dorothy “D.C.” Fontana and Gabrielle Stanton
The City on the Edge of Forever – Roger Lay Jr., Scott Mantz and Mark A. Altman
The Trouble With Tribbles – David Gerrold and David A. Goodman
These new commentaries are nice extras — importantly “Paradise” and “Tribbles” include people who were actually involved in the production.
Documentaries
Here’s where we get to the good stuff! Inside each of the new documentaries is the found footage.
A disclaimer about the footage: these are very old (not well cared for either, I’m sure) bits of film, most were left on the cutting room floor, many are from cheaper film stock used for the dailies. They’re presented here quite raw, with dirt and scratches, audio pops and hisses, and shifted color tints, which all come with aging film.
On each disc is a 30-minute segment of “Inside the Roddenberry Vault” (combined 90 minutes). This documentary follows the episodes included on the disc. Each episode is highlighted and then deleted scenes and alternate takes are woven into the information from Trek experts (including Richard Arnold and Mark A. Altman), notable fans who are now making TV that have been deeply influenced by TOS: Bill Prady (The Big Bang Theory), David Mirkin (The Simpsons), and Gabrielle Stanton (The Flash). New interviews with William Shatner, members of the production crew, such as Dorothy Fontana, David Gerrold, Joe D’Agosta (casting director), and Richard Edlund (VFX), and the guest stars of the episodes: Clint Howard, Craig Hundley, Elinor Donahue, Barbara Luna, Charlie Brill, Michael Forrest, and Leslie Parish, give depth to the documentaries.
Some highlights from the vault:
Gene Coon’s influence on TOS is brought front and center; often “the other Gene” has been passed over when discussing the production of TOS.
There is a deleted scene from “Space Seed” which shows Khan promising McGivers a place at his side as she mans the transporter controls after beaming him back to the Enterprise with his crew from the Botany Bay.
There is another deleted scene from “Space Seed” which shows how ballsy and no-nonsense McCoy is: while being held by Khan’s men, he confronts Khan about how he (McCoy) had saved his life earlier in the episode.
There’s quite a bit more to Kirk and Edith Keeler’s love story from “The City on the Edge of Forever” which really helps drive home how much the two fit with one another, even though they’re from such different time periods.
The famous Peter Kirk on the bridge scene from “Operation: Annihilate!” was found.
The equally famous (thanks to the James Blish novelization) original ending from “Who Mourns for Adonais?” where McCoy announces that Lt. Palamas is pregnant with Apollo’s child, couldn’t be found as a complete scene, but they did find a reaction take of Leonard Nimoy as Spock, with the script coordinator reading Kirk and McCoy’s dialog off camera, confirming that the scene was indeed filmed.
They found an extended version of Kirk’s “risk is our business” speech from “Return to Tomorrow”.
There is a second documentary included on each disc; these are standalone pieces on different topics.
Star Trek: Revisiting A Classic (30 min.) – This is a look back at the origins of the series and the initial production of TOS. We hear from the surviving main cast members, Adam Nimoy and Chris Doohan are interviewed on behalf of their fathers, plus casting director Joe D’Agosta, and others. Naturally this has plenty of behind-the-scenes photos and “vault” footage. This segment does a good job introducing TOS to more casual fans, and also throws in bits and pieces of found footage for the more versed TOS fan to enjoy.
Strange New Worlds: Visualizing the Fantastic (30 min.) – This is a really worthwhile feature that talks about the design of the show, the cutting edge visual effects that TOS used, and how it was accomplished on a TV budget. Of course the huge volume of work that Matt Jefferies created for TOS is highlighted. We’re treated to newly unearthed original visual effects photography interspersed by interviews with Richard Edlund (who was the right-hand man at The Westheimer Company during TOS and later helped to found ILM), and more recent TNG-era visual effects crew, Doug Drexler, Dan Curry and Gary Hutzel help describe the visual effects processes of TOS.
A collage filmed for use as The Companion effect in “Metamorphosis”
Swept Up: Snippets from the Cutting Room Floor (20 min.) – This a grab bag of various unseen footage, such as alternate takes, and omitted dialogue. Basically, anything else worth including that didn’t belong in one of the documentaries is bundled up in this final piece.
Test footage of the nacelle cap lighting
Final Thoughts:
It’s hard to describe all the bits and pieces included, some are tiny trims, or brief alternate takes, others are complete deleted scenes. It’s really something you’ll have to see for yourself. As a life-long Trek fan, whose first love is TOS, this is an easy recommendation. The glimpses back in time are well worth it. There’s a lot of love put into this set by all involved.
Mirror Chekov reminds Sulu that Uhura is deadly with her knives
The only thing that saddens me, is that we know other deleted scenes exist, and this taste of them leaves you wanting to see even more. Those other deleted scenes must really be lost at this point, chopped up and sold to folks in the ’70s and ’80s, or worse, tossed in a trashcan by an editor long long ago.
We’re incredibly lucky as fans to have The Roddenberry Vault. It shows us new material from a TV show made 50 years ago, long before the concept of home video — today deleted scenes are purposefully preserved since they make for great bonus content.
Support TrekMovie by ordering The Roddenberry Vault through the link below: