BW Media Spotlight

In the last installment we looked at the third revision writer’s guide bios on the three Enterprise crewmen who got to be in the opening credits. This time we’ll look at the rest of the cast.

Even Star Trek: The Next Generation had recurring characters in the closing credits. I don’t remember if Guinan ever got to be in the main credits, but if she did I don’t think it was her early appearances. The supporting cast is also important, especially in a show set on a starship that travels around the universe doing science stuff, protecting the worlds and colonies of the Federation, and having adventures at every corner. Kirk, Spock, and McCoy can’t do everything. They aren’t Tom Paris.

While there are only two pages we get five characters with a history. The two men share one page and the three girls the second, due to more info on Scotty and Sulu than on Uhura, Nurse Chapel, and Yeoman Rand. Chapel and Rand I can understand, as there were a lot of episodes where the only reason Majel Barrett had anything to do was that she doubled as the ship’s computer, a benefit of sleeping with the showrunner. Oh shut up, they were married! Grace Lee Whitney could be gone for multiple episodes as she had so little to do. She would later earn a command rank, so we all start somewhere. Admittedly even I was ready to chock it up to Gene’s reported casual sexism, seeing as Uhura was on often enough that she should get as much written about her as Scotty and Sulu, but I don’t know for certain if that’s in play here with her.

If you think that means this will be short, the part with the main three took a page each and by the time I was done was all one article. So I’m betting I can at least fill this one. Let’s get reading.

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