Home Entertainment : Next Generation of ‘Trek’ Marketing: Uncut Videos

In 1966, Gene Roddenberry’s fertile imagination created “Star Trek” for television. Twenty-eight years later, after one of TV’s more popular programs grew into three series as well as seven motion pictures, Trekkers can voyage back to where the phenomenon began by purchasing episodes from two home-video collections.

Columbia House Video Library is offering the “Star Trek” and the “Star Trek: The Next Generation” collections for members. These episodes are not available in stores.

Each volume contains two uncut, unedited episodes reproduced from the original master, with running times of 100 minutes.

Both collections feature rarely seen pilot episodes: “The Cage” from the original series and “Encounter at Far Point” from “Star Trek: The Next Generation” series.

The original collection also includes “Where No Man Has Gone Before,” a second pilot produced for the series in which William Shatner assumes the lead role and Sulu and Scotty are introduced. Sally Kellerman and Gary Lockwood guest in this one, which also stars Leonard Nimoy, James Doohan and George Takei.

The second episode on this first volume of the original series is “Mudd’s Women,” featuring Roger C. Carmel as a space pirate who believes women are the only acceptable payment for the lithium crystals the Enterprise must have.

* Columbia House Video Library can be reached at (800) 638-2922. The introductory “Star Trek” volume costs $4.95, plus shipping and handling. Subsequent volumes will be mailed every four to six weeks at $19.95 plus handling. Laser discs, slightly higher, are also available.