[Tell It Right]

To me it was more than just a space western. I like Star Trek's futuristic takes on real navy historical events.

Like dealing with an enemy who can cloak and the Enterprise crew saying it's unfair...always made me think about the Allies fighting the German U-boats in WW1. Or when some of them are captured and send a message encoded in some way that only the Starfleet folks can know it's there -- reminds me of the real life Captain Bainbridge of the USS Philadelphia in the early 19th century. The times they have to chose to destroy a federation ship to keep it from being used by the enemy reminds me of Stephen Decatur's crew from a real ship named Enterprise having to burn the Philadelphia. And in one of the Next Generation episodes (I think the one where Picard becomes a Borg) the Enterprise shows up for a battle too late and the crew spends a minute staring in awe of the death and destruction. That scene always makes me wonder what it was like for the real crew on the WW2 Enterprise to arrive at Pearl Harbor too late. (A scene I'm glad they put in the new Midway movie.)

[Dr. Franklin]

To me it was more than just a space western. I like Star Trek's futuristic takes on real navy historical events.
Like dealing with an enemy who can cloak and the Enterprise crew saying it's unfair...always made me think about the Allies fighting the German U-boats in WW1. Or when some of them are captured and send a message encoded in some way that only the Starfleet folks can know it's there -- reminds me of the real life Captain Bainbridge of the USS Philadelphia in the early 19th century. The times they have to chose to destroy a federation ship to keep it from being used by the enemy reminds me of Stephen Decatur's crew from a real ship named Enterprise having to burn the Philadelphia. And in one of the Next Generation episodes (I think the one where Picard becomes a Borg) the Enterprise shows up for a battle too late and the crew spends a minute staring in awe of the death and destruction. That scene always makes me wonder what it was like for the real crew on the WW2 Enterprise to arrive at Pearl Harbor too late. (A scene I'm glad they put in the new Midway movie.)

Star Trek had that military aspect to it, but they tried to play it down. The episode, The Balance of Terror was adapted from 1957 film The Enemy Below. Star Trek tried to avoid military force unless required as a last resort. Star Trek was largely adapted from the Western. Think of Kirk as Marshall Dillon, Spock as Chester his loyal deputy, and Doctor McCoy as Doc. It's about the interplay between the main characters. In that context, its the Miss Kitty character that is missing, which was to be Grace Lee Whitney's character before Roddenberry changed things.