Star Trek: The Original Series Season 1 — Blu-ray Review
Star Trek: The Original Series Season 1 Blu-ray
James T. Kirk & Co. boldly go where they haven't gone before: Blu-ray. With all the fanfare surrounding the Star Trek reboot hitting theaters, there's no better time to check out where the franchise first started — and in stunning HD picture and audio, no less.
Star Trek: The Original Series Season 1 includes all 29 episodes of the NBC series' first season, including favorites "Balance of Terror," "Space Seed" and "The Devil in the Dark." The set offers a 7.1 surround sound audio upgrade as well as enhanced CGI effects also released a few years ago on DVD. Most notable, however, is that Trekkie purists are for the first time able to seamlessly switch between the "enhanced" audio and visuals and the original episodes on the very same disc. On the downside, however, the dazzling picture appears in a 4:3 aspect ratio (not widescreen for those not versed in techno-speak).
The featurettes and documentaries are plentiful and chock-full of goodies, but they are nearly all ported over from past DVD (or even the forgotten HD DVD) releases. Among the best, however, are "To Boldly Go...Season One," "Billy Blackburn's Treasure Chest: Rare Home Movies and Special Memories," "Spacelift" (which focuses on all the work behind the audio and visual upgrades and the re-recording of the entire score), "Reflections on Spock," and "Life Beyond Trek: William Shatner."
As with any release making its way to Blu-ray, the question on everyone's mind is this: Is it worth the cash to upgrade? This case is a definite yes. The episodes have never sounded or looked better, and probably won't until Blu-ray is eclipsed years down the line. Throw in the aforementioned seamless branching, the easy-to-use menus (vastly superior from the DVD versions), and the awesomely cheesy overacting of the entire Enterprise crew, and you have no reason to keep from slotting this onto your shelf.
