At Flashbak: The 5 Most Underrated Episodes of Star Trek (1966 - 1969)

My new article at Flashbak takes a close look at five episodes of the original Star Trek that I consider underrated, given their quality.

Here's a snippet (and the url: http://flashbak.com/the-5-most-underrated-episodes-of-star-trek-18299/ ):

"In 2016, the world celebrates the 50^th anniversary of Gene Roddenberry’s Star Trek (1966 – 1969), a TV series and cultural phenomenon that has spawned cartoons, comic-books, films, live-action spin-offs and more toys than you can shake a tribble at.

The original series episodes have been updated to feature modern CGI special effects too, in a bid to make the series seem more contemporary, but the effort was largely unnecessary because the storytelling on the program remains so vibrant and cerebral, even half-a-century after first broadcast.

Many episodes of Star Trek are considered classics because of their importance to the franchise. “Space Seed” introduced Khan (Ricardo Montalban), for example. Some episodes reveal new shades of the beloved characters, and engender empathy for them (“City on the Edge of Forever,” “This Side of Paradise,” “All Our Yesterdays.”)  Others involve events important to the galaxy itself (“Errand of Mercy,” “The Doomsday Machine.”)

But some of the seventy-nine Star Trek episodes produced simply don’t get their fair share of the sunlight.  Perhaps these shows don’t possess the most memorable high-concepts of the most enduring episodes, or perhaps they are superficially similar to other, more popular segments, and thus easy to forget.

With that description in mind, here are my choices for the five most underrated Star Trek episodes."