![]() Among them are Voyager: Elite Force, Starfleet Command II: Empires at War, and Armada (of course there's also New Worlds, but they can't all be winners), as well as a number of upcoming products that show great promise, including Bridge Commander, Dominion Wars, and Away Team. This persistent gaming curse on the Star Trek franchise has seemingly been broken, however, with the recent addition of several well done titles to the inventory. ![]() Past efforts to cash in on the popular Star Trek license have resulted in a long string of games ranging in quality from slightly above mediocre to downright poor. This rather harsh judgment is not entirely unwarranted. ![]() (Gene Rodenberry would later write useless, never-sung lyrics so he could lay claim to half of Courage's royalties).In recent years the gaming community has come to view any game with the words "Star Trek" in the title as pariah, unworthy of even a second thought. The result is a theme that is both adventure-driven (you can almost hear trotting horse hooves underneath the singing) and iconically sci-fi, as the first four notes ring out like satellite pings over the depths of space.Ĭourage even created the "woosh" sound effect as the Enterprise zips across the screen during the opening credits, by making the sound with his mouth. "He wanted something that had some balls and drive to it."Ĭourage combined woodwinds, a harp, a vibraphone, French horns and Loulie Jean Norman: a soprano singer from The Dean Martin Show, who was the first to sing the wordless Star Trek melody. "I don't want any of this goddamn funny-sounding space science fiction music, I want adventure music," composer Alexander Courage recalls Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry telling him, in interviews excerpted in the 2013 collection Music In Science Fiction Television: Tuned to the Future. ![]() A 2013 poll by the official Star Trek site found a split fanbase, though the most substantial support went to the same two themes as top this ranked list. Those sticky lyrics ensure you'll never forget it.īut while it's easy to step on the Enterprise song, ranking the rest of the Star Trek themes-which stick closer to the style of the soaring orchestral introduction that first appeared before the very first episode, "The Man Trap," on September 6, 1966-is a lot trickier. "By the time they've watched the 20th episode, they'll be thinking, 'Well, it's not that bad after all.'" But they'll get used to it," he said in 2001. Watson, the song's singer, probably described the journey towards acceptance best: "Something new happens, and people aren't quite sure of it. (Other selections used for morning esprit de corps on space missions included the theme from the 1965 Western For a Few Dollars More, "Eye in the Sky" by Alan Parsons Project and "Gettin' Jiggy Wit It" by Will Smith.) NASA archivist Colin Fries confirms Space Shuttle crews were subjected to it four times, with "Where My Heart Will Take Me" serving as a wake up call twice as often as the themes for the original Star Trek or The Next Generation. While few would dispute that "Where My Heart Will Take Me" is the worst Star Trek theme, it has still, for the most part, been tolerated, sometimes even embraced. The Enterprise theme may have sucked all the mockery in the galaxy into its orbit, but it's a little hard not to admire them for sticking by it, even doubling down with a baffling third season pivot to a new version-this one smooth jazz-pop, which sounded a little as if the record player had been sped up slightly to get it over with. But for all the sputtering, it's hard not to find a Star Trek theme with singalong lyrics at least a little charming, even if its syrupy sentiment would make actually singing along embarrassing.
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