I believe in God. This is a somewhat unpopular stance in a geek like myself. Secular humanism is generally the order of the day in SF, but, of course, if I was content to follow the herd, I wouldn’t be head writer for this site, would I? Suffice to say, however, that given the obvious rationalist bent of the genre as a whole, religion was kind of a taboo for most of its history.

We rag on Trek a lot here at the ‘Bot…

[Pause for uncomfortable comedic effect]

You probably expected a “But” to follow that statement. Something like “We rag on it a lot, but it’s only because we love it so” or “…but only because we want it to rise above its shortcomings” or simply “…but we don’t really mean it.” So let’s try that again, shall we?

“We rag on Trek a lot here at the ‘Bot.”

[Another uncomfortable pause]

You know how people sometimes say that Trek is like a religion? They talk about it’s optimism, their faith in its view of the future and the human spirit, they natter on about what is and isn’t ’canonical,’ the true believers dress in silly vestments and call themselves “Trekers’ to differentiate themselves from casual fans and from the lower-caste “Trekies.” They have revival meetings they call ‘conventions,‘ where they can recharge their batteries in the presence of like-minded believers.

Wow! Now, as you know, most TV series buy more scripts than they can possibly use in a season, simply because they know in advance a couple of ‘em will crap out for various reasons in preproduction. Some of these will get held over for the next season, and some will simply be shelved, never to be seen again. This site http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Undeveloped_Star_Trek_episodes actually links to a metric buttload of unproduced scripts from the ORIGINAL trek from the 60s! Golly!