Future Perfect: How Star Trek Conquered Planet Earth (Review)

But fortunately Gene wasn’t one to give up easily, and by combining his message about human nature with one of the most popular genres of the time—the Western—he was able to sell the idea of a "wagontrain to the stars" to NBC. But that was only one small battle won in a much larger war.

Under constant threat of cancellation, the original Star Trek series—known as TOS to Trekkers—never really took off during its first run. After three seasons and 79 episodes, the ax finally fell on the head of intelligent television.

Enter syndication. In reruns, Star Trek finally began to soar. And the rest is history. These days, there is virtually no person in the United States who doesn’t know the phrase "Beam me up Scotty" (though Kirk never spoke those words on the TV series), or "warp speed." And, as Jeff Greenwald discovers, this phenomenon is not limited to the U.S. People worldwide have been taken in by the positive message about humanity that Star Trek conveys.

When many people watch Star Trek, all they see are spaceships and uncannily similar aliens with strategically-positioned bumps on their heads. These people often dismiss Trek as something for children to enjoy. Surely this would not grab the attention of scientists, philosophers, politicians, and teachers all around the world. So what is it about Star Trek that has helped it to become so ingrained in our global culture?

Underneath the superficial is an extremely intelligent concept that speaks to what most of us want to believe—that mankind is inherently good and that we can overcome our problems and enter into a prosperous future. It is something that is difficult to make yourself believe given the current state of our affairs. The portrayal of the Federation’s 24th century is both positive and, thanks to the attention paid to keeping scientific theories and technology fairly accurate, believable. Star Trek is a great teacher.

So with this belief that Star Trek means something, Greenwald begins his globetrotting to speak to real people. His journeys take him to a Kensington Star Trek pub to talk to the British, to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory to find out how Star Trek has influenced the real-life design of spacecraft,