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cold, logic-driven female first officer, Number One.
    A group of survivors is discovered, all that remain of the crew of the SS
Columbia
, a ship that crashed over a decade before. Vina – just a child when the ship crashed – forms a strong connection with Pike. Hidden alien intelligences observe them and use Vina to lure Pike into a trap. Captured by the Talosians (large-headed mute creatures, now humanoid in form), Pike is incarcerated with Vina, in fact the sole survivor of the
Columbia
crash. The remaining
Enterprise
landing crew see the encampment vanish, realising it to have been an illusion created by the aliens as a lure.
    The Talosians (played in the episode by short actresses, but voiced by male actors for an ‘alien’ effect) want to breed a race of humanoids, and hope to mate Pike with Vina. Utilising a series of illusions, they try to force Pike to comply, but he resists. Number One and Yeoman Colt are kidnapped from the
Enterprise
, beamed by the Talosians directly to Pike’s cage. If Vina is not to Pike’s liking, think the Talosians, maybe they can tempt him with one of his own female crewmembers? Meanwhile, Spock and company have returned with a laser cannon and turn it on the hidden Talosians’ lair. Although the weapon is effective, the Talosians maintain a psychic illusion so the
Enterprise
crew do not perceive the damage they have done.
    Pike escapes and discovers the truth about the Talosians. Having wrecked their planet’s ecology the race moved underground, developing their mental capacity but losing the ability to produce children (hence their interest in recreating their race via Pike and Vina). The truth is also revealed about Vina: she was disfigured in the crash of the
Columbia
, but the Talosians have psychically maintained her self-image as that of a beautiful young woman. Pike agrees to leave the Talosians alone, as long as they maintain Vina’s illusion – in fact, they create an unreal Captain Pike who stays with her. The
Enterprise
crew resume their ongoing voyages . . .
    Executives at NBC responded to Roddenberry’s full pilot script with a series of ‘notes’ – comments on the settings, characters and structure of the drama. Roddenberry quickly took offence at this interference in ‘his’ project, thinking he knew best how to tell his story, but was persuaded by Solow that if he were to have any realistic hope at all of getting
Star Trek
on air, he’d have to work with NBC, not against them. Again, this was odd behaviour from a producer who’d already run his own TV show in
The Lieutenant
and had previously experienced thetrials and tribulations of dealing with network executives. Roddenberry’s strong personal investment in the
Star Trek
concept as a storyteller was beginning to get in the way of his duties as a practical producer.
    Desilu had previously been known for comedy and variety shows, most of them simple vehicles for the star power of Lucille Ball. Now it was looking at a major, risky expansion into drama for network television with both
Star Trek
and spy thriller
Mission: Impossible
entering production simultaneously. Practical problems loomed, starting with assembling a production crew for the needs of an ambitious drama like
Star Trek
: the team who produced
The Lucy Show
would simply not be up to the task. Instead, Solow and Roddenberry were faced with the challenge of building a completely new production unit from scratch to film the revised
Star Trek
pilot script, in the hope that NBC would commit to a full series and so result in Desilu recovering its up-front investment. Although NBC would be paying for
Star Trek
, the fee Desilu would receive would regularly be less than the cost of making the show – the difference would have to be recouped through advertising and foreign sales.
    The crew on
Star Trek
was made up of people selected by Roddenberry and Solow to realise the creator’s storytelling ambitions. It was clear to the production team that