Sunday 27 July 2014

Please Release Me: More Star Trek

Here's another batch of unreleased Star Trek oddities unlikely to ever make it onto a home video format near you:

National Power and Powergen Ad
William Shatner and James Doohan took the money and ran for this British TV advert shot on the Star Trek: The Next Generation sets for National Power and Powergen.



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Hallmark Star Trek Christmas Ad
An earless Leonard Nimoy goes Christmas shopping. It's a little embarrassing.



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Hallmark Enterprise-D Ad
In 1993, Patti Yasutake and Majel Barrett appeared as Nurse Ogawa and the voice of the computer respectively in an advert for Hallmark's Enterprise-D Ornament. Ogawa is a surprising choice of character as this is clearly meant to be 'in character' and you wonder how much of the wider audience would recognise her.



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Hallmark Klingon Bird of Prey Ad
Another advert, another guest star in the lead. Robert Reilly gives us an unusually generous Gowron with his usual wide-eyed gusto. How many TV adverts would trust the audience to read subtitles throughout, never mind those accompanying dialogue in a fictional language?



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Star Trek Social Security Ads
I love George Takei and while I'm sure it's all in a good cause, he risks looking like he has lost his mind in this pair of adverts for SocialSecurity.gov. The costumes are beyond awful (the UK Pizza Hut ad with Finchy from The Office is more impressive) and aggressively tucked in, but George manages to get his "Oh My" catchphrase in, so at least he's happy.





Fear not, I've got a few more videos that I'll share in a couple of days.

Would using Star Trek characters, cast and crew make you more likely to part with your hard-earned?

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