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Welcome to Gene-ology, a podcast by Roddenberry Entertainment that dives deep into the early TV writing works of Gene Roddenberry. To fans, they were the Great Bird of the Galaxy and the First Lady of Star Trek. To their friends and co-workers, Gene Roddenberry and Majel Barrett Roddenberry were, perhaps, slightly less mythic figures with their own very human quirks, but still beloved and admired. In this panel from the TrekTalks 5 telethon in support of the Hollywood Food Coalition, Gene and Majel are remembered by those who knew them. Podcast hosted by Earl Green & Ashley Thomas TrekTalks panel hosted by John Champion Panel guests: Fred Bronson, Denise Crosby, Ernie Over, Rod Roddenberry About Gene-ology Gene-ology explores Gene Roddenberry's early television scripts, including his lesser-known works before Star Trek using the Mission Log format popularized by Roddenberry Podcasts. We analyze the themes, writing style, and cultural impact of his scripts, and we even unearth stories from the Roddenberry archives that were never produced. Join us as we trace the roots of Gene's creative genius. In This Episode Memories of Gene Roddenberry and Majel Barrett Roddenberry from those who knew and worked with them Join the Conversation What did you think of this episode? Share your thoughts, theories, and favorite moments in the comments or reach out to us on social media or email us at missionlog@roddenberry.com Did you know Roddenberry Podcasts is on YouTube? Find the video versions of your favorite shows like Mission Log: Prodigy, Mission Log: The Orville, as well as exclusive content only available on YouTube. Subscribe now! https://www.youtube.com/@RoddenberryEntertainment?sub_confirmation=1 Follow us on Social Media: INSTAGRAM https://www.instagram.com/roddenberrypodcasts BLUESKY https://bsky.app/profile/roddenberrypod.bsky.social THREADS https://www.threads.net/@roddenberrypodcasts FACEBOOK https://www.facebook.com/MissionLogPod Our shows are part of the Roddenberry Entertainment family. For more great shows and to learn how we live the legacy of Gene Roddenberry, the creator of Star Trek, follow us here: RODDENBERRY PODCASTS https://www.instagram.com/RoddenberryPodcasts RODDENBERRY ENTERTAINMENT https://www.instagram.com/RoddenberryOfficial RODDENBERRY FOUNDATION https://www.instagram.com/TheRoddenberryFoundation Support the Show For as little as $1 a month, you can gain access to our Mission Log Discord Community! There, we continue the discussion with dedicated channels and a weekly video chat with the hosts. Become a member of our Patreon today! https://www.Patreon.com/MissionLog Subscribe and Stay Tuned Be sure to subscribe to Gene-ology for more deep dives into Gene Roddenberry's early works. New episodes are released regularly as we uncover more of Gene's television legacy. – Gene-ology is produced by Roddenberry Entertainment. Executive producer Eugene "Rod" Roddenberry. Visit https://Podcasts.Roddenberry.com for more great content. Edited by Earl Green.
BBC Home Video re-releases the first four seasons (including seasonal specials) of the revived Doctor Who series on Blu-Ray, starring Christopher Eccleston and David Tennant as the Doctor. The content of this box set (apart from the final few specials starring Tennant, which were shot in high definition) was upscaled to HD, initially to include these seasons in a larger box set encompassing the entire revived series.
Actress Joanna Cameron, perhaps best known for starring in the cult classic 1970s live-action kids’ superhero series Isis (a.k.a. The Secret of Isis), dies at the age of 70s after suffering complications from a stroke. Launching her career in 1969 at the behest of family friend Bob Hope, Cameron at one point held the Guinness World Record for the most commercial appearances for a single actor. Following her two-season stint as Isis, she moved on to TV guest roles in The Amazing Spider-Man, McMillan & Wife, and Switch, with her last TV credit in the appropriately titled 1980 made-for-TV movie Swan Song. After leaving Hollywood, she produced and directed promotional films for the U.S. Navy, and then moved into careers in health care and hotel marketing.
Streaming service CBS All Access releases the 30th episode of Star Trek: Discovery, opening the series’ third season, which has been delayed for the better part of a year due to the COVID-19 outbreak forcing an unexpected switch to remote post-production. David Ajala (Doctor Who) joins the series’ regular cast for the third season, which takes place in a future centuries beyond what has previously been chronicled in any prior Star Trek series.
The CW airs the 115th episode of The Flash, a modern-day reboot of DC Comics’ superhero starring Grant Gustin. Sendhil Ramamurthy (Heroes) guest stars.
The 161st episode of Arrow, a modern-day reboot of DC Comics’ Green Arrow superhero starring Stephen Amell, airs on the CW. Susanna Thompson (Star Trek: Voyager) and John Barrowman (Torchwood, Doctor Who) guest star in the season eight premiere.
The 139th episode of Arrow, a modern-day reboot of DC Comics’ Green Arrow superhero starring Stephen Amell, airs on the CW. This is the premiere of the series’ seventh season.
Streaming service CBS All Access releases the fifth episode of Star Trek: Discovery. Rainn Wilson (The Office) guest stars as Harry Mudd, a character originated in the original 1960s Star Trek series, and Jayne Brook (Chicago Hope) guest stars as Admiral Cornwell.
The 48th episode of Arrow, a modern-day reboot of DC Comics’ Green Arrow superhero starring Stephen Amell, airs on the CW. Caity Lotz (Mad Men, Legends Of Tomorrow) and Brandon Routh (Superman Returns) guest star.
A week after the Genesis sample return mission tumbled back to Earth, slamming into the Utah desert floor at nearly 200 miles per hour after its parachutes failed to open, investigators find a likely cause of the crash. It appears that four gravity-sensitive switches, designed to sense the sudden deceleration of the Genesis capsule through Earth’s atmosphere and set off a timed sequence that would’ve opened the parachutes, had all been installed backwards. The four switches were designed to be redundant, so that if some failed the others could still carry out their assigned task…but this doesn’t do a lot of good if all of them are all installed incorrrectly. The investigation indicates that an erroneous schematic diagram of Genesis may be to blame. In the meantime, researchers begin to examine the surviving chunks of the broken collector plates containing particles of solar material.
China becomes the third country to independently launch a crewed mission with the flight of Shenzhou 5, an orbital flight lasting almost 22 hours. Taikonaut Yang Liwei becomes the first Chinese citizen to leave Earth, though an American astronaut born in China had flown aboard space shuttleChallenger in 1985. Derived from Soviet-era Soyuz spacecraft, Shenzhou 5 comes in for a rough landing, causing Liwei some minor injuries upon impact.
The 126th episode of Joss Whedon’s supernatural series Buffy The Vampire Slayer, starring Sarah Michelle Gellar, airs on UPN. James Marsters and Alyson Hannigan also star.
The 91st episode of Gene Roddenberry’s Earth: Final Conflict, airs in syndication, starring Jayne Heitmeyer, Von Flores, Melinda Deines, Guylaine St. Onge, and Alan Van Sprang.
NASA/JPL’s interplanetary probe Cassini, with the European Space Agency-built Huygens Titan probe tagging along, lifts off on a Titan IV-B rocket. The voyage to Saturn will last seven years, during which Cassini does close flybys to receive gravity assists from Venus, Earth, Earth’s moon, and Jupiter en route to Saturn. It will operate in Saturn’s vicinity for over a decade and launch the Huygens probe, the first landing probe to visit a body in the outer solar system.
The feature-length 29th episode of George Lucas’ historical adventure series The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles airs on cable channel The Family Channel, starring Sean Patrick Flanery. Allison Smith (Kate & Allie) guest stars.
Fox airs the eighth episode of the sci-fi western, The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr., starring Bruce Campbell, Julius Carry, and Christian Clemenson. John Astin (The Addams Family) and Billy Drago (The Untouchables) guest star.
The ninth Doctor Who New Adventures novel, “Love And War” by Paul Cornell, is published. A pivotal point in the young book series, “Love And War” sees the exit of TV companion Ace and the introduction of an older companion, archaeologist Professor Bernice Sumemrfield, for the seventh Doctor. Using a non-sequitur mention of the “Hoothi and their great gas dirigibles” from the television story The Brain Of Morbius as a starting point for this book’s enemy, author Cornell crafts a novel that forces the series to grow into more mature territory, with a truly unsettling adversary for the Doctor to fight. An audio version will be produced by Big Finish Productions 20 years later.
The second episode of the syndicated Alexander and Ilya Salkind-produced Superboy series, starring John Haymes Newton and Stacy Haiduk, airs. Julie McCullough (Growing Pains, Robin’s Hoods) guest stars.
CBS airs the fifth episode of the animated series Superman, starring the voices of Beau Weaver and Ginny McSwain, and comprised of two stories: The Big Scoop and Overnight With The Scouts.
The 39th episode of a revival of Rod Serling’s The Twilight Zone airs in syndication. Louise Fletcher (One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine) stars.
With $4 billion having been spent on upgrading and customizing a special launch facility since 1972 to handle (mostly military) Space Shuttle launches in polar orbits, Vandenberg AFB declares Space Launch Complex 6 launch-ready, with a year to go before the first scheduled polar orbit shuttle launch. But in 1986, amid jitters in the wake of the Challenger disaster, planned use of the west coast launch facility is curtailed and finally cancelled, despite the money and time spent.
The fourth episode of the Hammer Studios-produced horror anthology series Hammer House Of Mystery And Suspense airs on ITV; the series will be shown later in the U.S. under the title Fox Mystery Theatre. David McCallum (The Man From UNCLE, Sapphire & Steel) and Jan Francis (Just Good Friends) guest star in an episode written by David Fisher (Doctor Who) and directed by Gabrielle Beaumont (The Tomorrow People, Star Trek: The Next Generation).
NBC airs the 21st episode of the Marvel animated series Spider-Man And His Amazing Friends, starring the voices of Dan Gilvezan, Kathy Garver, and Frank Welker.
The fifth episode of the science fiction series The Powers Of Matthew Star airs on NBC, starring Peter Barton and Louis Gossett Jr. Arthur Roberts (Air America) guest stars.
General Computer Corp., a small company making “grey market” modification kits to freshen up Pac-Man and Missile Command arcade games, cuts a deal with Midway, the American licensee for Pac-Man, handing over the code to its Pac-Man modification kit Crazy Otto. Midway contracts GCC to continue work on the kit, but now under license. The first thing to go are the kit’s name and its modified Pac-Man character, who now has legs. A few changes and a few months later, the game’s central character has no legs, but will now sport lipstick and a pink bow, as Midway prepares to officially release the new game as an authorized Pac-Man sequel, Ms. Pac-Man – amazingly good luck for a small business that could just as easily have been sued into oblivion.
The 460th episode of Doctor Who airs on BBC1. Michael Sheard (The Empire Strikes Back) and Frederick Jaeger guest star; John Leeson joins the cast as the voice of K-9.
NASA prepares a preliminary schedule of Space Shuttle launches, covering the years 1979-1982 (and assuming the shuttle will be ready to launch in 1979). The ambitious schedule (which also assumes, in line with current planning, that the test orbiter Enterprise will be upgraded to spaceworthiness) includes almost-monthly flights from 1979 onward to deploy communications and weather satellites already on the drawing board, as well as frequent science missions with the cargo-bay-mounted Spacelab. On only the second test flight, the schedule has OV-102 (yet to be named Columbia) slated for a mission to the abandoned early 1970s space station Skylab, using a teleoperator retrieval system which also exists only on paper. While many of the schedule’s goals will be met, the delay in the shuttle program will be longer than NASA anticipates at this time.
The sixth episode of Filmation’s Saturday morning science fiction series Space Academy airs on CBS. Living asteroids rock the Space Academy cadets back on their heels.
Electric Light Orchestra‘s sixth album, A New World Record, is released, featuring the singles “Livin’ Thing”, “Telephone Line” and “Rockaria!”; the record goes gold and then platinum by the end of the year. This is the group’s first album to sport artwork with the now-familiar ELO logo, created from a mirrored image of the upper part of a Wurlitzer jukebox; following the post-Star Wars science fiction revival, future albums render this logo as a flying saucer.
Absolutely no generative AI was used in the creation of the content on this website. It’s mostly just some guy named Earl.
BBC Home Video re-releases the first four seasons (including seasonal specials) of the revived Doctor Who series on Blu-Ray, starring Christopher Eccleston and David Tennant as the Doctor. The content of this box set (apart from the final few specials starring Tennant, which were shot in high definition) was upscaled to HD, initially to include these seasons in a larger box set encompassing the entire revived series. 
Actress Joanna Cameron, perhaps best known for starring in the cult classic 1970s live-action kids’ superhero series Isis (a.k.a. The Secret of Isis), dies at the age of 70s after suffering complications from a stroke. Launching her career in 1969 at the behest of family friend Bob Hope, Cameron at one point held the Guinness World Record for the most commercial appearances for a single actor. Following her two-season stint as Isis, she moved on to TV guest roles in The Amazing Spider-Man, McMillan & Wife, and Switch, with her last TV credit in the appropriately titled 1980 made-for-TV movie Swan Song. After leaving Hollywood, she produced and directed promotional films for the U.S. Navy, and then moved into careers in health care and hotel marketing.
Streaming service CBS All Access releases the 30th episode of Star Trek: Discovery, opening the series’ third season, which has been delayed for the better part of a year due to the COVID-19 outbreak forcing an unexpected switch to remote post-production. David Ajala (Doctor Who) joins the series’ regular cast for the third season, which takes place in a future centuries beyond what has previously been chronicled in any prior Star Trek series. 
The CW airs the 115th episode of The Flash, a modern-day reboot of DC Comics’ superhero starring Grant Gustin. Sendhil Ramamurthy (Heroes) guest stars.
The 161st episode of Arrow, a modern-day reboot of DC Comics’ Green Arrow superhero starring Stephen Amell, airs on the CW. Susanna Thompson (Star Trek: Voyager) and John Barrowman (Torchwood, Doctor Who) guest star in the season eight premiere.
Streaming service CBS All Access releases the fifth episode of Star Trek: Discovery. Rainn Wilson (The Office) guest stars as Harry Mudd, a character originated in the original 1960s Star Trek series, and Jayne Brook (Chicago Hope) guest stars as Admiral Cornwell. 
Cable channel Disney XD airs the 39th episode of the series Star Wars: Rebels. Robin Atkin Downes (Babylon 5) and Lars Mikkelsen (House Of Cards, Sherlock) guest star. 
Intrada releases a 3-CD set of original episode scores from the first season of Buck Rogers In The 25th Century, featuring music by series theme composer Stu Phillips, among others. This marks the first release for any soundtrack material from the show beyond the series pilot (already re-released by Intrada). 
A complete expanded edition of Dennis McCarthy’s soundtrack from the movie Star Trek: Generations is released on GNP Crescendo Records. 
The Null Corporation releases former Nine Inch Nails members Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross’ soundtrack from the movie The Social Network. 
The 24th episode of The Sarah Jane Adventures airs on CBBC, starring Elisabeth Sladen (Doctor Who). This is the third season premiere. 
The sixth episode of The Sarah Jane Adventures premieres on BBC iPlayer, the first half of a two-part storyline. 
A week after the Genesis sample return mission tumbled back to Earth, slamming into the Utah desert floor at nearly 200 miles per hour after its parachutes failed to open, investigators find a likely cause of the crash. It appears that four gravity-sensitive switches, designed to sense the sudden deceleration of the Genesis capsule through Earth’s atmosphere and set off a timed sequence that would’ve opened the parachutes, had all been installed backwards. The four switches were designed to be redundant, so that if some failed the others could still carry out their assigned task…but this doesn’t do a lot of good if all of them are all installed incorrrectly. The investigation indicates that an erroneous schematic diagram of Genesis may be to blame. In the meantime, researchers begin to examine the surviving chunks of the broken collector plates containing particles of solar material.
The 77th episode of the prequel spinoff Star Trek: Enterprise airs on UPN, concluding the opening two-parter. 
China becomes the third country to independently launch a crewed mission with the flight of Shenzhou 5, an orbital flight lasting almost 22 hours. Taikonaut Yang Liwei becomes the first Chinese citizen to leave Earth, though an American astronaut born in China had flown aboard space shuttle Challenger in 1985. Derived from Soviet-era Soyuz spacecraft, Shenzhou 5 comes in for a rough landing, causing Liwei some minor injuries upon impact.
The 57th episode of the prequel spinoff Star Trek: Enterprise airs on UPN. 
The 126th episode of Joss Whedon’s supernatural series Buffy The Vampire Slayer, starring Sarah Michelle Gellar, airs on UPN. James Marsters and Alyson Hannigan also star.
The 91st episode of Gene Roddenberry’s Earth: Final Conflict, airs in syndication, starring Jayne Heitmeyer, Von Flores, Melinda Deines, Guylaine St. Onge, and Alan Van Sprang.
Pay cable channel Showtime premieres the 54th episode of Stargate SG-1. 
Virgin Books publishes the non-fiction book Doctor Who: The Seventh Doctor Handbook by David J. Howe and Stephen James Walker, offering a detailed inside look at the tenure of Sylvester McCoy as the seventh Doctor, with additional material about the 1996 TV movie starring Paul McGann as the eighth Doctor. 
NASA/JPL’s interplanetary probe Cassini, with the European Space Agency-built Huygens Titan probe tagging along, lifts off on a Titan IV-B rocket. The voyage to Saturn will last seven years, during which Cassini does close flybys to receive gravity assists from Venus, Earth, Earth’s moon, and Jupiter en route to Saturn. It will operate in Saturn’s vicinity for over a decade and launch the Huygens probe, the first landing probe to visit a body in the outer solar system.
Fox premieres the fourth episode of the military science fiction series Space: Above And Beyond. Tony Amendola (Stargate SG-1) guest stars. 
The 47th episode of Lois & Clark: The New Adventures Of Superman airs on ABC, starring Dean Cain and Teri Hatcher. Julian Stone guest stars.
The feature-length 29th episode of George Lucas’ historical adventure series The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles airs on cable channel The Family Channel, starring Sean Patrick Flanery. Allison Smith (Kate & Allie) guest stars.
Fox airs the eighth episode of the sci-fi western, The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr., starring Bruce Campbell, Julius Carry, and Christian Clemenson. John Astin (The Addams Family) and Billy Drago (The Untouchables) guest star.
The ninth Doctor Who New Adventures novel, “Love And War” by Paul Cornell, is published. A pivotal point in the young book series, “Love And War” sees the exit of TV companion Ace and the introduction of an older companion, archaeologist Professor Bernice Sumemrfield, for the seventh Doctor. Using a non-sequitur mention of the “Hoothi and their great gas dirigibles” from the television story The Brain Of Morbius as a starting point for this book’s enemy, author Cornell crafts a novel that forces the series to grow into more mature territory, with a truly unsettling adversary for the Doctor to fight. An audio version will be produced by Big Finish Productions 20 years later. 
The week-long national syndication window opens for the 77th episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. 
Warner Bros. Records releases the Paul Simon solo album Rhythm Of The Saints, featuring the singles “The Obvious Child” and “Born At The Right Time”. 
The second episode of the syndicated Alexander and Ilya Salkind-produced Superboy series, starring John Haymes Newton and Stacy Haiduk, airs. Julie McCullough (Growing Pains, Robin’s Hoods) guest stars.
CBS airs the fifth episode of the animated series Superman, starring the voices of Beau Weaver and Ginny McSwain, and comprised of two stories: The Big Scoop and Overnight With The Scouts. 
The 39th episode of a revival of Rod Serling’s The Twilight Zone airs in syndication. Louise Fletcher (One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine) stars.
The 17th episode of Black Adder airs on BBC1, starring Rowan Atkinson. 
With $4 billion having been spent on upgrading and customizing a special launch facility since 1972 to handle (mostly military) Space Shuttle launches in polar orbits, Vandenberg AFB declares Space Launch Complex 6 launch-ready, with a year to go before the first scheduled polar orbit shuttle launch. But in 1986, amid jitters in the wake of the Challenger disaster, planned use of the west coast launch facility is curtailed and finally cancelled, despite the money and time spent.
Atlantic Records releases Julian Lennon‘s debut album, Valotte, featuring the singles “Too Late For Goodbyes” and “Valotte”. 
The fourth episode of the Hammer Studios-produced horror anthology series Hammer House Of Mystery And Suspense airs on ITV; the series will be shown later in the U.S. under the title Fox Mystery Theatre. David McCallum (The Man From UNCLE, Sapphire & Steel) and Jan Francis (Just Good Friends) guest star in an episode written by David Fisher (Doctor Who) and directed by Gabrielle Beaumont (The Tomorrow People, Star Trek: The Next Generation).
NBC airs the 21st episode of the Marvel animated series Spider-Man And His Amazing Friends, starring the voices of Dan Gilvezan, Kathy Garver, and Frank Welker.
The fifth episode of the science fiction series The Powers Of Matthew Star airs on NBC, starring Peter Barton and Louis Gossett Jr. Arthur Roberts (Air America) guest stars.
General Computer Corp., a small company making “grey market” modification kits to freshen up Pac-Man and Missile Command arcade games, cuts a deal with Midway, the American licensee for Pac-Man, handing over the code to its Pac-Man modification kit Crazy Otto. Midway contracts GCC to continue work on the kit, but now under license. The first thing to go are the kit’s name and its modified Pac-Man character, who now has legs. A few changes and a few months later, the game’s central character has no legs, but will now sport lipstick and a pink bow, as Midway prepares to officially release the new game as an authorized Pac-Man sequel, Ms. Pac-Man – amazingly good luck for a small business that could just as easily have been sued into oblivion.
Mattel Electronics releases the Astrosmash cartridge for the Intellivision home video game system. 
Mattel Electronics releases the Space Armada cartridge for the Intellivision home video game system. 
Mattel Electronics releases the Snafu cartridge for the Intellivision home video game system. 
The 49th episode of Star Blazers, an English rewrite and dub of the 1974 anime series Space Battleship Yamato, airs in syndication across the U.S. 
The fifth episode of Glen A. Larson’s science fiction series Battlestar Galactica airs on ABC. Ian Abercrombie guest stars. 
The 460th episode of Doctor Who airs on BBC1. Michael Sheard (The Empire Strikes Back) and Frederick Jaeger guest star; John Leeson joins the cast as the voice of K-9.
NASA prepares a preliminary schedule of Space Shuttle launches, covering the years 1979-1982 (and assuming the shuttle will be ready to launch in 1979). The ambitious schedule (which also assumes, in line with current planning, that the test orbiter Enterprise will be upgraded to spaceworthiness) includes almost-monthly flights from 1979 onward to deploy communications and weather satellites already on the drawing board, as well as frequent science missions with the cargo-bay-mounted Spacelab. On only the second test flight, the schedule has OV-102 (yet to be named Columbia) slated for a mission to the abandoned early 1970s space station Skylab, using a teleoperator retrieval system which also exists only on paper. While many of the schedule’s goals will be met, the delay in the shuttle program will be longer than NASA anticipates at this time.
The sixth episode of Filmation’s Saturday morning science fiction series Space Academy airs on CBS. Living asteroids rock the Space Academy cadets back on their heels. 
The 41st episode of The Bionic Woman, starring Lindsay Wagner and Richard Anderson, airs on NBC. Andrew Prine (V, Weird Science) guest stars.
Electric Light Orchestra‘s sixth album, A New World Record, is released, featuring the singles “Livin’ Thing”, “Telephone Line” and “Rockaria!”; the record goes gold and then platinum by the end of the year. This is the group’s first album to sport artwork with the now-familiar ELO logo, created from a mirrored image of the upper part of a Wurlitzer jukebox; following the post-Star Wars science fiction revival, future albums render this logo as a flying saucer. 