Episode three, actually the second pilot for TOS. It shows, in the missing characters (Bones, most notably), the different uniforms. But what’s strangest is the overemphasis of the two guest stars: Gary Lockwood and Sally Kellerman seem to get most of the screen time, and certainly most of the interesting lines. The regular cast outside of Kirk seem to get almost no screen or development time at all.
Some of this is the change in what a pilot is: we’re used to the pilot setting up the situation and characters today, but in the 60s it was more a ‘regular episode’. It’s probably a better way of doing it: it would give the decision makers a much better idea of what they’re buying in the TV show.
All that aside, this is the first episode that really feels like ‘Trek’. Charlie X could have easily been a Twilight Zone episode, and The Man Trap was an uninspired monster-of-the-week. But the themes of this episode, particularly the person with god-like powers, are something that Trek would pick up again and again in the future.
Red shirt deaths: 9 off-screen, plus one on-screen. And still not one in a red shirt.
3 down, 734 to go.