Airing in 1967, “The City on the Edge of Forever” is easily one of the best Star Trek stories of all time. Gene Roddenberry feared the newborn franchise’s future, and he’d recruited some of the brightest lights in science-fiction to help him save Star Trek. Harlan Ellison was a key member of this “Committee,” credited by William Shatner himself for helping Star Trek navigate its first season. But behind the scenes, Ellison’s most famous script – “The City on the Edge of Forever” – was incredibly controversial.
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“The City on the Edge of Forever” is undeniably one of the best Star Trek episodes of all time. It’s an epic time travel story in which the USS Enterprise stumbles on the Guardian of Forever, traveling back to Depression-era New York City to prevent history being changed. Kirk discovers accomplishing this goal will mean letting the woman he loves die. The episode’s ending is a shocking one, as Kirk chooses to close his eyes and allow Joan Collins’ Edith Keeler to be killed in a car accident, ensuring the timeline remains unchanged no matter the cost.
Harlan Ellison’s Captain Kirk Made A Very Different Decision
This wasn’t the original story Ellison wrote, though. The legendary sci-fi writer had a very different vision of human nature to Roddenberry, and he crafted a narrative in which the whole time travel jaunt kicked off in a different way; one member of the Enterprise’s crew was selling illicit drugs, and he fled to an alien world, stumbling into the time travel plot. Roddenberry, whose vision of Star Trek was essentially utopian, found a different way to trigger the time travel.
That change is a relatively small one, compared to the even bigger alterations Roddenberry made to the ending. Ellison’s Kirk didn’t choose to stand by at all; love was stronger than reason, and he’d have saved her if not for Spock’s intervention. Ellison felt this was truer, and was appalled at the actual broadcast version. As he explained in one interview (which recently resurfaced courtesy of Women’s World):
“The script does not end the way the episode does. Kirk goes for her to save her. At the final moment, by his actions, he says, ‘F**k it, I don’t care what happens to the ship, the future and everything else. I can’t let her die, I love her,’ and he starts for her. Spock, who is cold and logical, grabs him and holds him back and she’s hit by the truck. The TV ending, where he closes his eyes and lets her get hit by the truck, is absolutely bulls**t. It destroys the core of what I tried to do. It destroyed the art; it destroyed the drama, it destroyed the extra human tragedy of it.”
Ellison Didn’t Even Want His Name on the Script
An outraged Ellison wanted his name removed from the script, which he considered appalling. According to Ellison, it all led to a series of confrontations with Roddenberry, including a threat that he’d be blacklisted. In the end, Roddenberry refused, and it was the beginning of a feud that lasted for decades. Ellison was public about his frustration, and Roddenberry openly argued he was being unfair. They finally began to reconcile in the late 1970s, when Ellison was even invited to pitch a script for a Star Trek movie.
The truce didn’t last. Roddenberry misrepresented the original script, claiming Ellison originally wrote Scotty as a drug dealer. The feud was reignited, with Roddenberry eventually retracting it – but not before it had become general knowledge in the fandom, repeated by several publications. Ellison, for his part, copyrighted the original script; he published it in 1996, and it was eventually adapted into a phenomenal graphic novel by Scott Tipton, David Tipton, and J.K. Woodward. Ellison later sued CBS for improved compensation, angered at the way the studio has milked the episode.
“The City on the Edge of Forever” may be one of Star Trek‘s crown jewels, but it will always be shrouded in controversy. Its original version featured a very different Captain Kirk, one who led with his heart rather than his head, and made Spock responsible for the death of the woman Kirk loved. It’s fascinating to imagine how different the dynamic between Kirk and Spock would have been had Ellison’s original version been made.
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