Matthew Continetti’s column in the Washington Free Beacon this week reviews The Fifty Year Mission, a two-volume history of Star Trek that chronicles the tumultuous story of the science-fiction franchise from the perspective of the cast and crew.

One of the prevailing themes: Creator Gene Roddenberry had the idea for his universe, but it managed to succeed only despite him. In the appropriate lingo (“technobabble”, as it’s been called), writers, producers, and directors were constantly rerouted to the latest Trek project’s life support systems to keep the franchise viable—and, ultimately, good. Continetti writes about the period in-between the end of the first Trek TV show and the feature film it eventually spawned: