The Red Shirt Syndrome

[TLOZ Lover]

It ain't easy bein' red in the world of TOS, is it? Red shirts (security officers, engineering personnel, etc.) are notorious for meeting their maker in an untimely fashion in our beloved original series. Interestingly though, there are blue shirts and gold shirts who also meet their demise. I can name several right away. Dr. Elizabeth Dehner (blue shirt) and Gary Mitchell (gold shirt) from "Where No Man Has Gone Before", Lts. Latimer and Gaetano (gold shirts) from "The Galileo Seven", and Lt. D'Amato (blue shirt) from "That Which Survives". Can you name other non-red shirt Enterprise crew members (male or female) who went to their eternal reward early?

 

[Spock's Barber]

Man Trap.....Crewmen Darnell, Sturgeon and Green all bite the dust in blue or gold tunics, IIRC.

 

[geotrek]

Specter of the Gun... Chekhov bites the dust. Of course, he lives... but still.

Balance of Terror: Robert Tomlinson
Catspaw: Jackson
Wolf in the Fold: Karen Tracy
Shore Leave: Angela Martine
(Excuse the spelling if any are incorrect, please)

Those are the ones I remember.

 

[Spock's Barber]

Galileo 7.....Latimer and Gaetano die in agony.

 

[TLOZ Lover]

Galileo 7.....Latimer and Gaetano die in agony.

Yeah, I mentioned them. I also just remembered Lee Kelso in Where No Man Has Gone Before.

 

[Spock's Barber]

Lang, a gold shirt, dies off screen in Arena.

 

[Nerys Myk]

Gary Mitchell (gold shirt) from "Where No Man Has Gone Before",

I also just remembered Lee Kelso in Where No Man Has Gone Before.

Aren't Gary and Lee "Sand shirts"?

Shore Leave: Angela Martine

Should we count McCoy, too?

Tormolen, a blue shirt in "The Naked Time".

 

[Spock's Barber]

Another Man Trap victim....

 

[JoeD80]

I think a lot of deaths in the first season were not wearing red shirts; that came about more in season 2.

 

[geotrek]

This is a good take on it:
http://www.startrek.com/article/did-redshirts-really-die-more-often-on-tos

 

[Mr Awe]

Here's a great statistical analysis of it.

http://blog.minitab.com/blog/advent...tality-rates-in-star-trek-the-original-series

 

[kkt]

Here's a great statistical analysis of it.

http://blog.minitab.com/blog/advent...tality-rates-in-star-trek-the-original-series

Did I miss where they have a source for how many redshirts, blueshirts, and goldshirts there are in the series?

 

[TLOZ Lover]

This is a good take on it:
http://www.startrek.com/article/did-redshirts-really-die-more-often-on-tos

Did I miss where they have a source for how many redshirts, blueshirts, and goldshirts there are in the series?

No kidding! I had no idea there were statistics on this! Thanks for the info!

 

[BlueshirtGuard]

Yeah I agree, where are these numbers from? I feel we see a relatively even number of all three so not sure where they are getting the idea of there being so many redshirts in comparison to the others.

 

[woodstock]

Just saw The Man Trap, two blue shirts and a yellow were snuffed out in that one. I don't watch TOS very much, so I'm wondering how many crewmen in red shirts actually were killed in all the episodes? Which episode had the first and when approximately did it become noticeable and referenced in pop culture?

 

[Spock's Barber]

Just saw The Man Trap, two blue shirts and a yellow were snuffed out in that one. I don't watch TOS very much, so I'm wondering how many crewmen in red shirts actually were killed in all the episodes? Which episode had the first and when approximately did it become noticeable and referenced in pop culture?

Hundreds, thousands of red shirts bit the dust. Just kidding. My guess is between 10-20. Obsession, The Changeling and The Apple seem to be episodes where red shirt mortality is high. And The Children Shall Lead has a scene where 2 red shirts are accidentally beamed into space!

 

[Greysun]

If we're talking about redshirts who have been killed/found dead in general, not just ones assigned to the Enterprise, the count would be pretty high. Consider ships like Constellation, Intrepid, Defiant, Exeter, Lexington, Excalibur, etc.There were scores of redshirts killed from those vessels as depicted on the show.
It would be interesting to see a body count estimate for the TOS series as a whole, the number would likely be staggering if you included all ship and colony losses that were mentioned or shown.

 

[Laura Cynthia Chambers]

And The Children Shall Lead has a scene where 2 red shirts are accidentally beamed into space!

I wonder if those kids (after they snapped out of it) ever felt (irrationally, since they were under Gorgan's spell) guilty over their part in the officers' death, as well as that of their parents.

 

[1001001]

I'm merging our two red shirt threads. Mr Awe has a good link above.

 

[Spock's Barber]

I wonder if those kids (after they snapped out of it) ever felt (irrationally, since they were under Gorgan's spell) guilty over their part in the officers' death, as well as that of their parents.

I think they felt remorse since they all started crying when Spock showed them the images of what the Gorgan had done to their parents.