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Excepting two-part episodes, should I watch TOS in some sort of order (production vs. stardate, etc), and if so, which, or are all the episodes essentially independent?

If a few episodes are not independent, please post them and the order they should be viewed.

Edit: Regarding the similarity to 2 other questions, this one is different: one is about the order of watching each series, and the other question regards the chronologic order of TOS, not the preferred viewing order.

user2144412
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  • @Politank-Z That question asks about sequencing of the various series, not about continuity within a specific series. – Jane S Aug 19 '17 at 23:03
  • @Jane S, correct. – user2144412 Aug 19 '17 at 23:14
  • This question is addressed in several of the answers on the dupe. HorusKul, for example recommends watching them in "Production Order". – Valorum Aug 19 '17 at 23:22
  • I reviewed all of the answers on the linked page, and none of them specifically address my question. HorusKul's answer is to watch the SERIES in order and does not specifically comment on the question of individual episodes in the TOS. Jane S's answer below differs from all of the answers on the page that is linked, so clearly my question was not answered on that page. – user2144412 Aug 20 '17 at 02:27
  • Two of the answers recommend watching TOS in broadcast order (which is also my personal commendation). None of the answers recommend doing anything different. I'm not really sure what you're hoping to hear other than the insane rambling of someone with their own peculiar 'machete order' – Valorum Aug 20 '17 at 07:44
  • The point is that if my question was the same as the other question, then why is the first answer here different to any of the answers on the other page? Clearly it must be different, but that was obvious to me already. I just noticed that Robert Fisher made the same point that Jane made in a comment, not in an answer, which is that the TOS episodes are basically independent of each other. I didn't read through every comment to every question on that page. Only 1 answer on the other page specifically recommended production order for the TOS and did not make this point. – user2144412 Aug 22 '17 at 14:39
  • Many fans believe that production order is the best order to view TOS. That will show how things gradually changed n the first episodes until they became the way they were in the rest of the series. – M. A. Golding Dec 17 '17 at 05:02

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Each episode is its own story. It doesn't make any difference in which order you watch them (except perhaps The Cage which frames around the pilot, so I'd suggest watching the pilot before that). Otherwise, you'll see the introduction of Chekov later on but there is no significant continuity change through the series that requires watching them in order.

Having said that, I probably would watch them in order just because there's no particular reason not to :)

Community
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Jane S
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  • There is a very practical reason not to watch them in order - multiple TV channels broadcast TOS, and it would be very cumbersome to try to watch them in order given different frequency and times of episodes each week, and availability to watch each one. – user2144412 Aug 20 '17 at 02:29
  • @user2144412 My point was that if available, then you can watch them in order. If not, then it just doesn't matter in which order you watch them :) – Jane S Aug 21 '17 at 01:11
  • I know that, but you said "because there's no particular reason not to" - I pointed out a particular reason not to. – user2144412 Aug 22 '17 at 14:42