10 Star Trek Episodes That Never Got Made
5. Star Trek's Inverted Slavery Plotline
Whilst Star Trek dealt with racial tensions in the much more allegorical episode Let That Be Your Last Battlefield, Gene Roddenberry was originally keen to tackle the issue in a more overt fashion. In his original series proposal Star Trek Is... Roddenberry had provided a story concept known as Kongo. The central premise was the discovery of a planet that had parallel development to Earth's own.
On this world, the white "savages" were enslaved by the black traders. Writer Barry Trivers took Roddenberry's concept and adapted it into Portrait in Black and White, set on a militaristic planet where Lieutenant Uhura was the only crewmember allowed to communicate with the population. As a Southerner, DeForest Kelly was taken with the concept and disappointed that the episode was never made.
It was rejected by NBC for being too violent and unacceptable for network television. The script was worked on by a series of writers, who attempted to make it more palatable to network executives, but were ultimately unable to do so. It was likely too incendiary a concept for network television to tackle at the 1960s. Ultimately, it's probably for the best. With Star Trek's overwhelmingly white writing team it's unlikely that it would have the edge it needed.