13 "Offensive" TV Episodes That Embarrassed Their Creators

7. "Patterns Of Force" - Star Trek: The Original Series

Star Trek Patterns Of Force
NBC

This season two episode of Star Trek's original run sees the crew of the Enterprise landing on a planet with a regime described as "Nazi-esque", to the point that the uniforms even bear swastikas and, well, every other piece of iconography you'd expect a Nazi to wear.

To the surprise of nobody, this went down like a lead balloon in Germany, where the episode was not aired in its two initial TV runs. Only 28 years after its original 1968 airing in the U.S. did it finally broadcast in the country on pay TV, and it was another 15 years before it aired on a public TV network.

Considering the episode takes a fairly sympathetic view of the Hitler-like tyrant in charge and debates the efficiency of Nazism, it's pretty understandable, and it's easy to see why many fans today consider "Patterns of Force" a bit of an embarrassment themselves.

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