Star Trek has helped to create, define, and perfect many sci-fi tropes since the franchise first began, with few sillier than the tendency for Kirk and the Enterprise crew to discover new worlds borrowing from some aspect of Earth culture – a trope called out as far back as the 1980s Marvel run of Star Trek comics.

Issues four and five of the Marvel Star Trek run – written by Marv Wolfman, drawn by Dave Cockrum and inked by Klaus Janson – included one of the most ridiculous, out-of-character Klingon plans ever, lampooning the frequent instances in The Original Series where Earth-like settings, constumes, and cultures appeared in the far reaches of space, a trope born of the budgetary and special effects limitations of 1960s television.

Not the Klingons' Proudest Moment

The story, starting in issue #4, has the Enterprise running across a haunted house floating in space. Beaming over, the away team is confronted by monsters from Earth lore, such as Count Dracula; similarly, terrifying creatures are seen aboard the Enterprise. Klingons soon arrive, revealing they created the house and apparitions. Abducting a human with extensive knowledge of horror movies and books, the Klingons hooked him up to a "thought enhancer," in order to create projections of the horror imagery in his mind. This was a clear reference to The Original Series, where the crew would face danger on a world patterned after ancient Rome, or the American Wild West.

The Enterprise Encountered Earth-Like Worlds Comically Often

Kirk and the Enterprise crew stop the Klingon plan to create an army with the "thought enhancer" – but there is no denying the plan is silly, and out of place for Star Trek’s warrior race. Spock slyly acknowledges the silliness of it all in his response, after the Klingon commander spells out their entire plan. Still, as a nostalgic nod to a classic aspect of The Original Series, it works. Some of the episodes featuring Earth-like settings, such as “A Piece of the Action,” are considered classics, while others look as goofy in retrospect as the Klingons' plan in issues four and five of Marvel's 1980 Star Trek run.

While there was always an in-universe explanation for the appropriation of Earth culture by the inhabitants of various star systems, in reality, it was a result of Trek’s producers having to get creative with what they had access to; this meant recycling props and sets used in the studio’s war, western and crime films. The Klingons' haunted house in Marvel's Star Trek was the result of a deep nostalgia for the show, which had ended just over a decade before the comic's run, nostalgia which culminated original cast's return on the big screen, and in turn, the franchise's reappearance on the small screen with Star Trek: The Next Generation.