 NBC executives reviewed the plot for " Space Seed " and approved it , but Justman reassessed the outline , saying that it needed to be heavily revised . In September , Wilber was given a list of suggested changes including asking him to remove any mention of the setting , as the producers did not want to say how far in the future Star Trek was set , and to remove the chess scene . Wilber submitted a second draft , but Roddenberry still had problems with basic elements of the script . He did not believe common criminals would be fired into space as a solution and strongly disliked the notion of space pirates . The second draft introduced the idea that Kirk marooned Erickson and his crew on a new planet ; this remained in the final version . Wilber was not asked for a third draft ; Coon was tasked with the re @-@ write ; he submitted it on December 7 and updated it twice over the following five days . Wilber accepted Coon 's re @-@ writes , and left the staff after the submission of his second draft as his contractual obligations were complete . 
