Preface
Star Trek: The Motion Picture was unique in many ways …
It was the first live-action Star Trek production in a decade.
Its early production went through multiple incarnations of TV series, movie, story and character ideas, and scripts, with multiple writers, producers, and directors coming and going before things settled into a specific project and direction.
It had the advantage of an eagerly-awaiting audience, while its troubled production was also saddled with the baggage of the aborted Star Trek: Phase II series.
It was the first in a long line of Star Trek movies.
And it probably had more Starfleet uniform styles, options, and variants than any other single production.
For a broader look at the TMP uniforms, check out this blog post and its corresponding video:
Overview
Here’s an overview of the TMP “Class D” jumpsuit:
Appearances
The TMP “Class D” jumpsuits were mostly worn by extras, although most of the main cast did wear this uniform at some point in the movie.
Uhura wore this uniform for the first Enterprise bridge scene, and for the rec room briefing.
Decker wore one for his “demotion” scene in engineering with Kirk, and a short while later (after the transporter accident) when he was assigned double duty as both executive and science officer.
Rand wore hers for both transporter room scenes, as well as the rec room briefing.
Scotty switched to the “Class D” uniform after Spock arrived and mostly wore it for the rest of the movie.
It was difficult to see, but toward the end of the movie, Kirk, Spock, McCoy, and Decker all wore “Class D” jumpsuits under their field jackets for their excursion to meet V’Ger.
When they returned to the ship, Kirk was the only one to take off his jacket, but once he did we could clearly see he was wearing the “Class D” jumpsuit.
Even though they never wore it in the movie, Sulu, Chekov, Dr. Chapel, and Ilia all had “Class D” jumpsuits made for them.
Ilia did wear hers for a camera test, which can be seen in the Blu-Ray special feature, “Costume Tests.”
Dr. Chapel did wear a “Class D” jumpsuit during some cast publicity photos – presumably early ones, since there are several other points of interest and minor inconsistencies with the uniforms worn by other cast members.
Outside these examples, though, they were primarily seen on extras throughout the movie – particularly during the crew briefing in the rec room, of course.
There was usually at least one on the bridge at any given time, often wearing white.
There were usually several in engineering – again, often wearing white (not to be confused with the engineering radiation suits).
