BCDB: Cartoon Reviews: The Slaver Weapon

"The Slaver Weapon" was an actual re-write of a pre-existing Niven short story. The characters were changed to make them Trek-friendly; for example, the detestable-to-the-Kzinti (for being a vegetarian) Puppeteer became the detestable-to-the-Kzinti (likewise, for being a vegetarian) Mr. Spock. It was cool to see genuine SF translated to a kiddie animated short - perhaps a high point in the history of animated SF.

This was the most unusual of the 22 animated Star Trek episodes from Filmation/Paramount. It only had three characters from The Enterprise: Spock, Sulu, and Uhura, a very good trio who could have been the basis for many stories. Despite the studio credits, no other characters from the regular series appeared. The episode was written by SF writer Larry Niven, who adapted significant elements of his fictional universe into the ST story. The extinct race of the Slavers and the carnivorous cat-like Kzinti were such elements. Because of copyright protections of these elements in print, this was the only animated ST episode which could not be later adapted to print (by Alan Dean Foster). "