Production
Episode writer Norman Spinrad based the script on a novelette "The Planet Eater" that had been rejected by a number of publishers. He revived the idea when he had a chance to pitch it to Executive Producer Gene Roddenberry. Spinrad had written the script with actor Robert Ryan in mind to play Commodore Decker, but Ryan was unavailable owing to prior commitments.
According to one source the model for the USS Constellation was an off-the-shelf model while other sources claim that the smallest and least detailed Enterprise professional model was altered for the episode. It has also been stated that the Constellation's somewhat incongruous hull ID number of 1017 (all other ships of this class having been numbered 17xx) came from simply switching the digits of an Enterprise model's 1701 hull numbers.
The episode was written as a "bottle" show i.e., one that could use existing ship sets to save time and money. According to Spinrad the episode was so well received by Roddenberry that he commissioned him to write another for comedian Milton Berle who planned to do a dramatic turn on the show entitled "He Who Walks Among Us".
Read more about this topic: The Doomsday Machine (Star Trek: The Original Series)
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“[T]he asphaltum contains an exactly requisite amount of sulphides for production of rubber tires. This brown material also contains “ichthyol,” a medicinal preparation used externally, in Webster’s clarifying phrase, “as an alterant and discutient.””
—State of Utah, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)
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“... if the production of any commodity necessitates the sacrifice of human life, society should do without that commodity, but it can not do without that life.”
—Emma Goldman (1869–1940)