In July of this year, Anson Mount and Ethan Peck were both guests at the Shore Leave convention. They did a joint panel, moderated by Amy Imhoff, and one of Amy’s questions was if either of them had done theatre. Mount said yes, but Peck said no, as he grew up in the theatre (recall that his grandfather is Gregory Peck and his aunt is Cecilia Peck), and he associates it with the places where he would fall asleep as a kid.
Mount then turned to Peck and said, “We should do Gilbert & Sullivan together,” and they both laughed a lot more heartily than was necessary from what they were saying. Mind you, “Q & A” had already been filmed at that point, and now I get why they were laughing!!!!
Before we get to the source of that in-joke, we’re given a delightful look at the first meeting between Number One and Mr. Spock, played, as on the second season of Discovery, by, respectively, Rebecca Romijn and Peck, with an appearance at the end by Mount reprising his role as Captain Christopher Pike.
The three of them were already brilliant, and this short just kicks it up a notch. My one frustration with Romijn’s role as Number One on Discovery was that we didn’t see nearly enough of her, and this short helps to address that.
The character was originally created as part of the original pilot, “The Cage.” She was a cold fish, very analytical and unemotional (Vina likens her to a computer), though the Talosian keeper adds that it’s a pretense. Meanwhile, while Spock had pointy ears and was obviously alien, he was just as emotional as everyone else: smiling at the vibrating flowers, being all pouty when Pike refuses initially to answer the distress call, being haughty and dismissive during a briefing session, and all shocked when shouting, “THE WOMEN!!!!” at the top of his lungs.
When that pilot was rejected, Gene Roddenberry was given a green-light to redo it, with Leonard Nimoy’s Spock being the only character he kept, and he moved the emotionless, rational element of Number One to the half-Vulcan. But later, in “The Menagerie,” the original pilot was established as taking place thirteen years previous, and the second season of Discovery, already taking place between “The Cage” and “Where No Man Has Gone Before,” made copious use of Pike, Spock, and Number One.
What I particularly love about “Q & A” is that Michael Chabon’s script leans into the early-draft versions of the characters that we saw in “The Cage,” as well as the early episodes of the original series, and into the fact that Number One and Spock are actually very similar characters.
The former is hilariously called back to when Spock first beams aboard and is practically screaming his dialogue, and Number One has to tell him that there’s no need to shout. Shouty Spock is one of the more hilarious aspects of the character that Nimoy abandoned after a few episodes, but we got a lot of it, not only in the two pilots, but also in the first couple episodes of season one of the series.
As for the latter, that is accomplished by having the two characters repeatedly say the same thing at the same time, from technobabble to Spock’s signature word (“Fascinating”).
Number One is escorting the newly assigned Ensign Spock from the transporter room to the bridge, but the turbolift they’re riding breaks down. Number One introduces herself to Spock by saying that she expects the science officers under her command to barrage her with questions until it gets annoying.
Thanks to the malfunctioning turbolift, Spock is given every opportunity to reach that annoying threshold, with questions ranging from ship operations to what are the three most important aspects of Captain Pike’s personality to the ethics of the Prime Directive to whether or not Number One likes eggplant.
Peck’s performance continues to show a magnificent balance between what Nimoy gave us and his own performance through the back half of Discovery season two. Best of all, it’s a more raw performance, one that gives us a mix of Nimoy’s specific performance in “The Cage” and also a slightly younger version of the Peck’s own prior work on Discovery. In particular, I like the opening bit where he’s smiling—which he drops when he beams on board, though not fast enough for Number One to have missed it. Later on, he laughs with Number One over a bonding moment over “Model of a Modern Major-General” from The Pirates of Penzance by Gilbert & Sullivan, and it’s a nice companion to the Spock who would grin widely when he saw the humming flowers on Talos IV.
And that’s where the meat of the short lies: Number One’s advice to Spock is to not let his freaky out if he ever wants to command. Spock insists—as he did often in the original series and in the movies—that he has no ambitions to command, but Number One calls bullshit.
Spock then has yet another question: what is Number One’s freaky? And it’s Gilbert & Sullivan. Bliss.
Romijn’s performance remains superlative, building on what Majel Barrett gave us in 1964 and Romijn herself did in three episodes of Discovery. Number One is assured, smart, snarky (but a low-key snark in comparison to your Jett Renos and your Paul Stametses and your Sylvia Tillys), brilliant, steady, reliable, and effortlessly competent.
“Q & A” is a nifty little vignette, exactly the sort of piece that Short Treks is wired for: providing a nice little prequel to “The Cage” and Discovery season two and a glance at the early career of the franchise’s most famous character. But that’s not the best thing about it, the best is that it gives us more of Number One. In 1964, NBC balked at a woman being second in command of the ship (though accounts differ as to whether or not their issue was with a woman in general or with Barrett in particular), which is frustrating, as Number One was arguably the most intriguing character in the first pilot. This short, just like the frustratingly fleeting glances of the character in Discovery’s “An Obol for Charon” and the two–part finale, just continue to whet the appetite for seeing a lot more of this most intriguing officer. Get on that, CBS!
And at the end, we get more Anson Mount as Pike, which is never a bad thing. More of this, also, please.
A couple of quick notes….
- This marks yet another example of duplicate titles in Star Trek, and the second time it’s involved a work of mine, the other one being Perchance to Dream (the title of a Howard Weinstein Star Trek: The Next Generation novel, and a comic book written by me). My 2007 TNG novel that was the ultimate Q story was also called Q & A.
- I rewatched the earlier Short Trek “Calypso” before watching “Q & A.” The end of “Such Sweet Sorrow, Part 2” puts the events of this short in flux. Is it a thousand years after the twenty-third century of the first two seasons, or is it a thousand years after the ship jumped nine hundred years into the future? And yet, Zora said that the shuttle that she gifts to Craft was just delivered to Discovery before it was abandoned, which is incompatible with a ship being stuck nine hundred years in the future. I’m really curious now…
- The next Short Trek will go live on Thursday the 10th of October, and is entitled “The Trouble with Edward.” You now know everything there is to know about it as of this writing. (There wasn’t even a teaser at the end of “Q & A.”) Looking forward to it… EDITED TO ADD: There is now a trailer.
Keith R.A. DeCandido has been writing about pop culture for this site since 2011, including the current “4-Color to 35-Millimeter: The Great Superhero Movie Rewatch” every Friday and reviews of every episode of Star Trek Discovery and Short Treks to date. Look for his reviews of the remaining batch of Short Treks over the next couple of months, as well as of Star Trek: Picard starting in January.
I’ve only seen the trailer yet, but Peck’s impression of Shouty Spock in the transporter room is dead-on.
I apparently missed some key details that would have made the short less confusing.
I like how Spock felt properly younger from his shouty arrival to his awkwardness with Number One.
Christopher: RIGHT?????
noblehunter: Which details are those, out of curiosity?
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
Mostly the bit that Number One’s freaky was Gilbert and Sullivan. The singing came out of nowhere for me. I would have been less surprised had she started singing a piece from HMS Pinafore.
noblehunter: Um, okay. “Model of a Modern Major-General” is quite possibly the most famous single piece from G&S, so it’s really the best choice to just drop in like that. And it also really fits both Number One and Spock’s characters. :)
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
@5 HMS Pinafore was a Simpsons reference.
Quoth noblehunter: “@5 HMS Pinafore was a Simpsons reference.”
:hurls self out the window:
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
@7 Poor little buttercup
How cool. I’ve never heard of Gilbert & Sullivan before. After saying so many unfriendly things about Discovery, it’s only fair when I also say that I love when Star Trek introduces me to classics, and I’m delighted that present-day Star Trek continues this tradition.
This wasn’t the first time that particular song made it’s way to Trek: https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/I_Am_the_Very_Model_of_a_Modern_Major-General
I had a few logistical problems that kept me from getting into the full spirit of the short.
1. What is it with the current production / FX team that makes them think starships are giant empty warehouses inside? It’s like the turbolift is moving on rails through a chasm in a futuristic city, and makes zero sense.
2. Why would anybody get stuck on a turbolift in a ship with a functioning transporter? When we saw a similar situation on TNG, main power had gone down. Here, it seems to be a problem with that one turbolift, so nobody should need to find a rappelling harness — just beam them to the pad.
3. And how is the rescue crewmember rappelling anyway, since it’s apparently in empty space? Once again, according to the visuals, there is no shaft or walls. Wouldn’t you just… lower somebody in a harness? Or just lower a harness?
@11/Aerik: The VFX shots in Discovery are so fanciful and nonsensical, and so often in conflict with the dialogue, that I just ignore what they show.
As for transporters, intraship beaming was supposed to be a difficult and dangerous thing to do in the 23rd century. Discovery was shown to be able to do it pretty easily, but it seemed to have a lot of prototype tech aboard.
@12 “so often in conflict with the dialogue”
Huh? I agree, the visuals of the turboshaft looked like the producers were high on something (spores?), but can you please elaborate on the “so often in conflict with the dialogue” part?
This was a really fun short. I wish we could get more than just four Short Treks.
I’d love it if they turn Una and Spock into a couple, or at least close friends. They pulled Spock/Uhura out of a hat in the Kelvin movies. This one makes more sense. Just think of them sharing their “freaky” (Una’s word) and letting go in private.
Also, Spock: “Have you ever considered that the prime directive is not only not ethical, but also illogical, and perhaps morally indefensible?” That deserves some elaboration.
Quibble: You never touch live electrical components with bare hands. Una is far too smart for her to go poking around like that without tools. I mean she’s not East European… (private joke: worked with a former Soviet bloc man who said that they didn’t have current meters, so they checked wires and pipes to see if they were charged by touching them, tapping with knuckles. Never with an open hand because it would convulse and grip and you became electrified.)
Are we sure this isn’t Number One’s typical induction routine for new arrivals?
Agreed about the vast cavern that suggests space was not well used in the starship’s design, as mentioned above.
Una having to check her clipboard to get Spock’s name on the bridge: Pike knows what’s up. No way she needs to do that. Good character nuance. Doesn’t quite add up that they arrive separately, since she was taking him to the bridge in the first place.
Overall very encouraged by Michael Chabon’s involvement in this enterprise.
@13/Sam: Well, there was the episode where a star described in dialogue as type O was depicted as orange instead of blue-white, something ten seconds on Wikipedia could’ve fixed. The time they were said to be at a starbase 100 AU from Earth (which would be somewhere in the Kuiper Belt beyond Neptune) yet there was a sunlit Class-M planet in the shot. The time the dialogue mentioned a D7 Klingon ship and what we saw looked nothing remotely like one (though season 2 retconned the familiar D7 as a new design). The time when Discovery was doing a whole bunch of microjumps in hopes of locating the cloaked Klingon sarcophagus ship, but the FX shots showed the ship just sitting there in exactly the same damn spot where they’d last seen it. The time when the huge alien orb was described in dialogue as displaying a transcendently beautiful and intricate pattern of light but it was just an ugly orangish blob. And, of course, the bizarre alternate dimension of the turboshafts.
@14/MaGnUs: There are six Short Treks installments in this batch, though two of them will be animated.
Couple of elements for this short we winked at in the ENTERPRISE WAR novel — the book reflects a plentiful amount of rappelling gear on the ship, and Amin is the officer who leads Pike on his first turbolift-shaft climbing expedition. More to come.
I liked this short a lot. Do I wish they’d come up with something less contrived than “stuck in an elevator?” Sure – but that would take more time than they had. I agree that the exterior shots of the turbo lift had no basis in logical design. An exterior shot of the Enterprise would’ve been nice.
Still, it was great to see Pike, Spock and Number One again. Here’s hoping we get a full-on series or movies with this crew (and these writers)!
The “two-hander in an elevator” format doesn’t surprise me, since these shorts seem to be made with budget in mind — using standing sets from the main show, limiting the cast size, etc. And it sounds like the lift “exterior” shots are recycling the digital element used in “Brother,” or maybe even reusing stock footage.
@15/Sunspear: they didn’t exactly pull Spock/Uhura out of a hat, as you put it. There was some flirtation taking place during “The Corbomite Maneuver” and “Charlie X.”
I do think, though, that there’s room here to interpret the characters in a slightly new light, that Spock adopted some of Una’s mannerisms, and looks up to her as a mentor. That wasn’t clear from “The Cage,” but there’s nothing there that contradicts it, either.
Quoth Lance: “@15/Sunspear: they didn’t exactly pull Spock/Uhura out of a hat, as you put it. There was some flirtation taking place during ‘The Corbomite Maneuver’ and ‘Charlie X.'”
Also “The Man Trap,” “Who Mourns for Adonais?” and “Is There In Truth No Beauty?”
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
@lance & krad: when you say flirtation… Guess none of that stuck in my memory banks prior to seeing the Abrams Trek.
Some of that is one-way, with Spock seeming clueless. I’ll cede “Charlie X” and subtract “Who Mourns for Adonais” (that’s just professional appreciation). She bats her eyes in “The Man Trap,” clearly flirting, but it’s immediately undercut by the following dialogue. In “Is There in Truth No beauty?” he thinks McCoy’s jibing him for quoting Byron, rather than expressing admiration for Uhura. None of that materialized into anything, far as I remember. Spock’s either being a gentleman, or has a workplace crush on the woman seated at the next station over.
There’s also the case from “Plato’s Stepchildren,” where they considered having Uhura kiss Spock instead of Kirk, but that never happened.
In any case, I hope we get more than such incidental low-level interaction between Una and Spock.
@22/Sunspear: “She bats her eyes in “The Man Trap,” clearly flirting, but it’s immediately undercut by the following dialogue.”
And later she dreams up a handsome black guy instead. It isn’t about Spock, it’s about her feeling lonely.
@Jana: and she seems to be messing with him because she can. He literally tugs at his collar.
@Sunspear: That’s probably true for “Charlie X” as well. In her introduction to one of the stories in Star Trek: The New Voyages, Nichelle Nichols wrote: “Not only in the ‘bloopers’ is Uhura occasionally tempted to say, ‘Mr. Spock, sugah.’ She has been known to tease him, even in song, and she is hardly the only one, present or future, who would be delighted to find some enchantment by which to disturb his Vulcan cool.”
JanaJansen @9
Never heard of Gilbert and Sullivan? You don’t know Poo-Bah, the Lord High Executioner, or the Three Little Maids?
All of the Orphans in, near, and passing by, Penzance?
*Sigh*
Peck does an amazing Spock voice here; my favourite post Leonard one. I also got used to seeing him clean shaven pretty quickly. I seem to remember some fans expressing dismay after seeing a photo still of his bare face, but he looks fine in this short.
I’m really tired of the way they light the ships in this era of Trek. If I served on one, I’d be wearing sunglasses the entire time :)
@26/wiredog: No, nothing. What would be a good starting point?
The ditty used here is from Pirates of Penzance and, as mentioned, is possibly their most famous piece. HMS Pinafore is good if you want to understand what Sideshow Bob was singing about (please don’t be younger than that episode). The Mikado is also heavily referenced and useful if you want to stay off the list. I’d start with those three (they may also be the only three I recognize off the top of my head).
@29/noblehunter: Thank you! I’ll check them out. As for my age, I’m slightly younger than Star Trek.
@15 – Sunspear: Spock and Una were going to the bridge, but no one says it’s the same moment as when Pike is there in the last scene. That is just Spock’s first time reporting to the brdige with Pike there.
@16 – Chris: Right, but still, I wish we had more.
@30 Whew. Though it’s a good reminder that stuff one thinks is unavoidably ubiquitous isn’t.
@32/noblehunter: At least not worldwide (I’m German).
@33/Jana: Gilbert & Sullivan were British, though, so they originated a lot closer to you than Star Trek did.
@Magnus: that just makes the moment when the uber-competent, ultra-efficient Number One seemingly has to check her clipboard even more awkward.
@34/Christopher: Closer in space, but not in time.
I thought “Q&A” was cute, fun, and worked great as both a prequel to “The Cage” and Discovery; I felt like the bonding between Spock & Una reinforced her line to Pike about not being ready to give up on Spock, during her first appearance on DISCO. I also loved that they brought back Amin from “The Enterprise War” & “Such Sweet Sorrow”. Number One’s implied attraction to Pike is referenced in “The Cage” as well, if I’m not mistaken.
The trailer for “The Trouble with Edward” was released today. The description for that installment: “Newly minted Captain Lynne Lucero (Rosa Salazar) is excited to take command of the U.S.S.Cabot, until she meets Edward Larkin (H. Jon Benjamin), an ornery scientist who believes he has found a revolutionary new use for Tribbles…”
Anson Mount as Pike is featured as well. I’m curious to see if it’s set before, during or after the first 2 seasons of Discovery.
@37. Jason: that sounds like a setup for some good comedy. Archer in Space! I’ll die if there’s a “zone of danger” reference.
JanaJansen. I recommend a great film about Gilbert and Sullivan, Topsy Turvey (1999), directed by Mike Leigh. It contains several productions of parts of their comic operas all within the context of their late 19th century Victorian England creation. Comic light opera, of which Gilbert and Sullivan is the definition, can be an acquired taste and the context helps.
@39/John: Thanks! I’ll add it to my list.
Along with Sideshow Bob, wasn’t Sallah in Raiders of the Lost Ark also a Gilbert & Sullivan fan? “I am the monarch of the sea…” That’s one of theirs, isn’t it?
GillyB: Yup, that’s from HMS Pinafore.
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
@Sunspear
It’s funny you claim this pair would make more sense than spock/uhura when they seem to, hinestly, kind of copy aspects of the latter a bit such as: the fact Uhura loved to sing and he’d smile to her. Him playing with his collar when Uhura was flirting with him too. I guess in the kelvin timeline (and maybe in tos too since, according to deleted scenes, he’d teach Uhura how to play his lyre), Spock and Uhura show their ‘freaky’ in private too.
The fact they may ‘retcon’ tos a bit, by adding new aspects in a prequel, doesn’t give them credit for being the ‘first’ to do things that you saw in the series or movies first but in a ‘later’ moment in the timeline of the characters. Heck, the fact the Spock/Una dynamic here takes place in the turbolift may accidentally make someone believe that kelvin trek inspired, however subtly, the interaction because the turbolift scene there was an iconic moment for spock/uhura, and thus kelvin trek, especially one that showed different layers of the characters. With Kurtzman at the helm, the thought might be reasonable because he’s the one who put Spock with Uhura. Peck reminds me of the Spock played by Quinto too, tbh. Certaintly more Quinto’s Spock than Nimoy’s version (voice aside).
“Is There in Truth No beauty?” he thinks McCoy’s jibing him for quoting Byron, rather than expressing admiration for Uhura. None of that materialized into anything, far as I remember. Spock’s either being a gentleman, or has a workplace crush on the woman seated at the next station over.”
Actually, that scene is the biggest hint he had a crush on her.
Kollos describes Spock’s colleagues the way Spock saw them (in his mind.) The fact he calls Kirk and Mccoy his friends is to be considered as valid as an expression of Spock’s feelings as him reciting Byron’s ‘she walks in beauty’ to Uhura because he finds her beautiful. The scene reveals that not only he reads poetry thinking about her, he looked for her native country (kenya) and what her name means in the swahili language too (‘Uhura whose name means freedom’). That suggests an interest from his part that doesn’t really find a ‘professional’ explanation. Byron and her original language certaintly aren’t stuff that kollos could know about either, it makes more sense that it was Spock’s thoughts. This is confirmed by Spock himself when Mccoy doubts it was ‘him’ who read Byron and Spock replies that he actually did.
If you take for good the information about Kirk and Mccoy (that they are his friends) you might as well consider Spock’s crush for her as valid.
Maybe some don’t like Uhura enough to consider her a valid, logical, love interest for him but Spock certaintly did. I believe that those who aren’t against spock/uhura simply recognize that it’s a valid pair in terms of canon, if not the one that makes the most sense for Spock. I don’t see how pairing him with number one is more logical or ‘canon’ than his attraction for Uhura in two separated timelines (one of which has them as a couple). After all, tptb had wanted to pair spock/uhura in tos originally but were prevented by racism. Anything that was created after that is more or less a surrogate of that original idea they had to drop.
@43/Mate: “With Kurtzman at the helm, the thought might be reasonable because he’s the one who put Spock with Uhura.’
No, he was one of the 3-5 creators who chose to do that, along with J.J. Abrams and Roberto Orci as his collaborators on the story and script, plus Damon Lindelof and Bryan Burk as fellow members of the “Supreme Court” that made the creative decisions on the first two movies. There’s no telling which specific parts Kurtzman contributed to that whole, or which parts he’d prefer to do differently as a solo creator or showrunner in his own right. Look at Ron Moore or Bryan Fuller — pretty much their entire post-Trek filmographies are about reacting against their time on Trek, doing all the wild stuff they didn’t get to do as part of a Trek writers’ room. It’s never wise to assume that a writer will do the same things as the head of their own team that they did as a junior member of someone else’s team.
@ChristopherLBennett
No need to specify it. He’s the only one working on TV trek, that’s why he was mentioned as one of the writers of kelvin trek too. If people feel like Discovery, at times, seems inspired by kelvin trek it’s reasonable to believe Kurtzman may have something to do with that because he worked on that first. He certaintly liked spock/uhura as well, as he made his own positive comments about it, and there is no reason to believe he didn’t agree or he doesn’t get credit for the idea too. Your reply is a tad redundant and adds nothing to the main point.
I’m glad the episode doesn’t shy away from suggesting that Number One had a crush for Pike. If there is any romance that could be developed it’s theirs. Even back in the 60s, they were meant to.. so it’s nice the writers don’t ignore it. Spock works more like a little brother honestly ( call it his destiny, so far) . Sure, a pike/number one romance would be even more doomed by his accident (I still HATE they spoiled it to Pike) but also add more dramatic layers to what ultimately happens to him.
I’m not convinced by the freaky thing, though, and Number One’s belief they have to hide it, particularly Spock. If he feels like responding to situations with a smile, like many humans do, I don’t understand the logic that, in order to be in command, he has to hide the fact he’s a guy who is capable of smiling. She has issues. Kirk, Pike and others certaintly aren’t forbidden to be humans and smile when it’s appropriate for them. The suggestion that Spock has to hide himself because his behavior goes against the vulcan stereotype makes it all the worse. It’s one thing for Spock to be insecure and try to hide his human side, another is his superiors demanding him to not be himself just because he’s half vulcan and they want him to behave like they believe vulcans should. They should be the first to encourage him to be honest with himself and make him feel accepted without prejudices.
I continue to be bewildered by the way Discovery treats Spock’s mixed heritage as a split personality disorder of sorts. That’s totally missing the point, not to mention slightly problematic and backwards thinking.
@45/Mate: “He’s the only one working on TV trek, that’s why he was mentioned as one of the writers of kelvin trek too.”
Which is missing my entire point, that it’s naive to expect that a solo writer will do things exactly the same as the larger team he was once a part of. Sure, it’s not impossible, but it’s not guaranteed either, so it’s reckless to jump to the conclusion that it must be the reason for any imagined similarity.
And no, it isn’t “redundant” to point that out. The human brain is programmed to look for patterns, and so we routinely fool ourselves into seeing patterns that don’t exist. That’s why we should always be skeptical of the patterns and connections we think we see. We should always question our own first impressions and remain open to alternative explanations.
@46/Mate: “If there is any romance that could be developed it’s theirs. Even back in the 60s, they were meant to.. “
That’s not how ’60s TV worked. They weren’t meant to become romantic partners; they were meant to have an ongoing, unrequited attraction yet never give into it because of their professional relationship, while both remaining open to romances with guest stars of the week. You can see that dynamic with Kirk and Rand in season 1. Back then, putting the male lead in an ongoing relationship with a fellow cast member was undesirable because it limited his freedom for romantic entanglements with guest actresses. So the norm was to keep the male and female leads in a perpetual state of unresolved sexual tension (so common it has its own acronym, UST). A female lead who got too close to the male lead was in danger of being killed off or written out to clear the board for him.
I wonder if Kurtzman somehow wants to develop a Pike-verse version of the kirk/uhura/spock trio through a pike/number one/spock dynamic. Those who are against the kelvin trio with Uhura (‘she replaces mccoy! Where are the bros?’) must be worry-free when it comes to Number One as she certaintly cannot interfere with the original trio status quo. Any romance with prime timeline characters must be more tolerable to some when the existence of tos as a sequel makes them doomed either way.
Back to the episode, the fact Number One doesn’t want to get called with her actual name, unless she gives you the permission, reminds me of the secret around Uhura’s first name in prime and how they turned it into a plot device in kelvin trek, where she wants people to call her just Uhura – and you can call her Nyota only if she has a personal relationship with you.
It seems the writers give more dignity to female characters who kind of got the short end of the stick in the original thing. In this instance, the fact no one bothered to make their first names canon before becomes a means to show their agency instead ( in that they are the ones keeping their names as a private matter).
@43/Mate: “Maybe some don’t like Uhura enough to consider her a valid, logical, love interest for him but Spock certaintly did.”
Uh, I love Uhura (when she’s being played by Nichelle Nichols). And I still wouldn’t want to see her with Spock. Partly because Chapel already has a crush on Spock, and it’s nice that there’s a female character who isn’t romantically interested in any of the men, and partly because I prefer the reading that she’s only teasing him. They work together and appreciate each other professionally. They make music together. And Uhura is a charmer and a teaser and has fun disturbing “his Vulcan cool” (see comment #25). I find that a more nuanced and enjoyable relationship than turning them into a romantic couple.
” The scene reveals that not only he reads poetry thinking about her, he looked for her native country (kenya) and what her name means in the swahili language too (‘Uhura whose name means freedom’).”
Uhura is from Kenya? I only knew that she’s from the United States of Africa.
And the scene only reveals that the Spock/Kollos compound connects the Byron verse to Uhura when he sees her. We don’t know if this is something Spock has ever done on his own. Perhaps Spock considers her a friend, and Kollos enjoys this new idea of female beauty he has found in the literature in Spock’s mind, and applies it to her.
@48/Mate: “It seems the writers give more dignity to female characters who kind of got the short end of the stick in the original thing. In this instance, the fact no one bothered to make their first names canon before becomes a means to show their agency instead ( in that they are the ones keeping their names as a private matter).”
Really? I thought the first two Kelvin films were terrible to their female characters, and I love Uhura in the “original thing”. And Spock and Sulu were one-name characters too, and so was almost every nonhuman character. And Chakotay in Voyager. So, not a sign of disrespect at all.
@ChristopherLBennett
Nevertheless, if people find that Discovery is as inspired by kelvin trek, if not more, as it is by other treks, it isn’t unreasonable to notice the one connection between the two: Kurtzman. Thinking everything is coincidence sometimes is as ‘jumping to conclusions’ as those who do what you have described, and I don’t think it’s fair to hint that people imagine things that don’t exist when you can’t rule out the possibility that, indeed, Kurtzman’s previous works are influencing his latest one.
It’s like those who watched the shows made by JJ, Kurtzman and Orci before they did trek and they noticed some similarities. Its possible, and human. No one is saying these writers plagiarize their own works, though.
They probably wouldn’t really develop Pike and Number one as a couple for the reasons you stated. In context of the sexism in the 60s, women and romance were considered as a distraction for the main guys or something that made them less cool . As a result, the only relationships allowed to get developed were friendships between men. I don’t think original trek should be used as a template to follow for modern trek too though; it certaintly is a good thing that there seems to be less prejudices and double standards for female characters and their dynamics nowadays, at least from the writers part. Can’t say all the fans are able to do that because some issues are internalized, but I think we really need to stop criticizing romance (often concern trolling about the female characters too) for things ‘bromance’ is always praised for. Different relationships aren’t arbitrarily less useful or relevant than the ‘Kirk/Spock’ kind of dynamics.
@JanaJansen
Agree to disagree. I find it hard to believe that Kollos would know about a earth author from centuries ago and be able to not only understand his poetry, but also use it to make a methaphor about Uhura’s beauty (that means he’s able to notice that too, in the first place). Further, I’m supposed to believe kollos would know that Uhura’s country is Kenya (which is part of the usAfrica, that is like the United states of America) and the meaning of her name in her main language that is rare even for today standards.
I think it makes more sense to think that those were Spock’s thoughts that Kollos voiced. However, you are free to interpret it as being all Kollos’ invention if it makes more sense with your narrative, but I expect you to use the same energy when he calls Kirk and Mccoy as Spock’s friends, and thus interpret it as Kollos’ own invention too.
I find kelvin Uhura is wastly an upgrade compared to how tos Uhura was treated (she’s elevated to the trio level and she constantly gets to use her skills to save the day more than Mccoy and the other secondary characters tbh) , and this includes her private life getting explored. It certaintly isn’t a negative thing that they were finally allowed to give her a relationship that she couldn’t have in tos because of racism. You can try to romanticize tos Uhura and pass her lack of screentime and character development, as well as her lack of relationships and private life, as something feminist or progressive for her character.. but it wasn’t and still wouldn’t be. The argument seems to be concern trolling (‘why can’t she still be a black woman who don’t need no man cliché’? she was ‘better’ when she didn’t interfere with the white guys status quo and the bros)
I’m baffled by the concept that someone can claim to love Uhura, and find issues in her kelvin trek portrayal, all the while simultaneously ignoring (or, worse, romanticizing) the way Nichelle was treated in the original thing, and thus the sexism and racism in tos. It is disingenuos.
Personally I don’t think Spock is good enough for Uhura. Granted he’s handsome and interesting but he’s also ridiculously high maintenance with Mommy issues, Daddy issues, communication issues and God knows what else.
Too Much Trouble.
Personally I don’t think Spock is good enough for Uhura. Granted he’s handsome and interesting but he’s also ridiculously high maintenance with Mommy issues, Daddy issues, communication issues and God knows what else.
Too Much Trouble.
“Partly because Chapel already has a crush on Spock”
One not reciprocated by him.
The fact Chapel has a crush on Spock doesn’t mean he must stay single, or no other woman is allowed to be attracted to him too before and after her appearance on the show.
Uhura doesn’t have that kind of role and dynamic anyway; even less in kelvin trek where, like it or not, she’s Spock’s significant other and someone he loves back and is in a relationship with. At times, see the last movie, he actually was the one pining for her more (but he isn’t Chapel either because he has a ‘crush’ on his girlfriend of years)
Kelvon Uhura is no less important than the men, a fact that makes some fans feel different levels of annoyance. Personally, I think it was a good thing kelvin trek (and discovery) challenged us out of our comfort zone a bit and what we take too for granted when it comes to the dynamics, and characters. We aren’t in the 60s anymore and you can’t expect it’s a boys only club in perpetuity.
@princessroxana
Who is good enough for Uhura? She’s the only one who knows that, and she clearly considers him “good enough” .
Spock isn’t good enough for the guys either, then. No one should care about him and be his friend because he’s ‘different’. He’s too much trouble. Your logic, not mine.
Is he, though? What makes him less deserving of love than Kirk and the full blood humans? What makes their flaws more acceptable? Dynamic characters have flaws and conflicts but he’s still a good, honorable, loyal man who is obviously capable of love even if he doesn’t express his feelings like others do, which Uhura gets. It doesn’t seem to me the humans are more successful than him in their private life, especially if we consider that Spock’s own personal life was affected by something outside his control (the loss of his planet and the survivor guilt he felt), not really his daddy issues, mommy issues etc.
I was pleasantly surprised by how much I liked spock/uhura in kelvin trek, to the point I honestly care for their dynamic more than their version of the old school bros. I increasingly became tired by the writers putting those dynamics only because the old thing had them. I felt they relied too much on the belief that, because fans already love the original, you don’t need to really develop them in the reboot because they see a given. I find none of the relationships got enough development, but the new dynamic certaintly felt less forced to me and more authentic as this version of the characters having their own life influenced by the circumstances of their reality, rather than what happened in the original version of the product. To each their own.
@50/Mate: “Nevertheless, if people find that Discovery is as inspired by kelvin trek, if not more, as it is by other treks, it isn’t unreasonable to notice the one connection between the two: Kurtzman.”
No, it is not. But neither is it unreasonable to consider alternative possibilities as well. One must always be open to every side of an unsettled question.
It is true that Kurtzman worked on both productions, obviously. But it is also true that he was not in charge on the Kelvin films, and that makes a far bigger difference than laypeople tend to realize. Both truths should be considered and weighed against each other, not just one.
After all, if Kurtzman really had no creative vision of his own distinct from what Abrams and Orci did, I don’t think he would’ve wanted to split from them and form his own independent production company. It seems more plausible to me that he’d want to put his own stamp on things rather than just copy Abrams. At least, while he might choose to do some things in a similar way, that’s no guarantee that he always would.
@51/Mate: Keep in mind that Kollos is not a newcomer to humanity. He’s the Medusan ambassador to the Federation, and the Enterprise‘s mission is to ferry him back to Medusan territory. it would make no sense to think an ambassador returning home from his host country would not be familiar with the culture of said country.
And why wouldn’t he have read the personnel files of the crew that was transporting him home? It’s not like he had much else to do sitting around in a cat carrier all day.
Actually I’m inclined to agree with you that Kollospock (Spockollos?) was drawing on Spock’s memories and sentiments there, the combined entity being freer to express them than Spock was alone. But Kollos’s mind did make some contribution there, and his observations about humans and our loneliness inside our skulls sounded like something he’d been thinking about humans for some time already, not some brand-new discovery on the spot.
@ChristopherLBennett
Fair points. I thought you were suggesting it isn’t valid to make that connection.
I stand by my opinion that it’s far more realistic and plausible that it’s simply Spock who found out the meaning of her name in her African idiom and the one who, reading Byron, thought about her. I don’t think the meaning of her name is the kind of needed information you’d find in her officer’s file, it seems more like something you deliberately have to look for, especially if you remember how, when she lost her memory, they barely realized that her main language was swahili.
Neverthless, I find it telling that some fans try to dispute the idea those were Spock’s thoughts about Uhura, but take for granted it was really him when Kollos described Kirk and Mccoy as his friends. No question. Spock having feelings for the guys is a given and acceptable, him having any sort of interest for Uhura is impossible and unacceptable. Some fans react to that scene the same way Mccoy did: with the belief they know what is Spock and what is not Spock better than anyone, and Spock basically replies to both and seems to say ‘this is still me, you shouldn’t assume I cannot be this. ‘ and it’s true, who Spock really is in his private and his interests and feelings is unknown, his colleagues and the audience only have a partial view of who the man really is; they only know what he lets them know.
In context of people disputing the spock/uhura romance, there seems to be a pattern in that they call it ‘baseless’ for tos, and accuse the writers of pulling it out of their b hole, but when someone points up those tos moments that show a mutual attraction at least, the same people will bend over backwards to minimize those scenes and ‘prove’ they cannot hint attraction. Often, the same people will support the idea of other romantic subplots that, in their own standards, are as baseless if not more than this one. This makes it seems the problem isn’t how people interpret a specific scene (nor the issue really is about ‘canon’), rather they are set on rejecting an idea in general (a dynamic too in this case) and disputing anything that doesn’t fit with their narrative (a narrative that includes them belittling the writers and their work)
@57/Mate: Oh, I certainly agree that Spock/Uhura was based on evidence in TOS. But I never really thought of the “She walks in beauty” bit as an example of that. In ’60s culture, if there was a beautiful single woman in the workplace, it was considered a given that every man there wanted to sleep with her and would flirt with her at the slightest provocation. So I didn’t take that as evidence of anything more than Kollos relaxing Spock’s inhibitions so that he said what everyone thought about Uhura, i.e. that she’s hot. I mean, certainly it does fit with the prior hints of mutual attraction in season 1, but it never really stood out for me that way until you brought it up.
@54/Mate: I liked that Kelvin Uhura had a bigger part in the story, but I didn’t like Kelvin Uhura. I had this problem with all three of the main characters. To varying degrees, I found them all unsympathetic. I also found the film more sexist than anything I had seen in Star Trek before. Winona Kirk was unable to raise her son on her own, something Carol Marcus and Beverly Crusher had managed fine twenty years earlier. Gaila was in love with the jerk protagonist. And if I’m not mistaken, we never even saw Christine Chapel.
Where did you get the information that Uhura is from Kenya?
Kelvin Uhura might’ve been a great character if they’d allowed her more opportunities to shine in ways other than being a snarky love interest straight out of a romcom. They came close to that in Into Darkness when she gets to speak Klingon, putting that goofy scene in Undiscovered Country to shame, and almost saving her friends. But then they had to have an action scene and violence. No, no, we’re close to being thoughtful and interesting here! Can’t have that.
@59/Jana: Several non-canonical sources say Uhura was born in Nairobi, including one of the Starfleet Academy novels set in the Kelvin timeline. But the earliest mention may have been Alan Dean Foster’s Star Trek Log Ten in 1978, which established that Uhura was from Kitui Province, Kenya (some 160 km east of Nairobi). It’s not an unreasonable conjecture, since Kenya is one of the main countries where Swahili is an official language.
@61/Christopher: Thanks!
@57. Mate: “Spock having feelings for the guys is a given and acceptable, him having any sort of interest for Uhura is impossible and unacceptable”
You’re overstating things here. Don’t think anyone here has claimed that, unless you’re dragging in arguments you’ve had elsewhere. There’s nothing unacceptable about Uhura being with Spock. It simply wasn’t established. Never happened with the original cast.
I’ve had a million crushes and only a few long-term relationships. Crushes and teasing happen all the time. We can even throw in workplace romances (or seedier affairs if the people are already attached to others), which could be applied to the Kelvin Uhura/Spock. They aren’t soulmates, they break up. And Spock “stalks” her. True relationships are rarer. I’m with Jana on this.
I even checked with my partner, She Who Must Be Obeyed, who is more astute than me in such matters, and she says there wasn’t anything in original cast Spock/Uhura interactions that automatically spelled “relationship.” Friendship and teasing (at least once egged on by Ensign Rand), yes.
There is really little need to say people hate the idea of the pairing. It maybe could’ve gone there. But it never did, not even in the later films with the OC, presumably much less subject to the sexism and racism of the TV era.
Btw, if you want a view of casual sexism regarding the Janice Rand character, read her wiki entry, including this gem:
“She was described as “blonde and with a shape that even a uniform could not hide.” In this first version of Star Trek, she worked as Captain Robert April’s “secretary, reporter, bookkeeper, and undoubtedly wishes she could serve him in more personal departments.” Roddenberry’s description of her ended with “She is not dumb; she is very female, disturbingly so.”
@63/Sunspear: “there wasn’t anything in original cast Spock/Uhura interactions that automatically spelled “relationship.””
I don’t think anyone has claimed that there was — merely that TOS provides enough evidence of mutual attraction that the idea of them having a relationship in Kelvin is not wildly out of character or devoid of precedent.
@CLB: lance and krad suggested such a claim by citing flirtations, each of which are qualified by context. While I have no issue with such a pairing, it’s not enough evidence to support a romantic interest, as opposed to friendship.
There’s also the problem of a human woman having to wait for a Vulcan’s seven-year-itch. That seems to preclude a sexual relationship, unless you handwave in the human half of Spock. The Kelvin versions touch and kiss, so maybe they simply ignored that aspect there. Or maybe it’s the reason for their break-up, besides Spock being emotionally unavailable.
@Sunspear
No one says they had a relationship in tos. Honestly, they didn’t need to in order to have one into a whole separate reality; that’s the point of those movies. This choice by the writers is as valid as other choices they made to make the kelvin reality its own thing. They could’ve have paired Carol with Mccoy instead of Kirk if they felt like that.
However, if your argument is about whether s/u makes sense with tos, it still does. Not because they have a relationship there too (they couldn’t either way because of racism), but because there are hints of attraction so the writers didn’t just pull it out of nowhere. People ‘shipped’ spock/uhura and wondered about the potential back in the days too, the fact you or other people don’t see those scenes as an inspiration doesn’t mean they couldn’t be one for other fans and the writers.
I’m not one who cares about the soulmates myth, so I wouldn’t get the appeal of it either way, nor find it relevant here. However, even with my lack of interest for such things, I’m sure soulmates aren’t, necessarily, just the romantic couples who stay together or never have issues.
The end hinted they got back together, anyway. Technically, the break up happened offscreen and it’s just an assumption Mccoy makes before he knows what really happened, which had nothing to do with them not being ‘soulmates’: Spock wanted to leave starfleet to help the vulcans – but changed his mind in the end, this also is only implied without him saying it – so Uhura did the selfless thing of letting him go to not get in the way of his duty. They obvioustly still love each other. I thought their relationship was sweet in the last movie with him wanting to save her even as he was injured himself, her saving him, him admitting he went to the party (instead of working on his report like she knew he was supposed to) just to spend more time with his girl.
As for him being a stalker, there is a joke about her necklace working as a tracking device when you aren’t on vulcan, but it’s just that. McCoy’s joke is funny but, given the necklace is a precious family heirloom, and he only realized its extra feature when he desperately was looking for a way to save her, I don’t think it’s fair to label him as a stalker for that and erase the significance of the gift and its intended purpose. Spock loved his mother and she died in the first movie, along with his home planet where the mineral originally was present in, I suspect, many jewelries beside that one necklace his mom had. Uhura must be important to him if he wanted her to have what could possibly be one of the few objects he still has that were owed by his dear mother, not to mention one of the few family heirlooms that him and Sarek could save from the destrouction of vulcan. He likely got the necklace either from his mom, or his father after her death. The point is it had a sentimental value that certaintly cannot get erased by a joke about how useful the necklace became when he needed to find her TO SAVE HER. I bet Uhura knows because she’s smart enough to figure it out herself.
@55, Mate, I wouldn’t want Kirk either. Who wants to compete with the Enterprise?. McCoy was my crush, yeah he’s got that divorce in his past but those blue eyes!
@Sunspear
“There’s also the problem of a human woman having to wait for a Vulcan’s seven-year-itch. That seems to preclude a sexual relationship, unless you handwave in the human half of Spock. The Kelvin versions touch and kiss, so maybe they simply ignored that aspect there. Or maybe it’s the reason for their break-up, besides Spock being emotionally unavailable”
I don’t get where people got the idea that vulcans only mate every 7 years, and apparently DC Fontana herself didn’t get it either because they never implied that. She explained, for those who didn’t get it, that vulcans can have sex anytime they want to. Every 7 years, they just have this moment where they have to and go through a ritual. A side effect of old fandoms is this annoying trend of passing purely fanon speculations as a canon until it gets to the point tptb are criticized by fans for contradicting them.
Btw, vulcans totally don’t kiss only with their fingers either. Unknown where fans took this idea from, given the gesture showed by Spock’s parents in tos was simply meant to be the vulcan equivalent of a pda, such as holding hands (Nimoy suggested it). They still kiss and do the other stuff humans do (kelvin trek isn’t the first to show that)
@66. Mate: you’re belaboring my points. No need for so much overthinking.
I know the necklace is used as a joke to needle Spock, hence why i said “stalking.”
Fans also shipped Spock/Kirk back in the day, based on scant evidence. It was one of the first slash fics, if not the first. One non-canon example: I recall one early ST book that made reference to a possible Spock/Kirk relationship. Don’t remember if it was a novel or stories, or whether it was in the form of a forward or preface, or an in-universe “scholarly” comment. It also brought up the pon farr thing. In any case, it’s all wishful thinking.
I do agree that the Kelvin writers had freedom to do what they did. And that’s another bit of wishful thinking> If I could go back and act on the instances where I was clueless when a woman flirted with me… whoa.
@69/Sunspear: Yes, the very name “slash” was coined in reference to Kirk/Spock (or K/S) fanfiction. There was probably homoerotic fanfiction long before then, but that’s where the name came from.
And you’re probably thinking of “Admiral Kirk’s” footnote in the Star Trek: The Motion Picture novelization where Kirk acknowledges the speculations and says that while he’s got nothing against that sort of thing, he personally prefers women. Which was pretty progressive for 1979.
Cont @Sunspear
To be honest, if Spock were asexual you are basically saying that he cannot have a relationship just because of that..as if asexuals aren’t capable of love, or never have relationships. Between this and the one claiming he isn’t ‘good enough’ because he’s too introvert, has a conflict and the trauma of losing his home planet, some of you seem to have warped, limited perception of what ‘conventional’ relationships are that might be a bit out of touch with the reality of how love works among people.
He may be more private about his feelings, but I don’t think he’s that emotionally unavailable given the tenderness he shows towards her on that transport pad in the first movie, or in beyond. There are hints of that different, private, Spock. Into darkness has a monologue by him to her that I thought was a spot example of the writers respecting the integrity of the character because he says that he loves her without using the words. He doesn’t need to. Discovery made their young prime Spock easily say I love you to his sister when, years later, that Spock still cannot even say it to his own mother. Not even the writers themselves agree about what is ooc or not for Spock.
Anyway, Uhura might be more similar to him than people realize, even if she complements him with her more open emotionality and encourages him to cater to his human side more and not deny it (don’t forget vulcans have feelings too) . She doesn’t seem to be the type who wants a clingy mushy Romeo for a boyfriend, tbh. For what we know, she might have been attracted by Spock because he isn’t that kind of guy: he’s smart, gives her more space, respects her, and she knows that he’s more than what it seems when it comes to his feelings. Uhura isn’t Chapel or Mccoy, so don’t project the issues they had with him on her too. The one time she is hurt by Spock’s vulcan coldness is in into darkness when she thought he didn’t care about dying and didn’t care about how she’d feel if he died. It was a misuranderstanding, though, because he actually cared too much so shutting down, in that moment, was just a coping mechanism. She got that, and he got that he is accountable to her and her concerns matter (beyond even has him tell her that). Not all their problems have to be about that now, the one in beyond for example wasn’t: it was about him being conflicted by what he felt was his duty as a vulcan survivor. After years of being in a relationship, not to mention a near death experience for both of them in beyond, he actually seems to ultimately be willing to embrace his feelings even more and take her needs into consideration.
I honestly think that, while those movies are in no way perfect or everything they could have been, they deserve more credit that some fans are willing to give them.
@70. CLB: Ha. I know that too. It’s one reason why it makes sense for Sarek to be with a human woman and for his son to follow suit. They may have higher libidos than average Vulcans.
I’m having so many things explained to me. Gosh. If one had to fully spell out what you know in every post, we’d never hear the end of it.
Ok, I’m in danger of not taking this discussion seriously anymore. I’ll see myself out.
@71. Mate: “if Spock were asexual you are basically saying that he cannot have a relationship… some of you seem to have warped, limited perception of what ‘conventional’ relationships are that might be a bit out of touch with the reality of how love works among people”
One more thing. Ok, two things. In context, I wasn’t saying Spock is asexual. He’s capable of both emotion and physicality, he’s just unavailable to his partner. It happens in relationships.
Secondly, not sure why you assume posters here have a “warped, limited perception of… relationships (and) the reality of love.” Again, it seems like you’re dragging in arguments from elsewhere.
While I don’t see Kirk and Spock as more than friends, and honestly think the so called subtext some fans see actually is CONTEXT (bros dynamics were developed that way, and given how homophobic the 60s were, in that gay guys weren’t even considered as a possibility outside of some offensive clichés, it’s unlikely the writers deliberately suggested a secret relationship between them), I remember Roddenberry himself eventually was OK about shippers seeing it that way and he didn’t care much, even if he said it wasn’t their intention in the series. It’s impressive what the fandom did with that. Iconic. Talk about, also, making lemonade when life gives you lemons (in that tos didn’t have any decent romance and their female love interests were treated as disposable characters )
If I still remember that infamous footnote from the novel, Kirk mentioned that the vulcans only mate every 7 years too but since that isn’t true, the writers said that, it might be a sly way to further the fact he cannot know about Spock’s sexuality because they don’t have a relationship so he repeats the speculations. It’s like someone saying that vulcans don’t have feelings: only those who don’t really know them would say that.
@74/Mate: It wasn’t some sly secret message, it was just Gene Roddenberry and D.C. Fontana making different assumptions about how Vulcan sexuality worked.
@66/Mate: “People ‘shipped’ spock/uhura and wondered about the potential back in the days too […]”.
Fanlore.org says it wasn’t a common shipping, though. What’s your source?
People shipped Kirk/Uhura in the Delta Triad fanzines.
@68/Mate: “Btw, vulcans totally don’t kiss only with their fingers either. Unknown where fans took this idea from, given the gesture showed by Spock’s parents in tos was simply meant to be the vulcan equivalent of a pda, such as holding hands (Nimoy suggested it).”
From “The Enterprise Incident”? In the first draft of the script, Spock kissed the commander, “but both Nimoy and Linville agreed they needed something different from normal “Human” love expressions, and suggested the hand contact instead” (Memory Alpha).
@70/Christopher: “And you’re probably thinking of “Admiral Kirk’s” footnote in the Star Trek: The Motion Picture novelization where Kirk acknowledges the speculations and says that while he’s got nothing against that sort of thing, he personally prefers women.”
He even says that he always found his “best gratification” in women. That sounds as if he tried and kinda liked the alternatives, just not as much.
@74/Mate: “Talk about, also, making lemonade when life gives you lemons (in that tos didn’t have any decent romance and their female love interests were treated as disposable characters )”
I assume that by this you mean that all the romances were one-episode only, and that the main characters usually walked away from their love interests at the end of the episode, except for poor Kirk, whose love interests always died. But you put it in a pretty judgmental way. It’s basically a byproduct of episodic TV. I like episodic TV, and I like some of these romances. If you don’t, that’s fine, but it’s a matter of taste, not objective quality.
@Sunspear: Talk about explaining the obvious… now I’m doing it too :)
@ChristopherLBennett
Why not? After all, DC Fontana is right: they never stated that in canon because it wasn’t their intention, it’s just a speculation that was contradicted by the writers later too . Given the working relationship between Roddenberry and Fontana and the fact that, according to Nimoy, Gene thought Spock actually was a ‘womanizer’ no less an Kirk, I find it hard to believe he didn’t know. However, since the note is supposed to be in character it makes sense that Kirk wouldn’t know if, in fact, he has no intimate relationship with Spock. His friend isn’t someone who shares personal details about himself, he actually is likely to support the assumptions that he’s more cold a different affected than he really is.
@77/Mate: I think it was just Roddenberry telling the K/S folks sorry, but no.
Funnily enough, some K/S folks also read a “sly message” into that footnote, just like you, albeit a different one: “I’m not exactly sure of when I first heard of K/S, but I do know when I gave the concept my first serious thought: immediately after reading page 22 of Gene Roddenberry’s novelization of Star Trek: The Motion Picture. For the Great Bird of the Galaxy himself to create a brand new term for the relationship between Kirk and Spock—and to include the word ‘lover’ as one of its multilayered meanings—lent unmistakable credence to the theory. And Admiral Kirk’s footnote on the ‘rumors’—penned, of course, by Roddenberry—was a delightfully ambiguous, sly, teasing affirmation of the fact….” (Not Tonight Spock!).
From memory alpha, right from the pon farr page:
“Vulcans mate normally any time they want to. However, every seven years you do the ritual, the ceremony, the whole thing. The biological urge. You must, but any other time is any other emotion – humanoid emotion – when you’re in love. When you want to, you know when the urge is there, you do it. This every-seven-years business was taken too literally by too many people who don’t stop and understand. We didn’t mean it only every seven years. I mean, every seven years would be a little bad, and it would not explain the Vulcans of many different ages which are not seven years apart.” – D.C. Fontana
(I think she meant vulcans of different ages in the same family from the same parents)
Hence why suggesting Spock, T’pol or other vulcans have this kind of relationship doesn’t contradict canon nor it means the writers are ‘ignoring’ it like some love to claim. It only proves wrong a supposition that fandom wants to pass as a fact when it was never meant to be one.
Trying again since the site ate my comment (probably because of the links)
@JanaJansen
Who said it was a popular ship? Making it a competition derails the point. The point is just that people saw the potential back then and it’s perfectly valid and reasonable that they did. Are you disputing that or what?
You both keep on downplaying the scenes that were mentioned here, and the fact there were hints that tptb had originally wanted to set spock/uhura up from the get go, but they had to drop it because of racism, an element that you keep on ignoring as well.
This was confirmed by Nichols herself back in 2009:
“I decided then from the character that I read [Spock] that I wanted to be very much like that character but in a feminine way. And Gene said, and I was sharing this with George the other day, when I told him that I thought of Spock as my mentor. Because if you remember Uhura was the only one he was able to teach the Vulcan lyre too and he sang and spooffed on Spock. Now, you could have never had a love scene in 63 between Uhura and Spock but there were several hints and [back to Roddenberry] Gene was one in the kind of beginning to follow that and he wanted to do episodes if we had gone past the third year [that explored different relationships]”
People shipped almost everyone with Kirk because, after all, he was the lead and he had most of the interactions with the characters. However, Nichelle had always stated, even before the reboot made the pair with Spock canon, that from her reading it’s Spock the character Uhura was attracted to and had more in common with, not Kirk. The kiss itself was originally written between them but, according to her, Shatner insisted he got the scene because he recognized how iconic it would be (believable, even if he gave a different version of the story).
Too long, dont read: It makes a lot of sense, actually, that the kelvin trek writers were inspired to make this particular pair canon. Not only they were allowed to by their alternate reality device, it actually is a legitimate example of making canon something that might have happened in tos too if the 60s weren’t so racist.
“I assume that by this you mean that all the romances were one-episode only, and that the main characters usually walked away from their love interests at the end of the episode, except for poor Kirk, whose love interests always died. But you put it in a pretty judgmental way”
If I’m judgmental it’s because, unlike you, I’m not so willing to dismiss the context of the era and how misogynistic tos was. The fact female love interests were mostly considered just eye-candy, and a disposable distraction whose romances interfered with the guys being ‘cool’ , was a product of the sexist mindset of the time.
I can’t take people serioustly when they claim kelvin trek is more sexist than tos. Get real.
“vulcans don’t kiss with their fingers” point:
This is also written in the “vulcan finger touching” page on memory alpha:
“Regarding the origins of the Vulcan gesture involving touching of two fingers with two fingers, Leonard Nimoy explained in his book I Am Spock that the gesture was not meant to be the Vulcan equivalent of a Human kiss, but rather the Vulcan equivalent of holding hands in public: “The question came up as to what public sign of affection, if any, Sarek and his Human wife would display. Handholding was clearly out, but perhaps finger-to-finger contact of a ceremonial, dignified nature might work. Mark [Lenard] and Jane [Wyatt] took my comments to heart, and came up with the wonderful gesture where Amanda rests her first two fingers lightly upon Sarek’s two fingers. It worked beautifully, and added to the texture of [the episode].” Nimoy also described Vulcan finger-touching as “the beginning of the Vulcan mating ritual”, “the Vulcan two-fingers-touching ’embrace'”, and “the Vulcan version of foreplay”. (I Am Spock, hardback ed., pp. 71-72, 237)
It isn’t a kiss, and in no circumstance they ever stated that vulcans don’t kiss or have sex like humans, hence why the writers can’t be accused of not respecting canon when they hint the vulcans have sexual relationships and/or kiss.
Like for pon far, the writers never said that certain interpretations by fans are canon. They are not.
Talk about people thinking they are ‘explaining the obvious’ when they are just passing their own speculations as facts. You are citing as sources things, like that script, that make a false equivalence and don’t really prove your interpretation is canon (all the while you ignore sources that are actually related to the point, such as the explanations provided by the creative team themselves and actual scenes that show the vulcan character kissing and/or hint an intimate relationship )
@80/Mate: It seems to me that this quote reaffirms comment #75, about Fontana and Roddenberry not presenting a united front. Personally, I tend to side with Fontana. Roddenberry had some weird ideas that fortunately never made it on screen. He also changed his mind a lot.
Perhaps more importantly, I don’t have the impression that anybody here disagrees with your main point (“Vulcans can have sex in between Pon Farr”).
@81/Mate: That was a pretty nasty personal attack, you know that? Not taking each other seriously may be the wisest thing we can do at this point.
@81/Mate: Nobody is “ignoring” the fact that the Spock/Uhura flirtation in early season 1 was shut down because of racism. It’s just that you’ve already pointed it out and it’s indisputably true, so none of us have anything to add to your entirely correct statement.
“The fact female love interests were mostly considered just eye-candy, and a disposable distraction whose romances interfered with the guys being ‘cool’ , was a product of the sexist mindset of the time.”
To an extent, you’re right about this, but Jana is also totally right that it was a result of the episodic nature of TV storytelling in the day, the need for every storyline to be wrapped up in a single episode. Shows with female leads (e.g. The Girl from UNCLE, Honey West, The Bionic Woman, or Wonder Woman) approached their male love interests the exact same way that shows with male leads approached female ones — either as romances-of-the-week that were never seen again, or as regulars who had a perpetual unrequited flirtation with the female lead. Jaime Sommers was introduced in The Six Million Dollar Man as Steve Austin’s lifelong love and bride-to-be, and she was killed off at the end, but when she proved popular enough to get resurrected and spun off into The Bionic Woman, she was conveniently given amnesia so her romance with Steve could be sidelined and she’d be free to pursue romances-of-the-week. In Wonder Woman season 2, when the show swapped networks and moved from a WWII setting to the present, Steve Trevor was initially portrayed as Agent Diana Prince’s partner on field missions and potential romantic interest, but after 8 episodes the show was retooled by a new showrunner and Steve was promoted to be Diana’s boss who mainly just sat in an office giving her orders, reducing him to a supporting character role and eliminating any hint of romantic tension.
@@@@@ 82. JanaJansen
“Perhaps more importantly, I don’t have the impression that anybody here disagrees with your main point (“Vulcans can have sex in between Pon Farr”). ”
Read 65 Sunspear.
@@@@@ 84 ChristopherLBennett
“@@@@@81/Mate: Nobody is “ignoring” the fact that the Spock/Uhura flirtation in early season 1 was shut down because of racism. It’s just that you’ve already pointed it out and it’s indisputably true, so none of us have anything to add to your entirely correct statement.”
I don’t get that impression when some people preach about how much a relationship wasn’t a possibility in tos, and dispute the scenes that show some flirtation in early season1 as just fans retroactively reading too much into it.
I see the same disingenuous obliviousness when some fans want to attack kelvin Uhura calling her ‘just the girlfriend’ (an accusation that is sexist, anyway), and they make it seems that Nichelle’s version was ‘feminist’ just because she was single, glossing over the fact that it’s sexism and racism that made her character like that. The character was less developed in all the episodes and movies than kelvin Uhura was in just 3 movies, and this says a lot.
To be honest, the vicious attacks that Kate Mulgrew received on twitter, when in one of her recent interviews she stated that tos was a product of its time and misogynistic, further made me think that some things are everything but a given in this fandom. A lot of people really do consider tos perfect. It’s in this page too that someone claimed that kelvin trek is more sexist than tos, so I can’t agree with your assertion that nobody is ignoring some things.
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@85/Mate: “I don’t get that impression when some people preach about how much a relationship wasn’t a possibility in tos, and dispute the scenes that show some flirtation in early season1 as just fans retroactively reading too much into it.”
I’ve just reviewed the thread, and nobody actually said those things. Sunspear initially said the movies pulled Spock/Uhura out of a hat, but subsequently conceded that there were indeed hints of flirtation in some TOS episodes, though they were ambiguous. Jana also agrees that the flirtation scenes were there, but says she prefers to interpret them as teasing rather than romance. Neither of them is judging other fans for “reading too much into it,” merely expressing their own personal opinions on the subject, with no “preaching” involved. And everyone’s in agreement that there was flirtation to some degree.
@87. CLB: I would give you a +1 if I could. Well said.
@87/Christopher: Thank you.
@87 ChristopherLBennett
Thank you for your imput, but I can read on my own and I stand by my own perception :)
The current discussion originated from a comment where Sunspear claimed that the relationship in kelvin trek doesn’t make sense (while Una/Spock would? ), and the kelvin trek writers pulled it out of a hat (unlike a possible Una/Spock thing that obvioustly gets so much support and evidence by tos canon..). When some pointed up that it isn’t true and mentioned hints of flirtation in tos, those scenes were downplayed as something you choose to see but there is no hint the characters could be attracted to each other, never mind the hints that tptb indeed had tried to set a romance up from the get go but dropped it because of racism; this point wasn’t even taken into consideration until it was brought up by others, btw.
The original point was then derailed by making it a matter of ‘ there was no relationship in tos’ (this always said by the same who wants to see a spock/number one romance instead :) ), when no one was really disputing that. The point originally raised was about whether the writers pulled it out of nowhere or not, and some people replied that they didn’t because hints of flirtation ( =/= relationship) were in the original thing too, so it isn’t that far fetched to have a relationship in the movies. That’s all. Claiming there was no relationship in tos (so there shouldn’t be one in the movies now) is disingenuos, btw, if you know that they couldn’t have an explicit romance in 60s TV anyway.
The alternate reality thing in the movies implicitly makes any complain about the ‘changes’ pointless, but it’s funny that some people nitpick about or dispute the romance that is still something inspired by canon.
My impression, judging by how much some people try to downplay hints of flirtation in tos and/or dismiss the mere idea that Spock could be indeed attracted to Uhura, is that the issue here isn’t that the writers “pulled it out of a hat” and, therefore, whether something is canon or not. It’s just that they don’t like it. This is fine, as long as you don’t paint yourself into a corner by using canon as an excuse, especially if you want to support other things (spock/una in prime) that are even less supported by ‘canon’. You can’t have it both ways.
I’m glad you feel the need to defend fellow fans and make yourself the moderator here, but I don’t appreciate you trying to make me the bad guy who saw things that weren’t here. Some of my points were obvioustly about some fans in general too (given the argument isn’t new since the reboot came out and I noticed some patterns).
I get no one likes it when someone disagrees with them, but conflict is unavoidable if you choose to post your opinions into a public fanboard.
Mate, I agree with you that there are plenty of flirtatious moments between Spock and Uhura in TOS. It’s certainly possible if they’d have met when they were younger there could have been a relationship. I don’t like the Kelvinvese but Spock/Uhura isn’t really a problem for me.
On the other hand I think making Una a love interest for either Pike or Spock would be a mistake and unnecessary in making them a triumvirate friends and colleagues.
At the risk of getting another long-winded response, I’ll spell out some things. The Trek movies had a chance to go there with a S/U relationship, outside of the strictures of 60s “sexist” and “racist” TV. (We’re generalizing here) They did not, despite any claims by Ms. Nicholls that Roddenberry had such intentions.
Second, the wishful thinking about a Spock/Una relationship is not based on any ToS context. Nowhere did I say that. We are in a review thread for this specific short, which showed wonderful chemistry between them.
You are interpolating baggage you seem to have carried from other discussions into this one. Perhaps someone there said things that offended you. My comments (even the pon farr one), my tone (which is admittedly hard for some to pick up -although it was obvious you were making Jana angry), were meant to be fanciful.
Your issue that “some people… It’s just that they don’t like it” is simply not supported by anything said here. It’s something you encountered elsewhere and keep belaboring here. I’ve said explicitly that I have no issue with such a pairing.
Lastly, this kind of discussion is meant to be fun, especially in light of the piece of media we’re discussing. Have you even watched it?
For me, the problem with Kelvin Spock and Uhura isn’t their relationship. It’s that Uhura is almost entirely about that relationship. Her main character beats through the trilogy are: 1. Dating Spock. 2. Arguing with Spock. 3. Breaking up with Spock is hard to do. And that’s pretty much it.
On the plus side we finally get her first name, but we get nothing about her background. We’re not shown where she’s from, her childhood, her family; something Kirk and Spock had in abundance. If you’re going to make her one of the three main characters, that’s great, but then don’t half-ass it by propping up the character with a romance to another main character. It’s lazy.
@93/GillyB: “On the plus side we finally get her first name, but we get nothing about her background.”
That’s one of the few things I liked about the film – that her first name, that had already been used for so many years in tie-in fiction, was finally used on screen. They should have done that in The Undiscovered Country.
I can understand that they didn’t give us her background. For Spock’s background they only had to refilm a scene from “Yesteryear”. Showing Uhura’s background would have required making up 23rd century Swahili culture from scratch.
Given Star Trek’s track record with characters’ native places, perhaps it’s better that we didn’t see hers. Picard’s family home in TNG looked like something from 1900. So did Kirk’s in this film. How would they have imagined 23rd century Africa?
93. GillyB
The fact Uhura gets to have a personal life (her relationship with Spock), to begin with, is innovative enough given that in the tos episodes and movies she never got that because of racism and sexism.
None of the characters outside Kirk and Spock has their background and personal life fully developed. Mccoy is ‘just’ Kirk’s best friend, are you complaining about that? It’s disingenuos to expect Uhura, who is a secondary character and not a co-protagonist, to get more development in that sense than even Mccoy and, at times Spock in prime, ever got in both tos and jj’s trek.
I take issue with people thinking that a romantic relationship isn’t also a legitimate way to humanize characters and know them better. The fact fans can demand the old school bromances to be front and center, and complain when they aren’t, while they simultaneously concern troll and harpy on the little screentime given to the relationship that features a woman screams sexism disguised as feminism.
In Uhura’s case, your double standards are even more glaring because it seems you are deliberately downplaying everything she did in the movies, just to support your narrative that she is just the girlfriend when she isn’t just that.
In 3 movies, Uhura is consistently portrayed as a competent officer who helps the plot move forward with her skills and she, unlike Sulu, Mccoy and Kirk himself (tbh) , is promoted to chief communications officer because she is more competent and skilled, as a linguist, than the previous officer was. She is the one who intercepted and translated that transmission that helped Kirk do 1+1=2 and saved them (and it’s only Spock’s trust in her skills and competence that persuaded him into taking into consideration Kirk’s theory when she supported him with her facts). In into darkness, she is the bravest officer in that away team, not to mention a skilled linguist, when she goes to face the klingons alone. The fact she isn’t successful doesn’t take away from the purpose of the scene that is emphasizing how brave and competent she is (more than Kirk and Spock there, frankly). In the end, she is the one who saves both Spock and Kirk by, once again, showing her bravery when she gets in between Spock and Khan’s fight in a crucial moment. Lastly we have beyond and, well, if you concern troll about her romance even there it speaks volumes about your bias since she barely interacts with Spock there and he is the one pining for her, talking about her, while most of her screentime is interacting with the villain and ultimately play a foundamental role in that she is the one who reveals his identity. If you complain she’s all about Spock even in the last movie (all the while you probably, I bet, praise Mccoy who only gets screentine through the bros) then it’s obvious the poor girl (and the writers) just can’t win with you.
There are other smaller examples of her using her skills through the movies. Tell me what Mccoy did in the movies or what we know about the characters because they objectively aren’t more developed than Uhura, let alone they are more important than her in the main plot.
Kelvin Uhura wastly is a huge upgrade compared to what Nichelle Nichols got to play. Of course, they can do more and better still, but if you really want to see more of her you should sacrifice a bit of the screentime given to the bromance and thus the main guys because THAT is the main reason why Uhura, Mccoy and the others get little screentime. It’s very disingenuos to blame her lack of screentime on the few moments her relationship, thus HER personal life, gets. Come on.
I think it’s interesting because on one hand, you complain she is all about her relationship but on the other hand, it seems her romance is the only thing that picks your interest and you ignore anything else the character did. I wonder if you really remember or paid attention to what the guys did outside of their interpersonal dynamics either.
I feel fans honestly care about the relationships much more than seeing the characters do their job or saving the day. The problem, for me, is that what some fans constantly consider normal and praise-worthy when it comes to the guys (e. g., mccoy) is perceived as the very opposite for the woman and this is bad for me, not to mention unfair.
@92 Sunspear
“the wishful thinking about a Spock/Una relationship is not based on any ToS context. Nowhere did I say that. We are in a review thread for this specific short, which showed wonderful chemistry between them.”
In your original comment you said:
“I’d love it if they turn Una and Spock into a couple, or at least close friends. They pulled Spock/Uhura out of a hat in the Kelvin movies. This one makes more sense. Just think of them sharing their “freaky” (Una’s word) and letting go in private.”
You are the one that specifically compared the two and didn’t elaborate on why the latter makes more sense. The fact you mention Spock/Uhura as something the writers pulled out of a hat, all the while you claim that Spock/Una makes ‘more sense’ than them, gives the illusion that you are suggesting that the latter wouldn’t be something the writers pulled out of a hat. Since your main argument against spock/uhura is that it didn’t happen in tos, it’s contradictory that, in the same context, you say that Spock/Una makes more sense than that pair when it’s even less supported by canon in both timelines.
I find it a bit funny, btw, that you mention chemistry and ‘sharing their freaky and letting go in private’ as reasons why a romance with Una would make more sense, when the exact some arguments can be used for spock/uhura too, in both timelines. I mean, Uhura loved to sing when she was out of duty and he smiled at her. She also flirted with him and made him feel ‘hot under the collar’ in the infamous ‘vulcan has no moon’ scene. It’s easy to imagine that a lot of their relationship in the kelvin timeline must be based on them sharing a different side of themselves when they are together (you do see that since the first movie when he hugs or kisses her etc). Other similarities include the fact that Uhura is the most similar to him, and she doesn’t want to get called by her first name unless the context and relationship makes it ok for her. It almost seems like your spock/una thing is more or less an imitation of tos/kelvin spock/uhura, without you realizing it.
I don’t think, though, that Uhura would consider Spock smiling and expressing his feelings a ‘freaky’ he needs to hide. I doubt she’d ever want him to hide who he is. However, since this is a prequel of prime Spock, I guess they are trying to explain why, by the time we see him in tos, he will become someone who wants to be more vulcan than vulcans and is so on denial about his feelings that he will eventually try to purge them. This Spock is, in that sense, hopeless compared to kelvin Spock as he cannot resolve a conflict that he will only resolve when he’s old.
“Ahe Trek movies had a chance to go there with a S/U relationship, outside of the strictures of 60s “sexist” and “racist” TV. (We’re generalizing here) They did not, despite any claims by Ms. Nicholls that Roddenberry had such intentions.”
The movies are not the series though, and it’s well known that they don’t necessarily coincide with what could’ve been tptb’s original plans for the series. Roddenberry didn’t even like or consider some of them canon, Dc Fontana hated Sybok and ignored him in novels, etc etc.
I think that, for a number of reasons, it would still be controversial for them to have a romance in the movies. For one, I don’t get the impression those writers cared about developing the other characters, anyway. The movies were a missed opportunity to develop the ensemble, a thing Nichelle Nichols had often lamented herself. Secondly, spock/uhura was controversial for some fans even when they did it in 2009, alternate reality and all! It still is nowadays. You must have never read the sexist and racist attacks Zoe Saldana received from ‘real star trek fans’. They really opened my eyes about this fandom.
@94/Jana: “How would they have imagined 23rd century Africa?”
Back then, it’s hard to imagine — probably just something Westernized. These days, they’d probably borrow from Wakanda in Black Panther, which has become — by default — the iconic portrayal of Afrofuturism in American cinema.
@96: Mate: “You are the one that specifically compared the two…”
Context is king. We are discussing this short. Any inferences about possible future material follows from there. There are no references to TOS Spock and Una interactions. You still fail to say if you’ve actually watched the short, or if continue to pull arguments out of a hat (being polite).
It’s interesting that you’ve used the word “troll” several times now. That may be a giveaway. You’ve been told directly that at least one person regards your rhetorical style as a “nasty personal attack” and you did it again with a rude post directed at GillyB, calling her out on a personal level.
Didn’t read your whole post (TL;DR) as it’s simply boring now and it seems you can run on the mouse wheel forever. And yes, I know I’m addressing you personally as well. No need to state the obvious (again).
We seem to be reaching the point where the back-and-forth in this conversation is no longer constructive or particularly polite in tone. Time to disengage and/or move on to other topics; as a reminder, our commenting guidelines can be found here.
#95
The creators seemed to be trying to elevate Uhura above McCoy as a member of ‘the trio,’ most likely to fill the need for a female lead, demographics, etc. Which is fine and understandable. So yes, they should’ve worked harder to give us more of her as a standalone character and not just a love interest, if not in the first movie then the second or third.
And yes, in my opinion McCoy always deserved to have more of his background explored as well. The scene of him and his dying father in Final Frontier is easily the most powerful in that movie, and arguably for the entire history of the character.
#98
That’s okay. I didn’t take those comments as insulting on a personal level. More perplexing than anything else. On the whole, though I disagree, I appreciate the points Mate has made.
LLAP
@100/GillyB: I don’t think Kelvin Uhura was ever just a love interest. She was also significantly defined as a gadfly to Kirk, a character who didn’t take his crap and challenged him to become better, and whose approval he had to earn in order to prove his worth as a leader within the story. Granted, though, that’s still defining her in relation to a male character. But it makes her important to the narrative in a way that isn’t just about romance/sex.
@101. Gilly; LLAP
Live Long and Process? “LLAP is a set of persistent daemons that execute fragments of Hive queries.” Could be a Borg motto.
#102
That’s true, she does get more to do than Nichols’ Uhura did. However, I think they could’ve actually built an entire story around her character, namely in Star Trek Into Darkness. The plot is basically about a paranoid admiral and possible war with the Klingons, which seems like a ‘failure to communicate’ between cultures, which seems like the perfect opportunity for a certain communications officer to shine, perhaps by convincing the Klingons to help Kirk defeat the admiral. Of course, that would mean ditching all the Khan stuff, but I don’t see a downside to that at all. :)
Meh, just a thought.
@100/GillyB: McCoy had some of his background explored. He was in love with Nancy Crater ten years prior to TOS, and she used to call him “Plum” (“The Man Trap”). He was once stationed on Capella for a few months in order to offer medical help to the people there, but they didn’t want any (“Friday’s Child”). He has a daughter who was going to school on Cerberus about ten years prior to TAS (“The Survivor”), and he headed a mass inoculation programme on Dramia Two nineteen years ago (“Albatross”).
There’s also a whole backstory about his failed marriage in the Writers’ Guide, but that never made it on screen.
ENsign Spock reporting for duTY!
Sold!
I’ve been waiting for these Short Treks and this was well worth it. As they did with Pike, they’ve made Number One as complex and nuanced and awesome as we thought she’d be, and Ethan Peck totally nails Shouty Spock. This was a delight from start to finish.
As Krad said , more please, CBS. Just take my damn money.
Not much to add here that hasn’t already been stated by others but this Short Trek did indeed feel like a valentine to fans who if we can’t get a proper Pike series, at least get this cute little trifle. But it also leaves us wanting more. Now that we see the very beginning of that Una/Spock connection, how great it would be to see that interplay continue forward, as well as Spock and Pike getting to know each other. In fact if there was a Pike series, it should lead off directly after this Short Trek, and not some other period of Pike’s captaincy, such as after the events of DSC Season 2. We would get to see the more smiley/shouty human Spock and how he ever so gradually starts to move away from that so he becomes like the emotionless, logical Spock of TOS. And we could get to meet the other Enterprise crew beyond “the Big 3”. So many possibilities!
Okay, I finally saw this episode. It was fun, aside from the insane exterior shots of the turbolift in industrial hyperspace instead of a bloomin’ elevator shaft. Although I found it incongruous for Number One to say “nobody talks in elevators,” given that the whole reason for having turbolifts in Star Trek (whereas real naval vessels generally don’t have elevators due to the risk of them becoming stuck due to battle damage) was specifically so that characters could have private conversations in them! (Well, that and the fact that it’s easier to stage a scene in an elevator than to build a whole futuristic stairway or ladder shaft.)
I found it amusing that when Spock was semi-audibly musing about whether the whole universe might just be a simulation, the music was quoting the TOS main title theme.
On the other hand, it becomes more plausible for the turbolift to become stuck and cause this Short Trek episode. I’ve read before that aircraft carriers had escalators in them to carry personnel to the flight deck and that they would become “out of tune” and stuck.