Tumblr crosspost (25 January 2025)

Femslash Spirk scrap for today (at a point around the end of “The Conscience of the King”):

“I will admit,” said S’paak, “that I do not find the governor’s presumed fate a particularly grievous one, captain. I see no reason that skill at performance should exempt anyone from justice, much less someone guilty of Kodos’s crimes.”

Captain Kirk’s lips curved into an unconvincing approximation of her typical expression. “His skill at performance wasn’t the difficulty, unfortunately.”

S'paak could not help but wonder what Kirk would have done if events had not taken the matter out of her hands. Dr. McCoy could talk with Karidian’s own theatricality about blood and severed heads and vengeance, but Kirk had been cautious to the point of near folly. True, the Jessica Kirk of Tarsus IV had been a girl of thirteen, and the uncertainty of human memory made caution understandable. But the weight of evidence was so clear.

Even so, Kirk—a woman more prone to leveraging emotion than hiding its existence—had not fully succeeded in concealing her true thoughts. At least, not from S’paak. Kirk had gone from uncertain and reluctant to grim, fearless, admirably unfaltering. S’paak guessed that, in the end, Kirk would not have hesitated to personally consign Kodos to the fate he deserved had circumstances allowed for it. That was not an irrational vendetta, however bitter, but deserved and necessary.

“Those difficulties are past,” said S’paak, “thanks to you, with respect to both him and his daughter.”

“Not me alone. But thank you, I think,” said Kirk. She turned slightly away, though not before S’paak observed the uneven inhalation of her next breath, the quick, repeated flicker of her lashes. “Riley deserves more of your sympathy, though. He’s younger than me, lost more, and I ... I’ve always needed challenges to struggle against. Something to overcome.”

“I see no logical reason for starvation to be among those challenges,” said S’paak flatly, “nor the massacre of civilians, least of all when they are sent to death on no pretext except baseless pseudoscience.”

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Tumblr crosspost (27 January 2025)

So the great chronological-by-airdate TOS watch with my housemates is nearing its end and I’m genuinely kind of sad about it, in much the same way that I was happy but kind of sad about my D&D campaign resolving.

I will say, though, that I’ve been trying not to be One of Those People but I truly hadn’t realized before this TOS household re-watch that Kirk/Spock on the original show was at this level. I didn’t clearly remember the little bits I saw as a kid (I was far more into TNG and Captain Picard as a tiny Anghraine) and so I thought it would be more like the standard action-adventure male friendships that inspire big slash ships, and not god-tier “these guys are truly unhinged about each other.”

I’d seen the various Spock/whomever shippers duking it out among themselves, but from a distance, and just vaguely felt that none of the ship warriors were covering themselves in glory. I hadn’t realized that—I’m sorry, I know I’m becoming the villain here, but I had no idea I’d end up feeling like every Spock ship in TOS vs Kirk/Spock is 100% coughing baby vs hydrogen bomb.

Tagged: #fine. the k/s girlies of yesteryear were entirely justified and spock especially has powerfully relatable closeted gay energy #(kirk does not. kirk's energy is powerfully bisexual)

ETA 4/21/2025: Somewhat relatedly, I was actually looking at how the characters' share of overall dialogue breaks down statistically between TOS and TNG. It turns out that, proportionally speaking, you'd have to combine the line shares of Picard, Data, Riker, and Geordi to reach the share of overall dialogue that Kirk and Spock have in TOS (~73% of all TOS dialogue). And this isn't only because Kirk gets so much of the dialogue (he does get a ton of it, though his share drops sharply over the course of the show; IMO he also gets the bulk of the bad dialogue in the later show, despite some great S3 scenes—he's not carrying so much of the show's bad writing earlier on). But the only TNG character who has a higher proportion of overall dialogue than Spock does in TOS is Picard, and only a few percent more at ~31%. Meanwhile, in TOS, there's a steep drop from Spock's share of lines/screen time to McCoy, who has only 13% of the show's dialogue; the line shares only get slighter from there. Meanwhile, Data and Riker both have slightly higher shares of overall dialogue than McCoy, and Geordi comes pretty close to his share as well. TOS gives a lot of centrality to Kirk and Spock compared to even other ST shows.

Tumblr crosspost (29 January 2025)

In response to this post, yavieriel said:

I don't have particularly strong K/S feelings - TOS Shatner has Dad Vibes too strong for me to overcome - but this has been a delightful journey to watch you take.

I replied:

Interesting, I see that more easily from Nimoy than Shatner, but we all feel the Dad Vibes differently, lol. And thanks, haha—I went from "this is just part of the fabric of the universe of me, I'm not passionate but it just kind of IS to me" to "beating my head against the wall to avoid going insane" so fast it feels like whiplash!

yavieriel said:

Oh that is fascinating, Spock is entirely "hot but unapproachable college prof" to me. I can't even slightly imagine him drinking beer while grilling, or mowing the lawn in cheesy tshirts, or coaching t-ball. Whereas I feel like Kirk would be entirely comfortable with those things, and probably somewhat enthusiastic. My own dad's very stereotypical middle class cishet guy-ness is definitely somewhat performative, but it's not insincere, if that makes sense? Which also matches with Kirk's vibes for me.

I replied:

Ah, I see! My own dad is an extremely reserved and intense programmer from LA with zero interest in the various sportsballs and a great value for reason and debate (and board games that require some amount of tactical thinking), and we've always been conspicuously similar and close. Also Spock continually being on the receiving end of microaggressions is pretty true to the ways my dad has been targeted (as a multiracial Mexican-American man), so Nimoy's Spock feels all the more familiar. That said, I think partly the show sexualizes Kirk so much that I personally find it hard to see him as exactly paternal despite the strong Father To His Crew vibes. But I can see that as a way to read, for instance, Uhura saying she finds it soothing to listen to his voice through the intercom when she's nervous—it could be seen as a shippy thing, but obviously isn't intended that way.