The Hetero Spock Agenda

Despite Spock's connection to the queer community and long history as a gay icon, Strange New Worlds made the decision to portray him as the Most Heterosexual Man Who Ever Boldly Went. Let's talk about it.
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0:00--Intro
0:18--Spock is Gay
4:27--Spuhura/AOS
7:01--Blade and T'Pring
11:39--Blade and Chapel
13:51--Spock is Straight
17:59--Editing Ren
Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, commenting, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing.
#startrek #strangenewworlds #pridemonth

[@redblack9618]

I'm fine with the straights doing *whatever it is they do* behind closed doors, but I don't understand why they have to push their agenda in our face like this. Why can't they make their own straight characters instead of making Spock straight? How do I explain straight Spock to my daughter? (This was a good video, Ren.)

[@RenTheBarbarian]

😂😂😂😂😂 Thank you!

[@_Phen_]

I can say the same things for gays

[@jamessatter7418]

I love your implication that Spock may have been motivated to join Star Fleet to get away from Vulcan and the arranged marriage. Brilliant!

[@ThatNB1]

Lmao that time Kirk thought Spock was massaging his back. Watched that again last night and almost fell out of my chair.

[@aestheticlyplaying]

YESS ME TOO

[@ryangriffin5362]

I don't know who over at paramount thought we wanted to see some Spock sex scenes with T'Pring but I hope they have a terrible day. Definitely unlocked a new kind of uncomfortable. Any Spock portrayal making him straight is so wild to me. One the of the MAIN ways they established Spock as an other in the original series, over and over again, was by having him not share the rest of the male crew's interest in women, dating, and romance. That was a very consistent feature of his character. How are they gonna explain him going from the pussy destroyer 9000 in SNW to a kind of awkward nerd who has no interest in women? We're supposed to believe he was Cassanova under Captain Pike, then dumped T'Pring, told Chapel to leave him alone, and then got so uncomfortable around the topic of sex that there are multiple episodes in TOS where he can barely stand to discuss reproduction in any form? Such a weird, bad writing decision.

[@aestheticlyplaying]

I couldn't agree more.

[@rkpres17]

The only problem with this video is that I could only give it one like.

[@meander112]

Same.

[@stellarluna1834]

Dude same here

[@haze-the-alt]

You sound pissed, but I think that's the correct response. I agree with you, they are trying to totally rewrite Spock's character :(

[@haze-the-alt]

@rkpres17 I didn't mean to respond to your comment lol, I just meant to post a new one

[@lxvenderjewel]

real shit

[@Daxjudzea]

The whiplash i got when they cast gay af Quinto as Spock then slaped him in a relationship. I refused to watch snw for a while because i was so upset. My father did not understand but he actually agreed with me when i pointed out that at the very least it doesn't make sense with the cannon.

[@RenTheBarbarian]

I love ZQ but I feel like he was so wasted as Spock. The scripts for 2009 and Into Darkness dumb Spock’s character down so much that we barely get any emotional nuance from Quinto and it sucks. JJ Abrams, I hate you.

[@bakasta5992]

@@RenTheBarbarianhe was good in Beyond at least

[@duanjisomar]

At last someone with the balls to clarify about spock being a lgbtq+ character. Spock's for us is much better being an intergalactic sasuke

[@bakasta5992]

Except Sasuke is super gay too

[@bakasta5992]

Spock is an intergalactic Yuno from Black Clover

[@duanjisomar]

@@bakasta5992 haha spock is chameleon. Who knows what cosplay hes doin

[@Seal0626]

I would like to think that(as happens so often with Sherlock Holmes) some naive, well-meaning individual thought "Spock's always been a runaway favourite with the female fans, right? Must be because they all want to fuck him, right? Women adoring Spock is the whole reason we even have a franchise, so let's reward them by giving Spock sex scenes with a woman who they can mentally substitute with themselves!", but it feels a lot more like "Listen, we know you grubby little goblins think of Spock as a queer icon and it's his dynamic with Kirk that birthed modern fandom as we know it and maintained interest in _Star Trek_ through its early hiatus enough for the franchise to survive, but it's very important to us that you know we do not accept or respect that. You can have some queer and ambiguous background characters, but Spock is a series lead and we're not leaving it open to interpretation - he is a cishet white man who the loudest anti-SJW, anti-woke armchair critics will be able to map themselves onto without worrying that some day it might be revealed that he's not the straightest, most rugged, macho man's man who ever exuded testosterone. No gay headcanon allowed. We wouldn't want the Fandom Menace to not like our show." Tell you what really boggled my mind and made my heart sink, though, and that was Ethan Peck revealing that _he somehow didn't know about K/S._ How. How is that possible. Deep sea creatures that have never felt sunlight know about K/S. How is it even remotely possible for someone to be involved in _Star Trek_ in any sort of official capacity, let alone _playing one of the characters involved,_ and have never encountered the world's most famous gay ship, possibly eclipsing even Holmes and Watson? What's depressing though is that it shows that it's no sort of consideration at a production level. If there was even a ghost of a possibility of them going through with it, someone would have told him.

[@Majesticmanatee217]

How on earth do people interpret TMP without the obvious queer coding? Like bro literally purged his emotions due to his shame over the depth of his feelings for another man before realizing that those feelings are precisely what makes life worth living

[@RenTheBarbarian]

Not to mention Spock entering a giant butthole in space

[@lxvenderjewel]

i watched tmp with my mom and when the "this simple feeling" scene showed up my face went STONE COLD. i was scared outta my mind that she'd realize how queer that scene was

[@pizzawithkaas]

Ah yes remember in star trek (2009). Where Kirk aggressively hits on every woman he encounters. Uhura features more prominently to be in a bizarre forced romance and even McCoy has a quick line about his ex wife just in case the audience might dare interpret the golden trio is anything but totally straight lol

[@retriwa5640]

okay but the story still revolves around daddy issues!kirk&younger!spock enemies to.... whatever. yeah uhura was absolutely unnecessary, kirk suffered from kirk drift incredibly but also jocelyn has been around for a while, so not totally out of the blue there with mccoy. yeah i agree the writing is pretty shit in this sense but the actors definitely cared about the sub-context. obviously, quinto is literally gay and he highfived pine in an interview while cheering "spirk!:)" once. pine i feel caught along pretty quickly, as he stated that he wouldn't mind playing a gay character in response to quinto coming out. i think this is the reason ao3 has a ton of kelvin timeline spirk. because even though the writers didn't care, the actors did and that meant something. snw on the other hand? it's just... desperation

[@user-pv6gc6rz8q]

This made me very emotional. Very. I just . . . want to live long enough to see canon queer Spock. Thank you so much for making this and for all your videos, you are very talented and clever. I have watched the SNW and I am excited for series 2 however I am trying to maintain hope for some . . . growth for Spock. Some of the devotion and cleaving he showed w/Pike gave me some hope in series 1, not to suggest Spock/Pike but rather, his hero worship and mayhaps kink for human men emerging. Curious; what is your read on McCoy's sexuality?

[@RenTheBarbarian]

Honestly same, I don’t really ship Spock and Pike but I could see Spock having a baby crush on him that’s mostly hero worship. As for McCoy, I see him as bi! Some of the things he says to Spock or Kirk can be a little flirtatious sometimes 😂

[@jeffbarnesyout]

I really liked this video. First time I've seen yours. Spock was a hero to me when I grew up because he was an outsider, and because he was immune to emotional abuse. Honestly, my read is that he's asexual except when the mating urge overcomes him. My impression was always that Vulcans had no sexuality outside procreation. Spock is half human and even he doesn't express sexual interest most of the time. So, this attempt to portray a hyper-sexed, relationship-oriented Spock is a complete betrayal of, not only Spock, but the whole of Vulcan society. (by the way, the stress in inexorable is on the second syllable). Thank you for this really thoughtful video.

[@liessynchro5780]

THANK YOU for putting into words my uneasiness regarding SNW Spock's romantic inclinations and just how un-vulcan it feels. Even if they were going to do a more feely Spock before clamping down on his vulcan logic way of doing things, there was a whole new way they could have done it without having having women being thrown to him left and right. They even forgot about vulcan's sensitive hands (nvm the fatc that any kissing done by Spock and T'Pring should have be the standard fingers touching) I could go on off a rant on how they could have done T'Pring and Spock's "romantic" relationship while still being very vulcan and respecting the whole incident of Amok Time by giving it depth without it feeling like a goddam telenovela. And Chapel... my girl deserves better than whatever they are doing to her and pushing the spock/chapel "romance". The whole thing feels illogical and contrarian to Spock as a character.... and I went off on a rant, but yeah, Spock's "queer" (regardles of romantic and sexual orientation) storytelling is getting erased for as you say a male fantasy storytelling.

[@eatsteas]

wow this pretty much captures my feelings on snw spock. amok time is one of the best tos episodes and i feel like what snw is doing is retroactively making that story less impactful. the way i see it, if they changed snw spock's name and said he's a new character there wouldn't be a difference. he just doesn't feel like spock to me and a big part of it is because it seems all they do is push him into romantic storylines with women. tos did their spock romance plotlines too of course but since these new spocks aren't as queercoded anymore it feels different

[@dideyeask4084]

OMG YES‼️‼️PLLEEASE IM SO UPSET 😭 thank you fr though you pointed out all my problems with snw and more so fr ty ty. i can only hope the writers are subscribed to you lol

[@Angie-Way]

Also re:editing Ren; while I personally believe you're right to be pissed off when there is clearly a lack of respect for the existing character in the writers room - I also think that you worded your script very well and put forward a lot of valid arguments that also had nothing to do with sexuality. You did good with this video

[@Tyr666Thor]

haven't watched the video yet (I agree with re Spock being queer by the by) but one thing that annoys me about the people to claim there is no or weak evidence for spock being gay in the original series is, like, there is also not much evidence for spock being hetero. It gets "picked" by people because it is the default. i think a reading of TOS without the assumption that heterosexuality is the default would come down on Spock being bi or get.

[@RenTheBarbarian]

To me everyone (in fiction) is bi until proven otherwise. I do think Spock is gay and aspec though.

[@jamessatter7418]

I completely agree with your take on Spock being queer coded in Amok Time, among other episodes.

[@AkaiNabi]

I. I'm crying because you're giving word for what I'm scared for. And that's pretty much confirmed after seeing the 1st ep of s2. My hubby, who's tired of my obsession of spirk (poor him 😂) , sees the ship as obvious. I'm just sad and disheartened. Spock alternate with Uhura i could tolerate, but snw's Spock just breaks my heart. And the thing of him and T'Pring kissing in public right of the bat like that? Seemed so occ that i yelled at my screen. I've no hope anymore for this show. I do hope I'm proven wrong.

[@jamessatter7418]

I love your take on modern Spock being a straight male fantasy! Again. Brilliant!

[@RukminiDMaria108]

Yes! Thank you! All Spirk all the time!

[@subscorpion9560]

Yea I’m not too fond of SNW Spock. In fact I’m not too fond of SNW in general. I liked the gorn episodes but I like to imagine those as a sub-species of gorn, not the intelligent bruisers or the real series.

[@andrewwilliams9599]

Yeah, I have issues with turning the Gorn into being more the Aliens in the alien series. It feels forced.

[@Majesticmanatee217]

I want to send this to the SNW writers…

[@RenTheBarbarian]

SNW, stop trying to make Spapel happen. It’s not going to happen.

[@Angie-Way]

SAY IT LOUDER FOR THE PEOPLE IN THE BACK! As someone who truly didn't understand why they made SNW Spock so... blade... it never occurred to me that he was a male fantasy and it was all projection. Whenever I watch SNW I'm like, did they watch a different show to me when they were watching TOS? It's not just Spock, but he sure is the worst offender. You've worded everything so succinctly; I always felt a bit silly when I'd mention how I didn't like Blade's relationship with T'Pring, especially when people just assume i'm mad cause he's not GayAce (my headcanon, but i truly don't care whether canon acknowledges that or not, as long as they don't do something wildly out of character like idk, say being enthusiastically attracted to women and f*cking constantly, oh wait...); but it really is just the deep disrespect for canon, both timelines, existing stories, and something so deep and ingrained like who the character is at their core.

[@lxvenderjewel]

saw this is my recommended and had to pause everything to watch it edit: so i watched this again bc i loved it so much and i have things to say about it, everything in this video was really well said and it's the reason i'm so hesitant to watch the 2009 trek movies and snw. from the bits and pieces that i've seen it really just doesn't seem like the same spock that's in tos. also, the continuity glitch with spock being the extra-mega-double-triple-straight guy who gets all the women in snw to the awkward, nerdy guy who gets uncomfortable around romance and literally has to get zooted out on drugs to even think about actually dating a woman in tos is so jarring it's like ??? i genuinely didn't know snw was supposed to be in the tos-verse until i looked it up. anyways thanks for this amazing video

[@lxvenderjewel]

i also want you to know that i listen to this like music

[@andrewwilliams9599]

As someone who used to be a socially awkward, nerdy little straight boy, who became a somewhat less awkward but still basically nerdy straight man, I have some agreement with you. The K/S story has been around as long as the original Trek. But let me give a different perspective, which may or may not be as valid. I see in Spock the struggle to be an individual, neither exclusively human nor totally Vulcan. He represents for me this quote from e.e..cummings: "To be nobody-but-yourself - in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else - means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting." Ethan Peck makes that struggle real to me, and believable. So I could care less whether he is straight, gay, bi or trans. Untimately, he is a nonesuch, a rara avis. He is Spock. He represents the triumph of individuality over conformity. And to a 14 year old Andrew Williams, who felt like a stranger in a strange land, he was a desperately needed role model, because I already knew that insidious pressure to make me like everybody else. And if society had succeeded, I would have not have written any of this.

[@aestheticlyplaying]

Idk how but i am crying rn. I can say i am emotionally compromised by this video. I thank you so much for this. You are totally correct and i agree with tou by my heart. No, you didn't sound like that, you just sounded confident. Lots of love from me!!! ❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤

[@mystupidlife123]

3:50 yes!! Also spot on with ineffable husbands for gay and ace aren't mutually exclusive in my humble opinion.

[@peggychase586]

I absolutely love your take on Star Trek, Watched your Trek reviews.👏👏💖💖 I found your argument that Spock is gay valid. You didn't seem "preachy" but passionate. The argument presented and you like the best damn defense attorney provided valid proof. I don't like SNW i find it kinda flat there is no chemistry there, maybe they are afraid Yeah good news on the job good luck!! It will consume you it will, real life is like that....Spock is gay the real question is he a top or bottom? Cause he definitely is in love with Jim.

[@plantcat6036]

aw, I hope you don't still feel as though this video is bad! I agree with everything you said here and many others share the same feelings of disappointment of spock being pushed as straight. this leads into the female characters, especially chapel, being one-dimensional love interests for him as you said as well. spock means so much to so many and it would be wonderful to get his queerness acknowledged, because that reading is such an integral part of star trek's and fandom history. it would be interesting to hear what you thought of the 2nd season. I thought it was a lot weaker than season 1, and so many episodes could have been written a different way for a stronger message.

[@yoshifan4569]

Wait Wait They made two vulcans kiss? In public? With their mouth? That's not even vulcan? Who, how, what?!

[@kaysanimalsqaud9424]

I'm straight and love star trek but I ship spock n Kirk and so i agree with you on this cause i think even tho its not canon its true.

[@jamessatter7418]

I noticed that you explained This Side of Paradise as Spock being under the influence. What about All Our Yesterdays? Would you say that his feelings toward the woman in that episode were due to the emotional effects of being back in time?

[@RenTheBarbarian]

That episode is a weird one. I always chalked it up to the time travel shenanigans screwing with Spock’s biology, likely even pushing him into an early Pon Farr (which explains not only the horny but the aggression towards McCoy), similar to what happened to him on the Genesis planet in Star Trek III. (Maybe it’s just my shipper goggles but I imagine if Jim had been present, Spock wouldn’t have paid Zarabeth much attention 😂)

[@Slashygirl66]

Someone sent me this video so I didn't feel so alone. I liked Spock in Discovery he felt more like the Spock we recognized going through stuff. But, when I saw the episode in SNW with T'Pring I didn't recognize him. The scenes between them made me cringe. This can't be happening!! Even the parted from me speech had no depth or meaning behind it and they said it so fast. The kissing in public was so shocking, where was the finger touching? The scenes where they were in bed together made me scream and top it all off T'Pring calls Captain Pike by his first name!! They looked like a bunch of teenagers making out. T'Pring is a full Vulcan so I was expecting better behavior on her part. Now, in season 2, we have Chapel. I've only seen bits and pieces of episode 1 and I'm already sad beyond words. Thank you for your video, I'm glad I'm not the only one that sees this travesty before us.

[@yoshifan4569]

This is gonna be my third comment, so sorry for the spam, but I just wanted to say I really enjoyed this video. You may think it is less than you others, but I was having a great time and it made me think about stuff (and write an essay about that stuff, sorry for that) and giggle sometimes because I really love your humor! (Also I read your novel and the humor in that was top notch. Just👌. Jeff Bezos being in a sidenote sentence was genius, I laughed so hard at that and then tried to explain it to my mother and that failed but that's okay because she doesn't understand the internet and you do and that's why I like you and your book so much😊)

[@RenTheBarbarian]

You are so sweet!!! Thank you so much [hugs you]

[@haze-the-alt]

Hell yeah gay and asexual just like me!

[@TerraSapien]

Thank you for saying it! It’s so awkward how transparently they try to force newer Spocks to be uber-straight and aggressively erase the history of Spirk and Spock’s queerness. It is so out of place for the character that it’s jarring to watch. Like, I get it, y’all don’t have the courage to legacy characters and heroes gay, even when the chemistry and writing and fandom all overwhelmingly indicate it. (I was so glad to see you make that point here - the distinction about how they’ll only create new characters to be gay, but all of our old heroes and legacy characters have to be palatable to “straight alpha males” even though neither Kirk nor Spock were written as “alpha males” with toxic masculinity, they were so different from that and that was a lot of what made them such great characters and moral examples to people of all genders. Spock and Kirk were in love and deeply sexually attracted to each other and idgaf what they wanna shoehorn in. I still hope they’ll find a way to get some courage in SNW, they COULD actually canonize Spirk. Those two could meet, have an immediate attraction, even have encounters or a relationship, and then we could deal with them coming to an understanding that it couldn’t continue when Kirk becomes Captain. Viola, then we have the backstory for their extraordinary chemistry, why they stare at each other with heart eyes for all of TOS and risk their lives and careers, we have the understanding that they never stopped loving each other (or being attracted to each other) but our duty first. And we can even fill in a little behind-the-scenes to imagine throughout the 5 year voyage there were times they were on again off again, fluctuating between duty and trying to make it work, or just momentary weakness for each other. This’ll be my headcanon I guess. When I rewatch TOS, I can almost SEE Kirk self-soothing with these random women after once again, for instance, having Spock end their romantic relationship over concerns about duty.

[@nojdepa7850]

As a very tired and disappointed gay man: Thank You for this

[@Asher8328]

I don't agree with TOS Spock being gay but you're certainly entitled to your opinion. Your argument was fine although I would say you dismissed the whole relationship with Leila Kalomi in a way I can't agree with. Anyway, I don't want to debate that, just to say that your video reminded me a lot of the Red Letter Media review of the first JJ Abrams movie where they explained the inexplicable Spock/Uhura pairing in a similar way.... more or less saying that people who know nothing about Trek might see Spock and think he's gay, and so they threw him in a relationship with a woman to keep the homophobes at bay.

[@DieVorleserin-ok8zr]

I am so glad this video extists, Straight Spock is haunting my dreams... Though I will say that personally, I definitely see him somewhere on the ace-spectrum since he never quite expresses interest in sexuality and the whole point of "Amok Time" was, in a way, that he didn't have to have sex to survive. Personally, I headcanon him as demisexual sometimes where he feels sexual attraction towards Kirk because of their deep, deeeeeep emotional connection, but that's up for debate.

[@anjar6483]

I was immediately concerned when all the Spock moments in the SNW trailer involved him kissing women. Even if you don't think Spock is gay (though i personally think he is), he is never shown to enjoy kissing or enjoying being touched much at all. It just doesn't make sense to suddenly have him be a physically affectionate person.

[@RenTheBarbarian]

@@anjar6483 Exactly! It’s not just that he’s straight, he’s out of character!!!

[@ThatNB1]

My pansexuality is the sun, my asexuality is the moon, my ignorance is the void.

[@elim_inator]

While I do generally enjoy SNW, how they treat Spock and his relationships just makes me angry. I read TOS Spock as gay ace (because I can relate to him so much and I am gay ace myself), and they just... did the exact opposite. I mean I guess I could be fine with that if it was more toned down and we didn't get those Spock/T'Pring sex scenes and Spock/Chapel passionate kissing scenes, but the way it is, it's just uncomfortable.

[@RenTheBarbarian]

It’s like they’re making a point of how not gay and not ace he is. This show’s writers hate its queer fans I guess

[@elim_inator]

@@RenTheBarbarian I don't think they hate their queer fans, I think it's rather indifference. It's quite jarring in this age of Star Trek to have a show with no explicit queer rep among the main cast. Sure, Chapel *says* she's bi, but we never get to *see* any of that. Uhura's actor is nonbinary, but that's not reflected in her character. Every relationship involving a protagonist we've seen so far has been a straight one. Well, maybe they do hate their queer fans after all.

[@RenTheBarbarian]

@@elim_inator Disco, Picard, and Lower Decks have all had prominent representation. Even Prodigy has Zero, a non-binary character. It makes SNW stick out like a sore thumb.

[@elim_inator]

@@RenTheBarbarian Exactly. And I refuse to believe that it's a total coincidence that SNW is also the show that was at least partly created on the premise of being a return to classic Trek, with the episodic storytelling and all. If one were cynical, one might say that they relegated the queer stuff to "blink and you'll miss it" kind of scenes so fans of the old stuff who's politics are also stuck in the past will not be too put off by it.

[@RenTheBarbarian]

@@elim_inator You hit the nail right on the head. It’s modern Trek for people who hate modern Trek (i.e. diversity and representation of the marginalized).

[@coolcucumber372]

This is why I’m not watching SNW

[@RenTheBarbarian]

When they turned the Gorn from a sentient intelligent race into generic horror movie monsters and also killed off the only physically disabled character, I almost ragequit right then

[@coolcucumber372]

@@RenTheBarbarian Gene Roddenberry actually wanted to imply that Spock and Kirk had feelings for each other, and created T’hy’la, so the creators of Star Trek AOS and SNW giving Spock girlfriends actually doesn’t make sense for Spock, because the original Spock had no interest in women, and if there was no Spirk, there would be no fandoms/Fanfiction and it is what made Star Trek so good. (Also Leonard Nimoy played a gay character not long before playing Spock)

[@yoshifan4569]

AOS Spock is different from TOS Spock but he is still a Spock (I guess, I only read fanfics from AOS and have not seen the movies) I can immediately feel if I'm reading a TOS or AOS fic by how Spock is portrayed (usually TOS Spock has more mirth and a feeling of experience, like not that he is old but that he has been through/lived through a lot and AOS Spock is a little bit more bitter, but in a slightly petty and childish way. This is how I interpreter/how I feel when I read those fics and it's not any authors fault. And it's very subtle.) I said that AOS Spock is still A Spock and not The spock because AOS Spock is literally another version of Spock. That's why I only find it a pity he's straight because I don't ship Spuhura and not because it makes this Spock not a Spock. What I hear about SNW "Spock", however, is that he is definetely not Spock in any way shape or form. (And no, you can't say he is Spock cus he looks like him because how people look doesn't matter in Hollywood anymore apparently *cough cough Snow White*). The point with SNW Spock is however, that SNW is supposed to be in the same universe as TOS. SNW "Spock" is supposed to be TOS Spock and I think that's why this Spock being heterosexual hurts/enrages me more than AOS's heterosexual Spock. This feels, to me, much more like a redcon/denial of Spirk/Spock with queer undertones than AOS Spock and that makes me so sad. I don't want them to redcon anything regarding Spock's sexuality because I am a fervent TOS Spirk shipper, but also because I don't like the modern tendency to redcon everyting. Media is always born in the time it was born and wears the marks of that time. It is something to learn from even if its bad in today's world (like the racism in Disney) and I find it really sad and also concerning that all those companies try to pretend they have always been making stuff that applies to our society today and by doing so missing a lot of subtext and lessons to learn from for instance Star Trek/TOS. Especially if the studio thinks 'the society of today' is filled with solely white heterosexual cis men.

[@robabiera733]

Well, there was that OTHER you that popped up when you reviewed "Mirror, Mirror" . . . .

[@andrewwilliams9599]

And I gotta admit, the idea of T'Pring reading Henry Miller and Simone de Beauvoir is...intriguing.

[@FameyFamous]

How did you like Spock’s “transition” in this week’s episode?

[@RenTheBarbarian]

Two gripes: A, they made Spock, a heavily Jewish coded character, eat BACON of all things, and B, I can’t believe they straight up stole the “We Were On A Break” plot from Friends.

[@bettywing52]

After midway through SNW 2, its funny to watch this as I have given up on expecting Star Trek to be anything but entertainment. As you say, they are being seriously inclusive, and they are clueless sometimes about what they are including. Someday they may be able to break free from fan service. I enjoyed your retrospective on Amok Time and the loves of Spock.

[@meander112]

Engagement for the engagement god! Subs for the sub throne! Male wish fulfillment can DIAF.

[@TransAroPan]

I Ship McSpirk,Sulu/Scotty/Chekov,Uhura/Chapel,&,M'Rand

[@rxxn8916]

❤️

[@anaiswinter9893]

I am fine with Spock being pan/bi whatever......I just like Spock. Love his character.

[@Cdr2002]

I’m personally headcanon Spock as bi, but only to reconcile his implicit queerness with the on-screen relationships with women, small as they may be. I like the idea of giving his relationship to T’Pring or Chapel’s crush on him real depth, but I think the handling of the latter has been.l kinda messy. T’Pring imo is a great character in this show but I get how properly exploring her relationship with Spock can feel like in your face heteronormativity. I’m bi myself and have gotten frustrated with other shows for the same reasons. Spock in SNW overall I like well enough, he’s enjoyable, but something is kinda missing. It’s not so with Peck’s acting, he genuinely feels quite a bit like TOS Spock in Discovery (the show that’s more overtly queer than this, coincidentally) but with SNW in their attempts to have him explore his human side, perhaps to lead up to his ultimate choice to almost entirely reject it in early TOS before finding the balance throughout the series and into the movies, I think they ended up rendering him a little… off. As for the presentation of his sexuality, if it was presented with a mind towards his existing implicit queerness, that could at least mitigate, but sadly this show feels the most afraid to be gay if the current Trek era with Chapel’s barely featured bisexuality and Captain Angel being (so far) a one-off and clearly depicted as a mostly fem-presenting enby in love with a man, similar to TNG’s the Outcast. They know this is the one show they can drop without immediate pushback from the conservatives and gatekeepers and I honestly don’t appreciate the effort to keep those people on board.

[@RenTheBarbarian]

Exactly. When people say “SNW feels like REAL Star Trek”, what they really mean is that it’s the most conservative Star Trek of the modern age. A white man’s back in the Captain’s chair and queerness is basically non-existent. The in-your-face romances with women are a clear erasure of everything queer about Spock so that there can be no room for interpretation.

[@Cdr2002]

@@RenTheBarbarian much as I like SNW, it feels the most like a show Berman and Bragga could’ve made and I don’t mean that complimentarily. Not super jazzed about the current defacto flagship show being this way. I hope Starfleet Academy is gayer and gets treated as “the main show” by paramount since they’re finally doing an idea they’ve been toying with for thirty years and not just splitting off two characters people liked from Disco season 2.

[@jawa8472]

modern trek makes me miserable so i just dont touch it

[@RenTheBarbarian]

Lower Decks and Prodigy are actually really great. I also enjoy Discovery despite its writing issues.

[@jawa8472]

@@RenTheBarbarian I’m turned off by lower decks’ derivative art direction and fast pacing, but maybe I’ll give it a second since theres less of a chance that my soul will shatter from watching my beloved characters get turned into someones weird self insert

[@TransAroPan]

I Personally Think Spock's Panromantic,&,Gay

[@TheStarTrekApologist]

Queer Coding is not real. Hey it is a fun Fan Theory, but it is totally fake.

[@RenTheBarbarian]

I invite you to watch a documentary called “The Celluloid Closet”, which explains the concept of queercoding quite well. Or watch any of the 50,000 free video essays on YT explaining it. Filmmakers like Alfred Hitchcock and William Wyler historically have used queercoding in their filmmaking. The Wachowskis famously created The Matrix as a trans allegory. Also not all queercoding is intentional. Many of HP Lovecraft’s works have been read with a queer lens despite the author being a well known homophobe.

[@Seal0626]

@@RenTheBarbarian hear hear.

[@redblack9618]

In addition to what Ren wrote above, I would like to say much of the queercoding in Trek is explicitly intended as well; Roddenberry fought HARD to try to get queer characters, queer love, and even queer sex on-screen in TOS and TNG. Queer coding has been in Star Trek since the very beginning, and has only reduced insomuch as they've been allowed to put explicitly queer characters into the stories. As much as more conservative Trek fans mourn the increase in queer and POC representation in recent shows, they're only realizing the intent Roddenberry had from the very beginning; it's ALWAYS been a queer world with queer people and queer intent in front of and behind the scenes. Also: without Spirk "fan theories", Star Trek would have died after TOS. It is literally only the (mostly women and trans men) writers and readers of Kirk/Spock slashfic that revived the show via fan conventions that convinced anyone there was enough interest for further Trek stories. Without the queer coding, queer intent, and queer readings of Star Trek we'd have never gotten the movies or series. Put a little more gratitude in your condescension, if you don't mind.

[@TheStarTrekApologist]

So first I want to start with reminding everyone, I am not trying to be negitive to any fan theory, that Kirk and Spock are gay lovers. Just that it is a fan theory. It is true that some charcters are low key gay, but the way that Queer Coding works on the whole tends to become more of a conspericy which goes to make out any form of male bonding into Queer Code. I did watch a Video, I think it is Ren's on the subject. But the more I thought about it, the more I come to find that the underling theory is poorly thought out. I would have to make a video on that it is to hard to flesh out in a comment section. Maybe if my Quacer Productions channel ever takes off I'll start my "The File" series and talk about it. I would love to use it to debunk issues I have with both the Left and Right.

[@redblack9618]

@@TheStarTrekApologist So the entirety of the history of film is wrong, and you are correct, okay. The fact that writers specifically say they are queer coding characters, that they are openly based on queer characters in real life (for example, Ursula being based on Divine, an IRL drag queen), none of that matters - because you really sat down and gave it a think. Welcome to queerphobia. This quality of analysis is likely the cause for you having a bunch of videos that literally no one watches, friend. I try really hard not to be too mean but what you're saying is not earning you the benefit of the doubt. Go sit down and listen to the decades and decades of very very very thoughtful people who have made their entire lives the study of queer readings of film.