Strange New Worlds made Star Trek history with very little fanfare

[Ed. note: This post contains material from an interview conducted before the SAG-AFTRA strike against the AMPTP went into effect.]

In the closing scene of Thursday’s new episode of Star Trek: Strange New WorldsStarfleet officers gather in the USS Enterprise mess hall to discuss the latest events. In the midst of an otherwise unremarkable conversation, Ensign Nyota, (Celia Rose Gooding), takes some time to introduce Lieutenant Spock, (Ethan Peck) to her new friend Lieutenant Commander James T. Kirk. It’s an entirely casual encounter, far from the monumental event that one might imagine from the first meeting of two people with a lifelong friendship ahead of them.

It may not be the case that this is what you are trying to say. These new versions of Kirk and Spock have been on since they debuted. Strange New WorldsYou can also find out more about the following: Star Trek: Discovery, respectively, they have been permitted to establish themselves as individual characters, complete people rather than components of some prophesied “one true pairing.” By denying Kirk and Spock the expected cosmic meet-cute, viewers can be treated to something far more satisfying: organic growth befitting a real, lasting relationship.

Star Trek’s canon never specified when and how Kirk met Spock, but the idea to spin their first meeting into a great adventure was always a hit. Two licensed novels have been inspired by the idea.The First Adventure of EnterpriseVonda McN. McIntyre, 1986 Star Trek: Academy: Collision CourseWilliam Shatner and Judith Reeves Stevens, in 2007, but it was more notably the center of the 2009 reboot film set in a different timeline. Here, the rebellious young Cadet Kirk (Chris Pine) is caught cheating at a Starfleet Academy exam, which puts him at odds with the exam’s designer, Commander Spock (Zachary Quinto).

They immediately became enemies, up until the alternate Kirk had a chance to meet with this. The classicsLeonard Nimoy is the actor who plays Spock. Kirk is baffled that any version of his rival would be so happy to see him, but Spock Prime assures him that the friendship between them will come to “define [them] both.” With that, Kirk’s attitude toward his own timeline’s Spock changes on a dime, granting their interactions an immediate gravity but robbing us the chance to actually see them become friends. It is. You can tell them by clicking on the link Kirk and Spock have a special friendship, which we all accept because nearly everyone who watches the show knows.

Where 2009’s Star Trek frames Kirk and Spock’s early lives as a mere prelude to their shared destiny, the modern Trek series have never treated them as a matched set. Spock’s reintroduction was as the foil of a completely different character, his foster sister Commander Michael Burnham, played by Sonequa Martin-Green. Star Trek: Discovery. We first meet Ethan Peck’s Spock in the midst of an emotional crisis, sporting a scruffy beard and a bad attitude. Spock’s story here is about the origins of his rejection of human feeling, here explained as a consequence of his fraught relationship with his human foster sister.

“My onboarding has been much longer,” says Peck, “and I’ve had a lot more time to develop my character than Paul has. I have the luxury of this very established inner world with Spock.”

Discovery’s only allusion to Spock’s future comes in Michael’s final words of advice before she is propelled a millennium into the future, never to see him again: “There is a whole galaxy out there full of people who will reach for you. It’s up to you. Reach out to the person you feel is farthest away. Let them guide you.”

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Marni Grossman/Paramount Plus

At the time, this felt like it foreshadowed Spock’s future friendship with the all-too-human Kirk. After a year and a quarter of Strange New Worlds, it feels as if Spock has already let Michael’s words resonate in his daily life. He has a human mentor in Captain Christopher Pike (Anson Mount), and is currently exploring a romantic relationship with Nurse Christine Chapel (Jess Bush), who’s even more of a rambunctious wild card than Kirk. We’ve now seen Spock wrestle with his emotions, deconstruct the human/Vulcan binary, and try his hand at starship command before sci-fi’s favorite Iowan even enters his life. He’s already a complete and compelling character in his own right, and his role on this series is distinct from the one Leonard Nimoy’s version performed on Original Series.

Similarly, Strange New WorldsJim Kirk’s future partner and recurring Guest Star Jim Kirk have deliberately been kept apart. Two of Paul Wesley’s four appearances on Strange New WorldsSpock has not met him in parallel universes. His first appearance, the season 1 finale “A Quality of Mercy,” is designed to contrast an alternate Kirk against Captain Pike, not against Spock (though they do share a scene together). It’s an introduction to Kirk as an agitator, someone whose guiding star is instinct, versus Pike’s empathy. His next appearance explores him as a romantic foil to Lieutenant Commander La’an Noonien Singh (Christina Chong). Kirk as the charmer and flirt, this is Kirk’s side. This Kirk also has a short meeting with an alternate Spock via videoconference, another subtle hint towards the meeting of two versions of themselves.

“Ethan and I didn’t chemistry-read together,” reveals Wesley, “which is kind of surprising. “I think [the writers] are just allowing it to grow naturally, and just trusting the process.”

Finally, in this week’s “Lost in Translation,” it’s Uhura, not Spock, with whom the “real” Kirk bonds aboard the Enterprise. It’s through Uhura that we finally get to know what makes Jim tick, as the ever-curious communicator coaxes out the earnest, selfless side of him that will one day make him a great captain. Their small misadventure together leads Uhura to introduce him to Spock in the ship’s mess hall, with no intent behind the gesture aside from basic politeness.

Marni Grossman/Paramount Plus

Photo: Michael Gibson/Paramount Plus

“Paul and I have talked a lot about their first meeting,” says Peck, “and for Spock, Kirk is just another Starfleet officer.”

“I think a lot of times in life, we do things without thinking about them,” says Wesley. “I think a lot of times, our instincts draw us to people when we’re missing something that we think the other person can fulfill, but it’s super subconscious.”

While this quite incidental first meeting between Star Trek’s most famous duo might seem like a missed opportunity, the truth is that the narrative did not need to make Kirk and Spock’s handshake into an important event — we, the fans, were always going to do that. Due to the 55 years of baggage from real life, profundity has been baked into every aspect of this picture. The storytellers instead of Strange New Worlds have done us a far greater service — making Kirk and Spock interesting enough separately that connecting them feels like a piece of their journey, rather than the beginning or the end.