TOS season 3: subtext becomes text (part 2)
Continuation from this other post: https://www.tumblr.com/electronickingdomfox/705554052352770048/tos-season-3-subtext-becomes-text-part-1
Plato’s Stepchildren
This episode is kinky, in general, though I don’t think there’s much K/S in it. It contains, however, the first appearance of Shakepeare’s homoerotic sonnets in relation to Kirk.
He’s forced to recite Sonnet LVII while crawling on the floor towards the Platonian lord: Parmen.
The sonnet in question deals with the poet’s “slavery” under the love demands of a younger man. This is the full text (Kirk only recites up to fourth line, before being interrupted by McCoy):
Being your slave, what should I do but tend
Upon the hours and times of your desire?
I have no precious time at all to spend,
Nor services to do, till you require.
Nor dare I chide the world-without-end hour
Whilst I, my sovereign, watch the clock for you.
Nor think the bitterness of absence sour
When you have bid your servant once adieu;
Nor dare I question with my jealous thought
Where you may be, or your affairs suppose,
But like a sad slave, stay and think of nought,
Save, where you are how happy you make those.
So true a fool is love that in your will
Though you do anything, he thinks no ill.
The sonnet was probably chosen because of its relation to slavery. But it’s an interesting choice nonetheless...
Wink of an Eye
Yet another episode in which Kirk is forced into a relationship with a woman, or isn’t really able to consent.
I read somewhere that Fred Freiberger, producer of season 3 in place of Roddenberry, wanted more romance in the series. Though I can’t locate the exact source, so take it with a grain of salt.
But anyway, there’s indeed quite a lot of love stories here, for several characters: Chekov (Spectre of the Gun), McCoy ( For the World Is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky), Scotty (The Lights of Zetar) and even a brief scene for Spock in The Cloud Minders (I’m not counting episodes in which Spock was just acting, or not being truly himself). For some of these characters, it’d be the first time they have a genuine romance in the series.
Did this mean more female love interests for Kirk as well? You know, since he’s supposed to be “space Casanova” according to some fans?
Well, not really. There’s Rayna, of course. But season 1 alone had both Ruth and Edith.
What happened instead was a dramatic increase of episodes in which Kirk is forced, or otherwise manipulated, into a relationship with a woman. So far, we’ve seen a marriage while under amnesia in The Paradise Syndrome, a forced kiss in Plato’s Stepchildren, and now a kidnapping in this episode. And we’re not even done yet: there’s still the love potion of Elaan of Troyius, Marta’s assault in Whom Gods Destroy, and a semi-forced situation in The Mark of Gideon.
To compare, there were only two episodes in the previous seasons, all together, in which I’d classify the “romance” as forced: Dagger of the Mind and A Private Little War.
What it’s interesting in this episode, in terms of Kirk/Spock, is the following scene:
Queen Deela links Kirk’s interest in Spock with “affection”. Affection, of course, can be just friendly affection... But this is not what she’s thinking about.
For starters, she wants a demonstration of such affection, and it’s not friendship what she’s looking for. Deela’s interest in Kirk is explicitly sexual in nature (she needs him to beget children). And then there’s, of course, her lover Rael’s jealous reaction.
Moreover, this isn’t the last time a telepathic being reads into Kirk or Spock’s minds, and finds love in there. Because after this episode comes...
The Empath
A really lovely, heartwarming scene, in an otherwise dark episode filled with torture.
Spock is looking at Kirk, while he rests after being tormented by their alien captors.
This attracts immediately the attention of Gem, the empathic woman who can sense other people’s feelings, and she turns towards Spock.
Finding himself under surveillance, Spock quickly averts his eyes, but Gem approaches him and touches his shoulder, to better feel his emotions.
And whatever she feels, it must be something really beautiful, since she makes this expression (coupled with sweet music in the background):
Gem can’t talk, but her face says it all. There’s also no dialogue in this scene, and yet it’s everything in the script.
Could be friendship or loyalty what she’s sensing there? Could be... But Gem has been around Kirk, Spock and McCoy for a while at this point. Those kind of feelings shouldn’t surprise her anymore. Moreover, McCoy is right there, and he’s about to sacrifice himself for his friends. Yet she doesn’t turn towards McCoy.
She must have sensed something new in Spock, a feeling she probably didn’t know till now. And I think it’s love.
Whom Gods Destroy
The second appearance of Shakepeare’s homoerotic sonnets, though this time, its relation with Kirk is weaker.
It’s actually Marta who starts reciting sonnet XVIII, till the fourth line. This is the full text:
Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date;
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm'd;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st;
Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.
She’s interrupted, but then turns to Kirk and asks him how he liked it:
Yeah, she knows you’re into this stuff, Kirk. Deela knew, Gem knew, and now Marta knows too. These guys are so obvious... They’re not fooling the ladies.
Requiem for Methuselah
And speaking of obvious, this episode is as subtle as a brick through a window (“como un elefante en una cacharrería”, as I’d say in my own language).
First there’s Kirk falling in love at first sight with an android woman, who talks about sciency stuff just like Spock, and also has problems dealing with her emotions (for another example of parallels between Spock and an android struggling with emotions, see Star Trek: The Motion Picture).
And of course, there’s the final scene:
MCCOY: Well, I guess that's all. I can tell Jim later or you can. Considering his opponent's longevity, truly an eternal triangle. You wouldn't understand that, would you, Spock? You see, I feel sorrier for you than I do for him because you'll never know the things that love can drive a man to. The ecstasies, the miseries, the broken rules, the desperate chances, the glorious failures, the glorious victories. All of these things you'll never know simply because the word love isn't written into your book. Goodnight, Spock.
SPOCK: Goodnight, Doctor.
MCCOY: I do wish he could forget her.
McCoy accuses Spock of being unable to feel love (specifically romantic love, since that’s what Kirk felt for Rayna). What does Spock do once McCoy leaves?
Exactly. He mind-melds with a sleeping Kirk and makes him forget Rayna (coupled with romantic music in the background).
Now, if it wasn’t for McCoy’s speech, we could assume that Spock was just trying to help his Captain, even if using some unorthodox methods. But McCoy’s speech changes everything.
He just told the viewer that Spock is unable to feel something like romantic love. Those were harsh words. And now Spock proves to the viewer that McCoy is wrong, that he can, indeed, feel love.
Again, it’s all in the script. It’s so obvious, that even people you wouldn’t usually link with K/S shipping seem to have got it. For example, this is what Marcy Lafferty (married to Shatner from 1973 to 1996) said about it in an interview (Shatner: where no man..., 1979) :
Turnabout Intruder
The final episode of TOS, and written by Roddenberry himself. Since it was the final episode (and probably everyone knew it at the time), it should have some grand plot, right? Something really glorious, and heroic, and epic. Maybe the Enterprise finally defeats the Klingons and Romulans, and achieves inter-planetary peace or something.
Actually, the production team called this episode.........
Captain Kirk: Space Queen.
Fuck yeah.
Of course, the plot revolves around Kirk switching bodies with a crazed ex-girlfriend, who then proceeds to take hold of the Enterprise.
But I wonder if, at some level, it was really about Shatner playing a woman inside a man’s body, or instead, playing a flamboyantly gay Kirk right under our noses. Specially since, while filming this episode, he changed a line out of nowhere to say “Spock, it’s always been you. Please say you love me too”.
Was this finale a way for Roddenberry to give the middle-finger to the network that killed his show? Hard to know, and pure speculation on my part. But fun speculation nonetheless.
At the story level, there’s the scene where Kirk, inside Janice’s body, says that Spock is closer to the Captain than ANYBODY ELSE IN THE ENTIRE FREAKING UNIVERSE.
And then Spock mind-melds with him. He didn’t make any mind-link with Kirk in previous seasons, but this is the fourth episode in which he melds with him in season 3. He got kind of an addiction to it.
There’s also the moment where Spock leads Kirk, taking him by the wrist.
The effect of all this is kind of mitigated by the fact that Kirk occupies a female body at the moment. So even if, for story purposes, is a rather gay scene, the 60′s viewer is still seeing an actor having a tender moment with an actress (which would be nothing new).
But there’s the other side, as well:
Yeah, it’s actually Janice but, from the audience point of view, what we’re seeing here is the Captain Kirk that we got used to for 79 episodes. Getting all lovey-dovey with a man (unfortunately not Spock), and seducing him to kill for his sake. Also, the guy doesn’t seem to mind much that Janice has turned into this hunk of a man. He’s only concerned because of the murderous plan.
Now think, was it really necessary to make Janice’s accomplice her lover as well? She already had a love interest in Kirk, and in the episode’s beginning, she was complaining about how lonely she felt.
Well, that’s all I have to say about this subject for TOS season 3 (which was a lot). If you’ve made it through all this text, thank you very much. And I’d be glad to hear your opinions.
270 notes
·
View notes