Star Trek: Strange New Worlds. Is Scotty in love with Captain Kirk? Is Spock in love with everybody? Will Patton Oswalt take his shirt off? With Chace and Atticus d*cks

 

Link to the n*de dudes

I grew up with Star Trek: 

Reruns of the original series (1966-69), with Captain James T. Kirk (William Shatner) fighting Klingons, taking off his shirt, and kissing alien babes

The Next Generation (1987-94), with Wesley Crusher (Wil Wheaton) as a far-future teen idol and the Borg saying "You will be assimilated."

Deep Space Nine (1993-1999), with a Ferengi named Nog (Aron Eisenberg) buddy-bonding with the captain's son. 

Voyager  (1995-2001),  where Captain Janeway, her crew, and the rebels they are fighting are zapped to the other side of the galaxy.

There were no gay characters in the far-future utopia, but there were few or no gay characters anywhere on tv, so we didn't really notice.

We have long known that the original Star Trek pilot had Captain Christopher Pike (Jeffrey Hunter) insteaed of Kirk and a female first officer named Number One.  In "The Menagerie" (Episode 1.15), they were retconned as the crew of the Enterprise before Kirk took over.  

Fast forward a lot of years, and Star Trek: Strange New Worlds (2022-) features the voyages of the Enterprise under Captain Pike (Anson Mount, left), with younger versions of familiar characters Scotty, Uhuru, Nurse Chapel,  Spock, and even James T. Kirk (serving on another ship).  And in the 2020s, there's bound to be some gay representation.

I reviewed Episode 3.8, "Four and a Half Vulcans," because I figured that gay characters would be trotted out late in the series, and because a guest star is Patton Oswalt, whom I have a crush on (he's chubby and 5'3", sigh). 

Scene 1: The Enterprise heads to Purmantee III for three days of shore leave, but Number One  plans to stay behind to do work. La'an thinks that she is avoiding an old boyfriend there.  Spock asks to join them, but La'an shoos him away; they're dating, but "it's weird." 

Remember when the original Enterprise took shore leave on a planet where anything you think of appears?  (I'll take me, Adam Devine, and Patton Oswalt on a tour of the Musee d'Orsay on Christmas Eve.) The aliens who built it didn't realize that some species can't control their thoughts, but after some mishaps they make the necessary adjustments.

Cut to Captain Pike practicing defensive moves with his girlfriend.  She is so aggressive that he wonders if she is angry with him, but no, she was mad before because of "you know what you did," but she's fine now.  Just, when they get to the shore leave planet, could they stay in a nice hotel instead of camping?

Scene 2: The heterosexualizing is interrupted by an urgent message from the Vulcan High Command.  The Planet Tezaar does not yet have warp drive, so the Prime Directive states "no contact."  But the Vulcans made contact before the Prime Directive was instituted, and gifted them with a nuclear power grid.  Now the grid has to be fixed, or the planet will suffer a nuclear meltdown.  The Vulcans are too far away to do it, so it's up to the Enterprise crew.

I can't wait to see the planet.  Remember when the original Enterprise visited a planet immersed in 1930s gangster culture? Or Halloween ghosts and witches?

But they can't just disguise themselves as Vulcans.  For reasons, they have to become Vulcans, with the appropriate DNA.  200 years of advanced genetic technology says that it's impossible, but Nurse Chapel jury-rigs somethng in 20 minutes. 

Scene 3: Pike and four ladies are transformed. Hey, no fair!  The old Star Trek always had cute guys in red uniforms going along. 

 The DNA-changing serum doesn't work on  Airhead Hippie (Carol Kane) -- LSD doesn't either.  Spock (Ethan Peck, left) offers to go in her place, but no, "You're only half-Vulcan."

Excluded from the party, he seethes with hurt feelings.

Scene 4:  They relent and allow Spock to come along, but he has to carry all of their stuff.  So Pike and company are racists?  They don't like "half-breeds"?

Back on the Enterprise, the Bridge Crew (which consists entirely of women) is shocked when the away team enters the structure immediately and repairs the grid in a few seconds -- they thought it would take hours.  Me, too.  I was expecting Tezaan culture, some misunderstandings, maybe some arrests, like we saw on the old Star Trek all the time.  We didn't even see the planet's surface!

They beam up.  At least there are two guys in the transporter room! The one on the left is Doctor M'Benga (Babs Olusanmokun), who according to the Star Trek wiki has four ex-wives, and the other may be Scotty, the future ship's engineer  -- pushing 60 when he's in James Kirk's crew a few years later, but here played by 30 year old Martin Quinn. 

I can't tell if Martin Quinn is gay in real life or not: he does comedy povs where he's gay, but some where he's straight.  Who cares?  At least he and M'Benga bring some testosterone to this episode of Girls Gone Wild: Outer Space.

Uh-oh, the away team can't turn back to human!  Something went wrong with Nurse Chapel's serum!  I saw that one coming a mile away.

Spock is noticeably upset, envisioning a future of racial harassment and discrimination.  

Scene 5: They are examined by the doctor. Nurse Chapel suggests that when she spent 20 minutes developing the serum, she was a stupid human and made a mistake, but now that she is a far superior Vulcan, she'll be able to fix it and make them human again.

Spock suggests that the others be quarantined until the cure is developed, as being Vulcan will play havoc with their personal relationships, but they disagree: as far superior Vulcans, they'll be much better at being friends and lovers. 

The doctor say ok, but no shore leave.

More after the break.

I'll separate the next scenes by relationship:

Beto and Uhura

Beto (Mynor Luken), a filmmaker doing a documentary on the Enterprise, asked Communications Officer Uhura for a date, but then forgot to make plans.  As a Vulcan, she concludes that he's just not into her.  "No, I'm into you, just stupid."

"Fine, then let's work on the real problem at the heart of our potential relationship.  Are you willing to make the necessary adjustment?'  Does she want to give him a bigger d*ck?  No, she just forces him to meditate and take showers, which he hates, and give up meat, which he loves.

His butch lesbian sister yells that Uhura has "brainwashed him into a Vulcan lapdog."  It's differences, not similarities, that make relationships interesting! 

Pike and His Girlfriend

In their quarters, Pike criticizes his girlfriend's housekeeping skills. (Don't you have like droids to do that?), cooking ability, and smell (humans smell awful to Vulcans).  The Admiral is visiting, and she is going to ask him for a promotion, but with Pike fussing about like Felix Ungar, he'll ruin her chances. 

Nonsense, Pike assures her, the Admiral is a Vulcan, too, so he'll be able to make a logical argument for her promotion. But even though Pike serves a nice leek sorbet, the Admiral decides that the girlfriend has not yet recovered from the injuries of an earlier episode.  

Nurse Chapel and Everybody

In sick bay, Nurse Chapel is working on the serum to turn the Vulcans back to humans, plus five other experiments -- she has a lot more brain power as a Vulcan, so she can get things done.  In fact, she's going to give up the time-wasting habits of sleep and relationships.  She breaks up with her boyfriend Dr. Korby (Cilian O'Sullivan), her ex-boyfriend Spock, and all of her platonic friends. 

Jim Kirk and La'an

Scotty beams up Jim Kirk (Paul Wesley), the first officer on the U.S.S. Farragut and future Enterprise Captain, and calls him Lt. Kirk.

"You saved my a*ss the last time we saw each other, so call me Jim." 

He came to see his brother, who has already gone down for shore leave, so he asks Scotty to have a drink with him instead.

Star-struck, gazing with sultry intensity, Scotty squeals "Wow, I'd love to!  Um...I mean sure, I gues that would be ok."  

"And invite La'an."

Scotty's face falls.  I get you, dude: that happened to me all the time in high school.  I'd ask a cute boy out, and he'd say "Sure...what girls are we going with?"  Why does every night out need girls?  Why can't it be two guys? 

At the dinner, the Vulcanized La'an complains that there's so much unclaimed space in the universe.  Why doesn't the Federation just claim it all, creating the biggest empire in the history of the galaxy?

"But won't other species want some of the space?"

"If they do, we'll just destroy them."

She steals Scotty's PADD, downloads the security codes, and complains to the guys that the Enterprise does not have enough weapons to take over the galaxy.  But she can fix that, with their help.

More Plot Complications:  The commanding officers decide that they will stay Vulcan forever, and start making draconian changes, like no chairs in the meeting rooms, and 42-minute rotations instead of day and night.

The friends and loved ones meet in the Hippie's off-the-grid quarters to strategize.  The Vulcanized cerw can't be relieved of duty, since there is technically nothing wrong with them.  They can't be forced to take the antidote. The only hope is to delve into their katras, their inner selves that are still human.

Doug:  Number One's ex-boyfriend, the Vulcan Doug ("my parents were drawn to human names"), played by Patton Oswalt, is a katra expert, so she invites him onto the Enterprise.  Problem: every time she sees him, she dissolves into a slurry of romantic desire.  She tries to distract herself by claiming that she and Spock are married, and he is actually superior to Doug in bed: "He has a big lirpa."  A Vulcan weapon.  What were you thinking?

Finally she has to excuse herself, and Spock takes over.  Doug praises him for the ease with which he participated in the lie.  He loves human personalities, and would give anything "to be half the human you are."  This makes Spock feel better.

I'm out of space, but don't worry, the commanders switch back to human, a near-catastrophe is averted, and the relationships are restored.

Beefcake: None.

Heterosexism: Lots.  I stopped counting the heterosexual couples.

Gay Characters: Beto's sister has a butch-lesbian look, and according to Out "gives off queer energy without feeling the need to label."  Yeah, I've heard that "not into labels" before.  It means "don't want to actually admit to being gay."

Nurse Chapel made an off-hand comment about dating a woman in Season 1, but on screen she's been only into men.

If I didn't know that Scotty gets seven or eight girlfriends and James T. Kirk ends up schtupping an alien babe every week, I would think that they were dating.  They don't express any heterosexual interest, Scotty is overwhelmed by romantic desire, they work together to save the day, and the episode ends with them clicking glasses in the bar. 

My Grade: Still, there are no real gay characters, and everyone is so overwhelmed by desire all the time, it becomes annoying.  And we didn't see either the pre-warp planet or the shore leave planet.  Tease!  C-

Bonus: A shirtless Patton Oswalt.  Don't worry, I have n*de photos of Chace Crawford, Jack Quaid, and Atticus Mitchell on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends

See also: "AP Bio": "Always Sunny" Glenn as a disgraced philosopher turned high school teacher. With Patton Oswalt, sigh.

Dan Shor: Tron, Star Trek, an Excellent Adventure, the South Pacific, and the Backside that Changed the World.

Michael Welch: Flying starships, fighting zombies, getting baked, showing his chest. With some d*ck pics

Star Trek