#tos: dagger of the mind

[anghraine]

It's genuinely kind of baffling to me that Leila Kalomi so regularly is the Spock "love interest" invoked as proof that Spock can't possibly be gay he had an ex-girlfriend didn't you see the episode with his girlfriend he could be straight or maybe bi but definitely definitely couldn't be gay.

Anyway, this is Leila's description of their previous relationship in "This Side of Paradise":

ELIAS: Did you love him? LEILA: If I did, it was important only to myself. ELIAS: How did he feel? LEILA: Mr. Spock's feelings were never expressed to me.

-

LEILA: Come back to the planet [with the docility sex pollen spores] with me. You can belong again. Come back with me, please. SPOCK: I can't. LEILA: I love you. I said that six years ago, and I can't seem to stop repeating myself. On Earth, you couldn't give anything of yourself. You couldn't even put your arms around me. We couldn't have anything together there. We couldn't have anything together any place else.

Like. Leila herself acknowledges that Spock would never willingly enter any kind of relationship with her unless drugged into it, even as little as taking her in his arms. And Spock, uniquely among the many people exposed to the spores, experiences physical pain in the transition to artificial happiness/belonging/"love":

SPOCK: No. LEILA: It shouldn't hurt. SPOCK: No, I can't. Please, don't! LEILA: Not like this. It didn't hurt us. SPOCK: I am not like you!

Early in the episode, she is very clear about how much she cares about what Spock would choose while fully functional:

ELIAS: Would you like him to stay with us now, to be as one of us? LEILA: There is no choice, Elias. He will stay.

Spock specifically asks her questions that would reveal the spore effect and allow him to make an autonomous choice. Leila refuses to answer until the spores painfully take him over. And even once she herself is freed of the spores' effects, her approach to Spock and his autonomy doesn't significantly change; it isn't really something she values about him.

Compare this to someone like Eve McMahon even in as terrible an episode as "Mudd's Women," in which Kirk is the one affected by the aphrodisiac and Spock is immune. Eve is strongly implied to be interested in Kirk, and she knows he's being affected by the drug that nobody has explained to the Enterprise crew; he asks her not to come into his bedroom, and she ignores that for a moment to carry out the seduction, but she knows it's wrong and is so horrified that she breaks it off and leaves. The even more ethically ambiguous Helen Noel in "Dagger of the Mind" also has an arc that leads to her insisting "This isn't right" when Kirk's autonomy is compromised, and reminding him of what's real. Chapel ultimately accepts in "Plato's Stepchildren" that Spock's no always meant no and could never be otherwise without some violation of consent that she finds horrifying. Leila is not uniquely terrible (Deela in "Wink of an Eye" is a lot more unambiguously chilling), but this isn't just how all women in TOS behave, either.

There's also an intriguing thread of very distinct mutual hostility and incomprehension between Leila and Kirk throughout the episode, in which neither comes off looking great, but Leila plainly cares quite a lot less about Spock's autonomy. A lot of this is mostly conveyed by performance (Shatner very convincingly bleeds jealousy as Kirk here), but Leila definitely doesn't get the nature of Spock's and Kirk's relationship even as it exists in S1:

SPOCK: Emotions are alien to me. I'm a scientist. LEILA: Someone else might believe that. Your shipmates, your captain, but not me.

Kirk very much does not believe that, just to be clear. I feel it's worth mentioning that this episode was aired directly after the one that concluded with this—

—and right before the one in which Spock insists he's acting based on logic and probability and of course wouldn't leap into danger. Kirk's response is just this:

That is also the one in which Spock torpedoes all his scientific principles in pure panic over Kirk:

SPOCK: Captain, are you all right? Jim? Jim!

SPOCK: Kill it, captain, quickly! KIRK: It's not making any threatening moves, Spock. SPOCK: You don't dare take the chance, captain. Kill it. KIRK: I thought you were the one who wanted it kept alive, captured if possible. SPOCK: Jim, your life is in danger. You can't take the risk. KIRK: It seems to be waiting. SPOCK: I remind you it's a proven killer. I'm on my way.

Anyway, Kirk is immediately jealous and resentful of Leila and regards her as the problem. He doesn't know much of anything about Spock and Leila's previous relationship and certainly doesn't seem to know how ephemeral it was (Leila's descriptions of how limited it was both occur in scenes where Kirk is not present and she pretty obviously tries to suggest it was a real romance when he is there). So Leila doesn't know what the relationship between Spock and Kirk actually is like and how bizarre Spock's spore-influenced behavior is going to seem, and Kirk doesn't know what Spock's relationship with Leila really was like, so we just end up with this wild uncomprehending mutual resentment between them.

Even before Kirk knows what's going on with Spock, he seems to think removing Leila from the picture would fix things. While it's not quite true, when he does figure out how to break the spore haze, his first priority is getting Spock away from Leila and back at his side. Spock makes it extremely clear what drives his refusal to return to Leila and the artificial happiness of the spores, as powerful as it was for him:

LEILA: I can't lose you now, Mister Spock. I can't. SPOCK: I have a responsibility to this ship, to that man on the bridge. I am what I am, Leila, and if there are self-made purgatories, then we all have to live in them.

Like, this whole situation is so fucked-up and puts such an emphasis on Kirk's oblivious jealousy of Leila, her lol what consent possessiveness around Spock (combined with the repeated revelations about how extremely minimal their relationship was and remains without literally drugging him), and the spores affecting everyone in basically the same pleasant but unhealthy way (rather than the highly idiosyncratic and physically painless effects of losing inhibitions in "The Naked Time") apart from it being specifically painful for Spock as he begs for it to stop. The whole interest of the episode turns on the essential melancholy of Spock's position: his only options are a) artificially- and painfully-induced contentment that is his sole experience of happiness but foreign to him or b) the fundamental self-inflicted purgatory of life at Kirk's side that is nevertheless truer to what he really is (I am what I am). It is not remotely difficult to read all this in repressed gay terms rather than proof!!! of Spock's attraction to women.

The thing is, of all the obligatory Spock "love" interests in TOS, there are multiple other ones that you could make an argument for. The most obvious is the Romulan commander; he's in his right mind, she's not the source of the dubcon, they have fantastic chemistry even if Spock's manner is deliberately ambiguous, she's super cool and hot and his age, and he definitely respects her. I guess there's Droxine, too; their interactions aren't even dubcon, just strange and bad and don't go anywhere. Even Zarabeth is only mildly sketchy compared to Leila and has a much better motive. But for some reason, the "well akshually" responses to gay Spock posts always seem obsessed with But His Canon Girlfriend Leila in particular.

[saintspock]

Bones prison abolitionist 💯💯💯💯💯

[trek-tracks]

Best type of episode

[9151967]

Jim Kirk + Loneliness in Star Trek: The Original Series

Dagger of the Mind, The Conscience of the King, This Side of Paradise, And The Children Shall Lead, Requiem for Methuselah, Mark of Gideon

[self-made-purgatories]

MCCOY: It's hard to believe that a man could die of loneliness. KIRK: Not when you've sat in that room.

Kirk is remembering the feeling of the brainwiper. He is starting to spiral. He looks over at Spock, and the "cold, emotionless" Spock looks genuinely concerned.

I'm here. I see you. How can I help you? What do you need?

But just that one gentle, loving, concerned look from Spock, is enough to make Kirk feel safe again. He starts acting normal again. He smiles, ever so slightly. He gives an order.

KIRK: Take us out of orbit, Mister Spock. Ahead warp factor one.

This time, the supposedly "emotionless" Spock, literally smiles, ever so slightly, back at Kirk. He does that little lip-pursing thing he does when he's trying really hard not to smile for real.

Why is Kirk giving the order to Spock? That's an order for the helmsman. It's almost as if, to Kirk, Spock is the only other person in the room.

And the flirty, sparkly bedroom eyes Spock makes during "Warp factor one"?

Come on, let's gay flirt our way out of this place. I'll help you forget the tortures of this planet ever existed. We're together. All is right with the galaxy.

SPOCK: Acknowledged, Captain. Warp factor one.

(gifs)

[spockeveryday]

[apodemus-sylvaticus]

That moment when you ponder loneliness and your first impulse is to give your first officer a yearning stare, making him extremely flustered.

[to-boldly-ship-mcspirk]

Bones being absolutely stunning in S1E09 (Dagger of the Mind)

[iamenits]

McCoy + Smiles | Dagger of the Mind

[modernmutiny]

I'm watching TOS straight through for the first time and it's actually hilarious how many times Kirk turns down a relationship with a woman in favor of his ship/crew. I'm on s1 e10 or so and he's done this explicitly at least 3 times (Naked Time, Dagger of the Mind, The Corbomite Maneuver, probably more) every time saying some variation on "I don't have time for a woman, the only woman in my life is my ship"

I understand why all those 60s women said he was gay. They're absolutely correct.

[missanthropicprinciple]

Kirk really does like a smart brunette in blue, doesn't he. Spock and Dr. Helen Noel.

[meefstewk]

Dagger of the Mind is sexy

[startrektospolls]

Please reblog so others can participate

Episodes that won so hard they automatically get to go to the finale under the cut:

The Corbomite Maneuver: Here & here

The Enemy Within: Here & Here

The Naked Time Here & Here

Balance of Terror Here & Here

Conscience of the King Here & Here

The Galileo Seven Here & Here

Court Martial Here & Here

[shetrekstv]

Mr. Spock: Interesting. You Earth people glorify organized violence for 40 centuries, but you imprison those who employ it privately. Dr. McCoy: And, of course, your people found an answer? Mr. Spock: We disposed of emotion, Doctor. Where there is no emotion, there is no motive for violence.

[sshbpodcast]

I’ll Spock the world and meld with you, Pt 1

By Ames

My mind to your mind. My thoughts to your thoughts. Your dirty, dirty thoughts. Sometimes a mind meld in Star Trek is a clever technique to advance the plot in a sci-fi way. Sometimes, it’s just a way to cop out of a scene when the writers have written themselves into a corner. And other times it’s straight up intrusive and horrifying because no one should have the power to read another person’s mind without their consent!

The A Star to Steer Her By hosts are going through all the mind meld scenes and collecting our thoughts on each one. First up: all the mind melds from The Original Series through the TOS films. So brace yourself for mostly seeing Spock (but somehow not entirely Spock!) touching a lot of people’s faces, random walls, and sometimes just the air around him to cognitively connect with whatever he damn well pleases. The list is longer than I intended since Spock is a bit of a meld slut, so check them all out below and telepathically listen to our chatter (jump to 45:43) over on the podcast. Back to those dirty, dirty thoughts…

[Images © CBS/Paramount]

“Dagger of the Mind” The very first mind meld we see comes pretty early in the release of season one of The Original Series, and it was all a way for the Enterprise crew to figure out what the hell was going on with that lunatic Simon Van Gelder without resorting to bunkum science like hypnosis. Cue Spock pulling some crazy faces throughout an agonizingly long scene to determine that Dr. Adams used the neural neutralizer on Van Gelder and is not to be trusted. Good job advancing the plot and introducing a Vulcan superpower we’ll use over and over and over again!

“A Taste of Armageddon” The next use we see later in the season already makes the whole idea of the mind meld so laughable as to be worthy of ridicule. The crew has been locked up by Eminiarians, as is their wont, and Spock uses a sort of long-distance, touch-free variant of the mind meld on one of the guards on the other side of a wall. Wow, it didn’t take the writers long to buff Spock’s magic powers to allow him to save the day by essentially mind controlling some bloke.

“The Devil in the Dark” We’ve got to commend Leonard Nimoy for some mesmerizing acting when Spock mind melds with the Horta in “The Devil in the Dark.” It’s over-the-top in all the right ways. Watching him feeling the pain of the silicon-based lifeform is haunting. What a great way to humanize a being that is probably among the furthest biologically from humans in the show. This is what science fiction is really for. Plus it opens up Spock’s magic powers to even more different lifeforms!

“The Changeling” Speaking of Spock using his powers on lifeforms that are further and further from the humanoids we’re accustomed to: we’ve got Spock mind melding with Nomad in “The Changeling.” So now Spock can mind meld with people he’s touching, people on the other sides of walls, aliens that look like a big afghan blanket, and even random robots whose sentience is questionable from the start. What can’t this man mind meld with? Things are getting out of control.

“Mirror, Mirror” Finally, our first instance of someone other than Spock melding with a person. It’s… Mirror Spock! Which still counts! This time, that pointy-eared hobgoblin is intruding on McCoy’s thoughts in order to learn the truth behind the origins of the prime-universe crew. And it just makes us wonder why we don’t use the Vulcan mind meld in courtroom scenes or any time we need to learn if someone is lying or not. This superpower is so overpowered that it could solve most TOS plots lickety-split!

“Patterns of Force” That’s just how they use it in “Patterns of Force” when Spock mind melds a mostly catatonic John Gill to learn why the actual hell he would bring Nazism to the Ekosians in the first place. And it introduced an actual limitation to the mind meld for a change! Apparently this power isn’t limitless. Gill has been tranqed so hard that the best Spock can do is allow Gill to answer direct questions asked of him. So play 20 Questions with this guy, and you’ll be all set.

“By Any Other Name” Remember how Spock once mind melded a guy through a wall? We just talked about it a moment ago. Well the writers remembered too because it comes up again when the Kelvins have the crew confined to some cave or other, and it’s almost the exact same scene we got in “At Taste of Armageddon.” Spock tries to mentally influence Kelinda through the rock wall; it’s unclear if she takes the bait or just wants to punish them for trying, but the result is the same.

“The Paradise Syndrome” It’s overacting all around in this use of the mind meld on Kirok, the persona that Kirk has taken on while on Amerind. Spock needs to restore Kirk’s memory and decides the quickest way to do that is go in there and defrag it himself. This meld thing really is a Swiss Army knife, and is probably used way more often than most people even open one of those tools. Are we at the point at which the whole concept of the mind meld is just an escape button from an episode? Guys, we’re not even halfway through this list…

“Is There in Truth No Beauty?” We’ve got a twofer of mind melds in one of my personal faves, “Is There in Truth No Beauty?” and our very first example of someone other than Nimoy performing it. So first we get Spock mind melding with the Medusan, Kollos, in order to merge consciousnesses, I guess? It’s close to a body possession, but Spock is still in there. It’s just that now he and Kollos together have the navigation capabilities to save the ship from doom.

And then Miranda Jones proves to us that humans can master the discipline as well if they are well trained. Sure, Vulcans get a new superpower every week it seems, but this is one that Dr. Jones picked up through years of schooling on Vulcan, and she uses it to save Spock from madness. And then presumably she lives happily ever after with Kollos, my biggest ship of the franchise.

“Spectre of the Gun” Get ready for the rarely seen triple mind meld, courtesy of the absurd western episode “Spectre of the Gun.” Considering at the beginning of TOS, Spock claims he’s never mind melded a human before (something Discovery blatantly retconned), by this point in season three, he’s melding Kirk, McCoy, and Scott in rapid succession to make their minds more pliant so that they’ll believe the bullets from the gunfight at the OK Corral will go through them. It’s a weird one, y’all.

“Requiem for Methuselah” Almost through the live action show now, and we’ve reached what we’ve called both one of Spock’s worst moments and one of the worst uses of a memory wipe on the show. It’s just plain messed up that Spock would remove Kirk’s memories of Rayna, the robot he fell in love with, because he does it without Kirk’s consent. Bones joshes that Spock will never understand love and comments that he wishes the captain could forget… and Spock makes the captain forget! Because Bones was razzing him! Not cool!

“Turnabout Intruder” Our last instance from the run of The Original Series comes from the last episode from the run of The Original Series. That’s when Spock mind melds with Kirk, who happens to be in Janice Lester’s body, to confirm that the two have body swapped. So it’s another lie detector use—further proof that this technique really can solve most conflicts in episodes. That is, if people trust the Vulcan performing it, which Janice Lester, who happens to be in Kirk’s body, emphatically does not.

“One of Our Planets Is Missing” We’ve made it to The Animated Series, and there are more Spock mind melds to cover! Do I have a soft spot for “One of Our Planets Is Missing” because it’s similar to some unrelated fanfic I wrote for the podcast? You bet I do! Both feature Spock mind melding with a sentient cloud while the ship is inside of it, which I’d say is stretching the capacity for mind melds except for the fact that he’s already done much weirder things, so whatever. 

“The Infinite Vulcan” The other instance of a mind meld we get in The Animated Series is the rare Spock-on-Spock meld in “The Infinite Vulcan.” For absolutely no reason except that it would look funny animated (which was shockingly something Filmation had the capacity to do in their very cheap box of tricks), the clone of Spock is fifty feet tall. Spock 2 needs to save original Spock from something or other, and a mind meld via just a massive fingertip to the noggin does the trick.

The Motion Picture Whatever the hell V’Ger is by the time the crew enters it in The Motion Picture, you can bet your ass Spock can mind meld with it. It’s somewhere between cloud, robot, and giant floating Ilia, and Spock is fully committed to putting his hands all over that puppy and figuring out its deal. He doesn’t even have permission to go investigate this thing. My dude just wanders in unannounced to get into that delicious brain, that’s how nuts Spock is at this point.

The Wrath of Khan This afterthought of a scene ended up being so consequential going forward. To pave the way for bringing Spock back to life after his beautiful sacrifice, a scene of Spock using a mind meld to dump his katra into McCoy was added. We at the podcast are still mixed about how necessary this was since we’re also very mixed on the ensuing movie as a whole, but it’s also nice to have Spock back. And it allows for some excellent DeForest Kelley acting in the third film. But it undoes a poignant death scene. So torn!

The Search for Spock Speaking of the movie we’re so torn on, The Search for Spock has some mind melds of its own. We get our first mind meld from Sarek when he comes looking for Spock’s katra and assumes it’s in Kirk. Why he didn’t ask what he was looking for first, we can’t say, but it is totally in Sarek’s character to just stride in and do whatever without explaining himself.

Toward the end of the movie, after we’ve done all the prerequisite searching for Spock, we get a scene at Mount Seleya where the Vulcan priestess T’Lar performs the fal-tor-pan ceremony on McCoy and the newly resurrected Spock, which includes something akin to a mind meld to move the katra over like cut-pasting a file from your My Documents folder.

The Voyage Home The movies really do have a good selection of mind melds to go around, with almost all of the TOS films having the Vulcan power represented. The Voyage Home’s mind meld of choice is on the humpback whales, George and Gracie, when Spock is trying to communicate the plan to the massive Cetacea. It’s absolutely batshit that Spock claims he’s succeeded in conveying to the whales what the plan is and that they’re onboard. Somehow the thing that makes the most sense is Spock learning that Gracie is pregnant.

The Undiscovered Country Our final mind meld for this week is also the most horrifying. Like the squicky mind wipe in “Requiem for Methuselah,” it’s another of Spock’s real low points as a character. Using the mind meld as a weapon to force information from Valeris in The Undiscovered Country really feels like the antithesis of what the practice was contrived for originally. We’ve come a long way since “Dagger of the Mind,” when melding was established so they wouldn’t have to show Spock doing something problematic, like hypnotizing Van Gelder, and now at the end of the movies, it’s even more problematic than that. Heckin’ yikes.

—

When I snap my fingers, you’ll subscribe to this space for more blogtiviities! We’ve got more mind melds to discuss from the other Trek series, and you don’t want to miss those! You also don’t want to miss more Star Trek: Discovery coverage as we watch through the whole thing over on SoundCloud or wherever you get your podcasts. You also don’t want to skip out on friending us on Facebook and BlueSky. Snap!

[spockeveryday]