In Defence Of James Kirk

[poliphilo]

TV executives in the 60s had yet to discover you could arc a storyline over several seasons. Every episode of a show was a stand alone drama. It needed a touch of romance, but the romance had to be done and dusted within forty minutes. James Kirk wasn't so much a Lothario, as the  victim of a TV trope. He loved all those women truly and sincerely and was devastated when circumstances beyond his control forced him to leave them behind. Then between episodes someone pushed the reset button and he forgot all about them. He wasn't unique in this. Every TV hero had a similarly bumpy love life.  What happened in an episode stayed within an episode.  Our heroes had their hearts broken, underwent trauma, did things that would scar any normal human being for life,  then popped up again next week as innocent as ever.  TV cowboys got caught up in more gunfights and killed more people than Wyatt Earp, Wild Bill Hickcock and Billy the Kid combined yet never lost their deep-rooted aversion to violence. 

Comments

[michaleen.livejournal.com]

Those last two sentences are most appropriate in this case. Gene Roddenberry began doing TV westerns. His great innovation was translating his horse operas into space operas.

I have mixed feelings about James Tiberius Kirk. On the whole, I much prefer Picard, cold and bloodless as he was. Much more realistic portrayal of a ship's captain, I think.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I always preferred Spock, but Kirk was OK. I think Shatner deserves enormous credit for taking a run-of-the mill, two-fisted, all American hero and making him interesting.

Patrick Stewart is a great actor. It shows.

[halfmoon-mollie.livejournal.com]

Shatner thinks he deserves enormous credit, and is more than willing to give it to himself. Ad nauseum.

I liked Scott Bakula on Enterprise, and I liked Patrick Stewart. And you're wrong, there was more than one 'continued next week' ep of Star Trek, TOS.

"For the Earth is a Hollow Place, and I have touched the sky."

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I'd forgotten about the two-part episodes, but I think my point about long story arcs remains valid.

The world would be poorer without the unique phenomenon that is William Shatner. :)

[michaleen.livejournal.com]

Thanks for that: I thought I was the only one that liked Bakula.

[halfmoon-mollie.livejournal.com]

my mom liked him too. That was a good show, and if the networks hadn't moved it around so much perhaps it would still be running.

[michaleen.livejournal.com]

Agreed. I felt it had just got its legs under it when they pulled the plug.

[michaleen.livejournal.com]

I will credit Shatner, but grudgingly, and I still found his death scene satisfying.

Also, I think this graphic sums up Kirk's character rather nicely, for good and ill.