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Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home Was Forced To Follow A Strict William Shatner Rule. [It's all about Kirk all the time.] (www.slashfilm.com)

submitted 5 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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"The approach we were told to take is that Kirk really had to be the one to lead everyone. [...] Not necessarily that he had to actually have the idea to do something, but it had to appear as if he has the idea."

Krikes recalled how illogical the mandate was, and how, when you watch the film, you can see how Kirk has been arbitrarily inserted into various scenes where he doesn't belong. For example, there's a scene near the end of the movie in which Spock (Nimoy) has a conversation with his father Sarek (Mark Lenard). Kirk is present in the background, watching the conversation. There is no reason for him to be there. But, golly, that's what Paramount wanted.

...

"I think the perfect example in the movie is when Spock goes into the belly of the Bird of Prey to use the computers and learns that the sound is whale songs. It's Kirk who has the idea to go back through time, although Spock is the one who plants the suggestion in Kirk's mind. Kirk verbalizes it, and that's the way it had to be played. We were told Bill had to be the leader at all times. In that scene, if you're reading it, you say, 'It's Spock's idea,' but on film, Spock's discovery that it's humpback whales is not as important as Kirk's idea of going to get them."

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[–] [email protected] 3 points 5 months ago (1 children)

no swearing in the 23rd century

I always took that to mean that the concept of a forbidden word had lost all meaning in the future post-scarcity society with strong civil rights.

So, in my head-canon, people in the future who do curse, do so as an academic hobby.

They've actively studied what combinations of words would have caused alarm in a chosen century of history, and then use those words. Anyone who reacts to the fact that they're cursing, in my head-canon, is reacting to the fact that they clearly intended to curse, having studied how to do so, and were looking for a reaction.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 5 months ago (1 children)

I suppose, but it's not presented that way in the dialogue:

SPOCK: Admiral, may I ask you a question?

KIRK: Spock, don't call me Admiral. ...You used to call me Jim. Don't you remember? Jim. ...What's your question?

SPOCK: Your use of language has altered since our arrival. It is currently laced with, ...shall I say, ...more colourful metaphors. 'Double dumb ass on you' ...and so forth.

KIRK: You mean profanity. That's simply the way they talk here. Nobody pays any attention to you if you don't swear every other word. You'll find it in all the literature of the period.

SPOCK: For example?

KIRK: Oh, the collective works of Jacqueline Susann. The novels of Harold Robbins.

SPOCK: Ah! ...'The giants'.

(Sorry about the bad transcript, it was the first one I could find.)

I wouldn't exactly call either Jaqueline Susann or Harold Robins to be examples of authors known to have excessive swearing in their books. The problem is that the punchline doesn't work unless it's those sort of authors and not authors of the time who did have extremely sweary books, like John Irving. So it makes it sound like everyone in the 23rd century is a prude who basically doesn't swear.

And Kirk not understanding how 'dumbass' worked kind of cemented that in.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 5 months ago (1 children)

In my head-canon, it's boredom, not prudishness, that caused swearing to die out.

Almost no one in the future swears because it's not any fun anymore, because almost no one else cares.

This allows for i.e. Mariner being intentionally fluent in 20th century swears, and command crew around Mariner reacting - not because anyone cares in the 24th century about those words, but only because they know Mariner explicitly intentionally chose those words to cause annoyance.

It also allows Kirk, another academically minded rebel, to have some poorly researched idea how to swear in the 29th century, while Spock is genuinely confused at encountering a long dead way of speaking.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (1 children)

Yeah, but it didn't die out. Not just Mariner and T'Ana swear. There's plenty of swearing in Discovery and SNW. It's been retconned and rightly so.

Edit: And Raffi swears in Picard as well. And then there's Data's "oh shit" when the Enterprise crashes in Generations. Plus, you know McCoy swore as much as T'Ana did, they just couldn't broadcast it.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (1 children)

Yeah. Bones absolutely was meant to swear like a sailor, and couldn't get out part the censors.

This all still fits my head-canon, in case it helps you enjoy Trek IV more.

In my head canon, It's not that swearing died out. What died off is any particular words being exceptional or able to cause offense.

Spock is confused in the 20th century, because the angry man expected a reaction to his swearing.

A typical angry 24th century person wouldn't waste their energy adding swears when truly angry, because the swears don't bring any additional reaction.

We do see some evidence of this in other Trek - 24th century people (at least federation officers) are often shown to get very articulate, when angry.

So I attribute Spock's confusion to encountering a 20th century person who became less articulate, when angered. Then Kirk has to try to explain that the selected (less specific) words carry 20th century cultural significance.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Except, again, people swear when angry in Discovery, SNW, Lower Decks and Picard.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Yeah. I mean - It's still clearly a retcon. I don't disagree by any means.

I just like to allow that the 20th century man's reaction is substantially different enough from any 24th century norm to support Spock's confusion.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Our conversation led me to this, which I hope you will enjoy as much as I did-

https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Profanity

[–] [email protected] 3 points 5 months ago

That's delightful! I love this community.