Given the destruction wrought I doubt Kirk felt he could risk it.
What was wrong with Kirk?
- Thread starter Skipper
- Start date
"Word of God" from the writers was that NuKirk wanted to prevent the Narada being pulled through the singularity and appearing somewhere else and wreaking more havoc there. Not out of the realm of possibility, since the ship had shown up in the 23rd century in the first place by going through a black hole. But it seems more far-fetched in this instance since the singularity was forming in the center of the ship, rather than the ship with full shields and everything entering into a singularity from outside. But anyway, if that was the intent with NuKirk's order to fire everything at the Narada, maybe they could have at least had a quick line of dialog to make it more clear. "We can't risk having that ship surviving and on the loose who knows where," or whatever. I'm not a big fan of overly expository dialog, but sometimes a quick line like that can help.
Kor
Kor
I agree that having a quick line to that effect would have been better, but I'm also fine with the situation the way it plays out (that is to say, I don't think the explanation is so opaque without being spelled out), and I love that Kirk's the one trying to be compassionate while Spock (understandably) has no interest in saving the crew of Narada.
In TOS episodes where the enemy ship is in rendered harmless or in distress TOS Kirk usually just warns them that he's going to rescue them and just beams them off. In 09, Narada's shields were down anyway so it wasn't like NuKirk needed to wait for Nero's cooperation so he could've just beamed them all out. A lesson for NuKirk would've been next time move the Enterprise to a safe distance first before dumping your weapons at the enemy ship to avoid being trapped in an explosion or sucked into a black hole. 
Which I always took as the point of the scene. Kirk is a very driven man and is passionate about things. In TOS he can become blind to his own motivations at times, i.e. like with Kodos the Executioner. Young Kirk had a moment of mercy but I have no doubt that he was also trying to ensure that what happened to his dad, i.e. the monster coming through a black hole, didn't happen again.In TOS episodes where the enemy ship is in rendered harmless or in distress TOS Kirk usually just warns them that he's going to rescue them and just beams them off. In 09, Narada's shields were down anyway so it wasn't like NuKirk needed to wait for Nero's cooperation so he could've just beamed them all out. A lesson for NuKirk would've been next time move the Enterprise to a safe distance first before dumping your weapons at the enemy ship to avoid being trapped in an explosion or sucked into a black hole.
He still had to learn though. But, the Kirk of TOS shines through in a lot of small 09 moments.
Nothing.
I got it in the moment.
Pretty much.
Kirk is the Captain. He has to maintain a positive and confident attitude. At least on the onside.
If the Captain is looking negative and depressed if would trickle down the entire chain of command. Perhaps not Spock, because he's half Vulcan.
in TNG Picard explains something similar. Not the exact quote, but he says something that even when he not sure about something or doesn't isn't confident in something, he pretends that he does in order to keep up morale of the crew.
A captain needs to be a leader, someone other can trust with their lifes and follow into dangerous situations
If the Captain is looking negative and depressed if would trickle down the entire chain of command. Perhaps not Spock, because he's half Vulcan.
in TNG Picard explains something similar. Not the exact quote, but he says something that even when he not sure about something or doesn't isn't confident in something, he pretends that he does in order to keep up morale of the crew.
A captain needs to be a leader, someone other can trust with their lifes and follow into dangerous situations
While I can agree on the principle, I would find it rather irritating for my commander to make jokes as the corpses of hundreds of my fellow soldiers float in space killed by my ship's weapons. Reassuring (even he feels dead inside), yes. A comedian, no.
From "The Enemy Within", written by Richard Matheson:
TOS was written very much from that point of view.
Just like in the Navy:
Fair play. That is indeed over the line. But some people laugh in the face of tragedy. Not because they think it's funny or amusing, but because they can't cope with the emotion. So they laugh.
I have it, it's quite annoying when you have to leave a funeral because you feel you're about to burst into laughter, even though you feel sad. So I bit my lip, covered my face and pretended I had to leave because I was overcome with grief (which was through, but actually laughing would be awful. I did burst into tears when I was alone outside
It's an annoying condition, but they have medication for it, so it's good now. It's linked to anxiety in my case.
Exactly and from personal experience, I can say that when my Dad died, I'd gone from shock, to laughter at his wake, to bursting into tears, back to upbeat and then just solid depression for a year. Kirk was obviously grieving in the scene following Spock's funeral and while not in pieces, he was still reserved and sad on top of being rejuvenated. Star Trek II had to end on something of a positive note because otherwise it would have been crushing, especially since there were no plans at that time to make another movie.
When we catch up with Kirk, some days later, David, Carol and Saavik are off the ship. Now Kirk is facing his bridge without new people in his life and with no distraction from the idea that his best friend is gone. Kirk is sad, on edge and not himself. He is obviously suffering from depression brought on by grief. This is normal. It's human. And I never once questioned it. Doesn't matter how much he got his groove back in TWOK, he had a HUGE loss to deal with. If TWOK was the last episode of a season and TSFS was the next season's premiere, I'd totally see it going this way.
I know how that feels. My parents divorced when I was 2 years old and both of them worked evenings (I saw my dad 4 hours a week, my mum not much more as she worked in a French restaurant as an assisant-cook, so I was raised by grandpa. For all intents an purposes he was my "dad" as he was the man who raised me. I went through the same thing.
I'll just leave this here. 
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