Saldana: Uhura-Spock

[M'Sharak]

I definitely believe this Spock will reach his, "If I were human, I believe my response would be, go to hell," moment in life a lot sooner than Spock Prime did.

Star Trek 3: Spock Amok... coming to a theatre near you in 2016.

 

[serenitytrek1]

I definitely believe this Spock will reach his, "If I were human, I believe my response would be, go to hell," moment in life a lot sooner than Spock Prime did.

He was basically there at the end of Trek XI.

In case you want to know the similarties between all this cahracters..they all had leading roles in the films and the romantic plot is between at least 2 of the characters I mentioned.

Yes, it's certainly a common cinematic trope. Or cliché, if you will.

All I'm saying is that I think the Spock / Uhura relationship was a cheap trick used to insert unnecessary melodrama (as if Spock didn't have enough going on in that movie) and to drag a few extra female butts to the seats, that there was a reason they used Spock outside of say, Scotty, as emotionally detached and / or distant leading men are very much en vogue as evidenced by Twilight etc

If you disagree, fine, but don't accuse me of not getting it because I'm a 'man'. It's rude and needlessly dismissive.

No offence again but you are still dont uderstand much. A cliché romance is a romance with two perfect pretty people having a relationship based on lust , superficiality and shallowness.

And again, they could not use scotty because he had a supporting role and was hardly a character in the first film. the love story must always been between the main leads. so that will be kirk/spock, spock/uhura or kirk/uhura. why is that so hard to understand.

There is nothing cliché about that. what will be cliché will be the substance and depth of the romantic relationship.

Also there is nothing wrong with attracting women...you are the one that is been sexist. You think trek should be all about actions and explosions and should have no feminine attribute like romance.

JJ trying to appeal to the masses is not a cheap trick it is a smart trick to make star trek more commercially successful and more popular among men and women.

In case you dont know but every film in history,regardless of its genre has always had added a romantic plot to the story line.

A lot of men loved Titanic.... they are just too ashamed to admit it.

 

[Malaika]

not surprised that the actors are so evasive about it

Zoe Saldana in another interview said:

“Whether they are together or not that will remain to be seen. But come on, I'm not going to ruin the element of surprise! I signed papers, trust me! I will lose a kidney if I say too much!”
well

this bit by Zachary Quinto from a recent article for EW is interesting though

"I think we tapped into something in the first film that a lot of people weren't expecting, which is the emotional undercurrent and how powerfully it runs through him. That continues in this film. There are things that happen to him -- and things that he's part of -- that are incredibly personal. That was really exciting for me both physically and emotionally."


I guess you won't know what he's talking about until may though

The Spock / Uhura thing is a load of forced melodrama, pandering to a tween audience conditioned to the female lead falling for the emotionally distant handsome male.

It's a lazy attempt at giving the Uhura character a 3rd dimension and probably more insulting to the character than any of the lowest Uhura moments TOS presented us with.

so what Spock finally getting the girl could be pandering to socially awkward nerds that dream to get the hottest girl for once

the old " pandering to" argument...
girls only like romance, the fanboys only wants actions and don't want the girl to distract the guys from their videogames.. what next? who wants to add more stereotypes?
up this point breaking them up would be as fan pandering as keeping them together

fyi, most of the shippers in the trek fandom, that are women, are slash fans anyway...

Personally, I found it tired and predictable. Had it been Scotty or Sulu... man, that would have been interesting.

In what way? How would that have served the movie, and how would it have worked thematically?

perhaps because ~thematically~ the few times the black girl is the love interest of the white guy, the latter is a secondary character (better if unattractive). Now that's predictable.
(notice how MCcoy didn't get a mention in that above comment )
That would surely fit with Hollywood-pre-established set of rules when it comes to love interests for characters like Uhura and would, therefore, be a cliché.
It is ironic, isn't it? say hi to intersectionality
Even nowadays, it takes more guts to put her with the white iconic protagonist, add that it's Spock of the two... whoa those crazy writers...

I'm just saying. Thing is, I'm white but Uhura is not a white girl and it's good to remember it.

 

[Dream]

In a big three, the two sidekicks pairing up has become pretty cliche now.

Han/Leia
Ron/Hermione

 

[BeatleJWOL]

Was there really enough Spock/Uhura romantic interaction in the film to be a nuisance? Not that I saw. Or is it the simple fact that the writers went there at all that gets to people?

 

[Nerys Myk]

Isn't that at the core of Spocks appeal to many in the female audience

As a by-product of the character, possibly, but the stoic outsider getting the girl is as cliché and tired today as your lantern jawed hero getting the girl has ever been.

and the basis of more than one TOS episode?

Any Spock / Uhura inference in TOS is lucky coincidence. It's not even something I EVER saw brought up until post Trek XI

There was probably enough Kirk / Uhura interaction in TOS as well if you looked for it. Heck, even the Uhura / Scotty stuff in the movies was BLATANT.

I was referring to most of the women in the series who found themselves attracted to Spock, not to Uhura.

 

[The Mirrorball Man]

In a big three, the two sidekicks pairing up has become pretty cliche now.

Han/Leia
Ron/Hermione

Gimli/Legolas.

 

[serenitytrek1]

not surprised that the actors are so evasive about it

Zoe Saldana in another interview said:

“Whether they are together or not that will remain to be seen. But come on, I'm not going to ruin the element of surprise! I signed papers, trust me! I will lose a kidney if I say too much!”
well

this bit by Zachary Quinto from a recent article for EW is interesting though

"I think we tapped into something in the first film that a lot of people weren't expecting, which is the emotional undercurrent and how powerfully it runs through him. That continues in this film. There are things that happen to him -- and things that he's part of -- that are incredibly personal. That was really exciting for me both physically and emotionally."


I guess you won't know what he's talking about until may though

The Spock / Uhura thing is a load of forced melodrama, pandering to a tween audience conditioned to the female lead falling for the emotionally distant handsome male.

It's a lazy attempt at giving the Uhura character a 3rd dimension and probably more insulting to the character than any of the lowest Uhura moments TOS presented us with.

so what Spock finally getting the girl could be pandering to socially awkward nerds that dream to get the hottest girl for once

the old " pandering to" argument...
girls only like romance, the fanboys only wants actions and don't want the girl to distract the guys from their videogames.. what next? who wants to add more stereotypes?
up this point breaking them up would be as fan pandering as keeping them together

fyi, most of the shippers in the trek fandom, that are women, are slash fans anyway...

Personally, I found it tired and predictable. Had it been Scotty or Sulu... man, that would have been interesting.

In what way? How would that have served the movie, and how would it have worked thematically?

perhaps because ~thematically~ the few times the black girl is the love interest of the white guy, the latter is a secondary character (better if unattractive). Now that's predictable.
(notice how MCcoy didn't get a mention in that above comment )
That would surely fit with Hollywood-pre-established set of rules when it comes to love interests for characters like Uhura and would, therefore, be a cliché.
It is ironic, isn't it? say hi to intersectionality
Even nowadays, it takes more guts to put her with the white iconic protagonist, add that it's Spock of the two... whoa those crazy writers...

I'm just saying. Thing is, I'm white but Uhura is not a white girl and it's good to remember it.

I think it is ridiculous that race should even be factor.one of the main purpose of star trek was to blur the race line.

Gene Rodenberry’s dream was that all people will be treated and respected equally regardless of them been black, white or yellow or a different colour. In star trek it was very common for people of colour to get together and people of different species to also get together.

In the 23rd century. Spock is more likely to be racially abused than uhura . We saw it in the film. Spock getting bullied and emotional abused for been half-human and Spock is white.

Jim doesnt seem to care...all he cares about is getting pretty girls in his bed. he flirts with uhura who is black, he sleeps with Galia who is Green and he flirts with those ladies on the steps and they were white.

 

[serenitytrek1]

In a big three, the two sidekicks pairing up has become pretty cliche now.

Han/Leia
Ron/Hermione

I will say no for ron/hermione. ron was not the hero and there was a good build up. it took them 7 years to get together. also the relationship was not based on lust.

As for han/leia..I always had this feeling that George Lucas only made Luke and Leia twins when he was writing Return of the Jedi.

yeah...yeah...I know Yoda tells Obiwan in Empire Strikes Back that there was another but heck...... Han Solo could have been ‘‘the other’’)

Leia seemed to enjoy kissing Luke more than Han.

 

[mos6507]

Personally, I found it tired and predictable. Had it been Scotty or Sulu... man, that would have been interesting.

In what way? How would that have served the movie, and how would it have worked thematically?

What would have been bolder is just not have the bridge crew banging each other at all. Or if they're a couple, they should keep it on the down-low and not exchange sweet nothings and kisses while on-duty. I mean, Starfleet is like the work-place and you can't get your work done if you are busy flirting with your girlfriend all the time. It just contributed to making the Enterprise feel like a frat-house with a bunch of kids that are more interested in shagging than getting their jobs done.

If they wanted to have this relationship taken seriously, though, they should have had some real relationship scenes between the two instead of dropping it on us like a bombshell merely through their overt body-language. It was clearly done just as a cheap shock-tactic.

 

[The Mirrorball Man]

Or if they're a couple, they should keep it on the down-low and not exchange sweet nothings and kisses while on-duty. I mean, Starfleet is like the work-place and you can't get your work done if you are busy flirting with your girlfriend all the time.

Yeah, no. Star Trek is not a documentary about Starfleet. Starfleet doesn't exist, Starfleet is anything that is required by the plot. Refusing to include scenes because it doesn't fit into a narrow interpretation of what would happen within a fictional organisation is an insane way to write fiction.

It just contributed to making the Enterprise feel like a frat-house with a bunch of kids that are more interested in shagging than getting their jobs done.

We're talking about two scenes in which two adults exchange brief kisses while having a conversation. I'm sure that whatever your personal life choices are, that kind of thing is nothing out of the ordinary, and not very similar to the kind of wanton debauchery you so vividly describe.

 

[Cake]

The Spock / Uhura thing is a load of forced melodrama, pandering to a tween audience conditioned to the female lead falling for the emotionally distant handsome male.

It's a lazy attempt at giving the Uhura character a 3rd dimension and probably more insulting to the character than any of the lowest Uhura moments TOS presented us with.

I kind of disagree; I think the writers of trek 09 had an obligation to attract a female audience by putting a romance in the film.

Women (and men) either like science fiction and may therefore consider watching Star Trek, or they don't and no romance will convince them otherwise. Someone who is into romantic movies has much better alternatives. There are so many movies out there, where everything revolves around a love story, where it is the focus of the movie.

The Spock / Uhura thing is a load of forced melodrama, pandering to a tween audience conditioned to the female lead falling for the emotionally distant handsome male.

It's a lazy attempt at giving the Uhura character a 3rd dimension and probably more insulting to the character than any of the lowest Uhura moments TOS presented us with.

so what Spock finally getting the girl could be pandering to socially awkward nerds that dream to get the hottest girl for once

the old " pandering to" argument...
girls only like romance, the fanboys only wants actions and don't want the girl to distract the guys from their videogames.. what next? who wants to add more stereotypes?
up this point breaking them up would be as fan pandering as keeping them together

fyi, most of the shippers in the trek fandom, that are women, are slash fans anyway...

Slash shippers dominate a lot of fandoms. I could name tons of other fandoms, where a non canon slash ship is much more popular than a canon straight ship. The Star Trek fandom is only one of many. Which proves again, that the argument, that they had to add a romance into the movie to attract female viewers is nonsense. If Spock/Uhura is such a huge draw to women, there would be much more S/U shippers out there. I think the number of women, who watched the last Star Trek movie ONLY because they heard of the Spock/Uhura romance, is very tiny. I think nearly all woman who have seen it in the cinema would have watched it without Spock/Uhura, too.

I think they added the romance, because it is one way to emotionally connect characters with each other. Other ways are for example family bonds and friendships, which they have also shown in the movie. If a romance is done well, it can add to the personality of the characters in question, makes them more interesting. The opposite can happen of course, too, which I think was the case in the last movie.

Personally I felt that Spock was acting very human in the last movie. The romance was one reason for it among others. If they go even further this way in the next movie, he will be an alien only on paper, which would be a bad development in my opinion. The rest of the main characters are already full humans, they shouldn't eliminate all Vulcan behavioural characteristics from Spock. For example making out in public in front of an audience feels really not Vulcan to me. After all the main difference between Vulcans and humans are, that the Vulcans are suppressing their emotions and don't show them openly all the time.

The S/U romance helped to increase Uhura's screentime, but unfortunately she is also the perfect example of this trope now, which I hate:

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheSmurfettePrinciple?from=Main.SmurfettePrinciple

The Smurfette Principle is the tendency for works of fiction to have exactly one female amongst an ensemble of male characters, in spite of the fact that roughly half of the human race is female. Unless a show is purposefully aimed at a female viewing audience, the main characters will tend to be disproportionately male. Said only woman will almost always be used as half of a romance subplot.

It just can't get more cliche than to only have one important female character and then to pair her up with one of the male main characters.

They didn't bother to do this:

Why does this trope happen? Often, the problem lies with the source material — the work's an adaptation of something written or created decades before equal recognition for women started to gain momentum. Sometimes, however, writers will try to correct this problem by inserting a few more female characters or at least an Affirmative Action Girl.

 

[SalvorHardin]

The S/U romance helped to increase Uhura's screentime, but unfortunately she is also the perfect example of this trope now, which I hate:

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheSmurfettePrinciple?from=Main.SmurfettePrinciple

The Smurfette Principle is the tendency for works of fiction to have exactly one female amongst an ensemble of male characters, in spite of the fact that roughly half of the human race is female. Unless a show is purposefully aimed at a female viewing audience, the main characters will tend to be disproportionately male. Said only woman will almost always be used as half of a romance subplot.

It just can't get more cliche than to only have one important female character and then to pair her up with one of the male main characters.

They didn't bother to do this:

Why does this trope happen? Often, the problem lies with the source material — the work's an adaptation of something written or created decades before equal recognition for women started to gain momentum. Sometimes, however, writers will try to correct this problem by inserting a few more female characters or at least an Affirmative Action Girl.

Perhaps this is one of the things Alice Eve's Carol Marcus will fix. After all, she supposedly plays a key role in defeating Cumby.

 

[Malaika]

I think they added the romance, because it is one way to emotionally connect characters with each other.

and also make people (us) relate to the characters more

The S/U romance helped to increase Uhura's screentime, but unfortunately she is also the perfect example of this trope now, which I hate:

I beg to differ. Refer to the meta I previously linked to.
Women of color like Uhura are never the love interest especially for the main white guy so this whole smurfette principle doesn't really fit with Uhura and it kind of sounds like an excuse to go backwards or justify something that, in her case at least, was - actually - a huge flaw for Nichelle's Uhura that the reboot corrected or attempted to correct, it seems.

It just can't get more cliche than to only have one important female character and then to pair her up with one of the male main characters.

it can't be cliché because in Uhura's case being the one important female character (at all) that also is the love interest of an iconic character is damn progressive as the same character wasn't allowed to be any of that in the 60s

In her case, the cliché and the actual trope for characters like her would be the writers doing the very opposite thing.

Nichelle Nichols: "I decided then from the character that I read [Spock] that I wanted to be very much like that character but in a feminine way. And Gene said, and I was sharing this with George the other day, when I told him that I thought of Spock as my mentor. Because if you remember Uhura was the only one he was able to teach the Vulcan lyre too and he sang and spooffed on Spock. Now, you could have never had a love scene in 63 between Uhura and Spock but there were several hints and [back to Roddenberry] Gene was one in the kind of beginning to follow that and he wanted to do episodes if we had gone past the third year"


It's kinda ironic that now that a pair Roddenberry himself had tried to set up but it was forbidden to do so by the bigotry of the 60s, some people want everything to go backwards and they turn something that actually was a flaw (racism directed at Nichelle and consequently the way her character was developed or not developed) into a quality.

Honestly? Going feminist 101 on nuUhura only now that she , coincidentally, happens to be Spock's love interest is kinda disingenuous to me.
Ultimately, I think it's Spock everyones cares about the most, I doubt the writers would get so much criticism had Uhura been paired with any of the other guys.
So I understand it more when people say that they don't like the pair because they see Uhura as a threat to Spock's vulcan stoicism.
I understand it although I disagree with that as I don't see his character in the same way some people do and to me, by showing this side of his character that was never developed before (because of the biases of the time) actually has the potential to make him even more interesting to me and add more conflict in his character.
But I digress..

 

[thumbtack]

Now, trekkies are notorious for hitting on their trapped coworkers, at least until their trapped coworkers go to HR and, as far as we know, Spock is not a trekkie and Uhura has yet to go to HR.

What's the problem?

 

[Cake]

I think they added the romance, because it is one way to emotionally connect characters with each other.

and also make people (us) relate to the characters more

The S/U romance helped to increase Uhura's screentime, but unfortunately she is also the perfect example of this trope now, which I hate:

I beg to differ. Refer to the meta I previously linked to.
Women of color like Uhura are never the love interest especially for the main white guy so this whole smurfette principle doesn't really fit with Uhura and it kind of sounds like an excuse to go backwards or justify something that, in her case at least, was - actually - a huge flaw for Nichelle's Uhura that the reboot corrected or attempted to correct, it seems.

It just can't get more cliche than to only have one important female character and then to pair her up with one of the male main characters.

it can't be cliché because in Uhura's case being the one important female character (at all) that also is the love interest of an iconic character is damn progressive as the same character wasn't allowed to be any of that in the 60s

In her case, the cliché and the actual trope for characters like her would be the writers doing the very opposite thing.

Nichelle Nichols: "I decided then from the character that I read [Spock] that I wanted to be very much like that character but in a feminine way. And Gene said, and I was sharing this with George the other day, when I told him that I thought of Spock as my mentor. Because if you remember Uhura was the only one he was able to teach the Vulcan lyre too and he sang and spooffed on Spock. Now, you could have never had a love scene in 63 between Uhura and Spock but there were several hints and [back to Roddenberry] Gene was one in the kind of beginning to follow that and he wanted to do episodes if we had gone past the third year"


It's kinda ironic that now that a pair Roddenberry himself had tried to set up but it was forbidden to do so by the bigotry of the 60s, some people want everything to go backwards and they turn something that actually was a flaw (racism directed at Nichelle and consequently the way her character was developed or not developed) into a quality.

Honestly? Going feminist 101 on nuUhura only now that she , coincidentally, happens to be Spock's love interest is kinda disingenuous to me.
Ultimately, I think it's Spock everyones cares about the most, I doubt the writers would get so much criticism had Uhura been paired with any of the other guys.
So I understand it more when people say that they don't like the pair because they see Uhura as a threat to Spock's vulcan stoicism.
I understand it although I disagree with that as I don't see his character in the same way some people do and to me, by showing this side of his character that was never developed before (because of the biases of the time) actually has the potential to make him even more interesting to me and add more conflict in his character.
But I digress..

Pairing her up with Kirk would have been as cliche. She would still be the only big female character paired up with one of the main male characters. A large part of her screentime was about her being the love interest. That is disappointing when there are no other female characters, who do something cool on a space ship or somewhere else in a future scifi setting.

And what do you mean with "only now"? In TOS were more female characters with Rand and Chapel, despite it being a 60s series and a lot of people at that time rather wished women solely at home as housewives and mothers. The older movies added very prominent female characters like Ilia, Saavik, Carol, Gillian, Valeris. At best Star Trek V didn't bother to do the same. Vixis wasn't a particular important character.

The last Star Trek movie was a step back in this regard, especially compared with the newer Star Trek series and the TNG movies.

It doesn't matter what was going on decades ago. Today Uhura fit perfectly the definition of the Smurfette trope, which was by the way named after a blue skinned character.