Did Spock ever speak with a contraction?
- Thread starter telerites
- Start date
Your premise is flawed - it was never the producers/writers intent that Mr. Spock not use contractions. Spock/Nimoy used them in the character' first seen in the second pilot "Where No Man Has Gone Before":
Mr. Spock: "I'll have you checkmated your next move."
The character used contractions all the time. The fact you can't remember Spock lines with contractions is non-sequitur.
To be clear here, I wasn't proposing a premise or theory at all. Again, I was just curious and you are correct as I stated, I couldn't remember any but there are obviously many.
You guys rock with your knowledge and memory. I always appreciate learning and absorbing as much as I can from everyone here.
Thanks again to all
Yes, and one time he had a bad case of the jimmy leg.
"I understand, Doctor. I'm sure the Captain would simply have said 'forget it, Bones'."
That's such a great line, too: you can just picture that that is, indeed, something the Captain would say!
That's such a great line, too: you can just picture that that is, indeed, something the Captain would say!
Here in Colorado we pronounce been 'bin.' Then again, some Coloradans pronounce Pueblo 'Pyebluh', so what do I know?
That was the original intention, but then in "This Side of Paradise," D. C. Fontana gave Spock an ambassador father and a schoolteacher mother. I'm sure an ambassador and a schoolteacher would jump at the chance to have their child grow up bilingual.
This does not prevent Spock from learning Vulcan first, nor does it prevent him from being predisposed to speaking English formally. In some ways, it may even encourage the latter.
Anyone want to guess how we pronounce "Puyallup" here in Washington? (It's the actual pronunciation, not just a regional thing, but I had to trot it out.)
On-topic:
Spock used a contraction on one notable occasion, but you couldn't pronounce it.
^I heard Guy Fieri say it on 'Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives' last week, but I forgot. And to make certain no one misunderstands, that pronunciation of Pueblo is pYEB-luh.
Bit off topic, but I absolutely despised the whole thing about Data not being able to use contractions, as a means of showing us just how distant he was from humanity. Not to mention the hokey moment of maturity when Lal managed it. It is such bad, lazy, childish sci-fi writing. I'm a beginner programmer and I'm pretty sure I can write a Java program that locates any instance of "can not" and turn it into "can't", but it's beyond a 24th century android apparently.
That's more fanfic than TNG writing, really. All Data is ever credited with is a tendency to speak formally - he simply prefers not to use contractions, colorful metaphors or limerics, there's no actual inability involved. If motivated, he can assume any pattern of speech, as seen innumerable times.
Data is always dismissive of his skills, and claims he hasn't "mastered" various things such as informal speech, sneezing or comedy. He still seems to do those better than 99% of mankind, and is merely a happy father when Lal does it better than 99.99999% of mankind within minutes of her birth.
Timo Saloniemi
Data is always dismissive of his skills, and claims he hasn't "mastered" various things such as informal speech, sneezing or comedy. He still seems to do those better than 99% of mankind, and is merely a happy father when Lal does it better than 99.99999% of mankind within minutes of her birth.
Timo Saloniemi
Last edited:
Spoken with a curious British accent that he never uses again...
My favorite is near the end of We'll Always have Paris, Data yells "It's me!"
But that was yelly Spock. He kind of disappeared halfway through Corbomite Maneuver with a quick visit at the end of Man Trap
At the conclusion of "Datalore", one of the androids has been defenestrated and the other survives. Which one is which? Well, the one left behind says "I'm fine".
It doesn't seem as if Spiner or his directors ever really paid any attention to the use of contractions or lack thereof. All that mattered was that Data sound stilted in his speech patterns, and avoiding contractions was one way of accomplishing that. But not something anyone would consistently have aimed at.
Timo Saloniemi
Similar threads
- Locked
