Human or not?

[Vandervecken]

A Talosian might get away with a masquerade for a while, if he's careful (this'd be an unauthorized alien passenger natch). I could see them doing that for a while at the end of the Menagerie.

 

[Shawnster]

What alien species could they have been? Someone above nixed the Betazoid idea because of the telepathy. We had episodes that affected telepaths, so if there were others besides Spock on board, we would have heard.

 

[Laura Cynthia Chambers]

It doesn't have to be ones we've heard of before.

 

[Nyotarules]

Mirror Spock had a Vulcan guard. Wonder whether he was on the prime Enterprise as well (seeing as most of the crew had counterparts there)



Almost certainly.

The Mirror universe was more diverse than TOS...for shame TOS for shame....

 

[Nyotarules]

I've always assumed that they were part of Sarek's entourage. They were ferrying over a hundred passengers in that episode.



IMO, having other Vulcan crew members aboard the Enterprise during the 5YM seriously dilutes Spock's character, as it makes him no longer unique. TOS Spock should always be the type of person who's all alone in a crowd. (This is the same reason I dislike the idea of Spock having a Vulcan half-brother who embraces emotion.)

On the other hand, D.C. Fontana had lots of Vulcan crew members aboard Pike's Enterprise in her novel Vulcan's Glory, so maybe in her mind there were other Vulcans aboard the Enterprise during TOS. Might be an interesting question to ask her some time.

Why should it dilute his character? Perhaps Spock was the only Vulcan-Human on the ship so had issues about his background. Maybe all other Vulcan-Humans in the universe were living it up on Risa, Earth and elsewhere totally at peace with their heritage. All Vulcans are not alike just like all humans are not.
Pike had 7 Vulcans on his ship, Kirk only seemed to have one. Maybe the others decided Kirk was too young and inexperienced and requested a transfer and decided to join USS Intrepid.
Considering the concept of world building and continuity was not important to the TOS writers, finding an in universe reason for why Spock was the only alien on the bridge until Arex and M'Ress came along is interesting.

 

[Nyotarules]

These other Vulcans may have been serving in departments that had little need to head down on away teams, in roles such as mathematicians, chemists, ship's systems technicians. We would never see it, and Kirk would have little reason to interact with them, being as they didn't leave the ship often, but they'd face the same I-don't-understand-you thing on a smaller scale among their immediate co-workers.

I would have liked to have seen Spock commiserating with full Vulcan crew members from other departments.

Over bars of chocolate and mugs of Brown Russians.

 

[JonnyQuest037]

Why should it dilute his character?

I explained my reasoning above.

Considering the concept of world building and continuity was not important to the TOS writers...

I would debate this. Yeah, you find a lot of variance in the first half season or so of TOS, but after concepts like Starfleet, the Prime Directive, and the United Federation of Planets were established, they stuck with them. And they were pretty good about bringing up bits of past continuity like Harry Mudd, the Corbomite Maneuver, and the Organian Peace Treaty. If the world building or continuity seem weak by today's standards, that's because they were less important in general to 1960s' TV writers. And why would they be? It was a pre-home video, pre-streaming era. Even syndication wasn't what it was today. Most episodes were designed to be seen once, maybe twice, and then never again. Overall, the continuity of TOS holds up remarkably well.

 

[Shawnster]

World building is one of the things that appealed to me most about TOS. It really felt like a cohesive universe.

 

[velour]

Edit: I just looked him up. His name is Russ Peek.

I wonder if he was related to Tim Russ.

 

[Tenacity]

Perhaps Spock was the only Vulcan-Human on the ship so had issues about his background

Given the way Vulcans were depicted through the multiple series, if there were other Vulcans on the TOS Enterprise, they might have refused to socialize with Spock.

That whole half-Human thing and all.

you find a lot of variance in the first half season or so of TOS

One of the great things about TOS, it seemed like a more expansive universe, not as tied down and narrow as later series.

 

[Nyotarules]

Given the way Vulcans were depicted through the multiple series, if there were other Vulcans on the TOS Enterprise, they might have refused to socialize with Spock.

That whole half-Human thing and all.

Well we only see a snapshot of what some Vulcans are like, due to TV writers' reverting to lazy stereotyping even when it comes to a fictional species.
Its why I prefer the Star Trek novels.

 

[Tenacity]

Its why I prefer the Star Trek novels.

I understand one or two percent of Star Trek fans agree with you.

 

[Laura Cynthia Chambers]

Well we only see a snapshot of what some Vulcans are like, due to TV writers' reverting to lazy stereotyping even when it comes to a fictional species.

You can get inside the head of characters in novels in a way you can't on TV, logs being the exception.

Generally, the books assume people are human unless they're enigmatic like Number One. She's even been said to be eternal.

 

[UnknownSample]

Sometimes TOS refers to people as "human" when they could not possibly be, such as Lazarus. They seem to mean physically like humans, sometimes just meaning corporeal as opposed to bodiless. Confusing.

 

[Tenacity]

Sometimes TOS refers to people as "human" when they could not possibly be, such as Lazarus.

There are times in TOS when they refer to "the galaxy" in situations where they could only be reasonably be referring to just the Federaton.

Sometimes "human" could just be a easier way of saying generic humanoid.