and that Spock wasn't even her boyfriend!
I like the Spock/Uhura relationship - I think that's a better word for it than "romance". No-one is trying to woo anyone here. They seem like two adults making it work under sometimes trying circumstances.
The only blemish is when Uhura corners Spock while they are flying down to Kronos. Bringing up serious relationship stuff in public is always a punk move, especially if your partner is a Vulcan. But I don't blame Uhura so much as the writers, and apart from the problematic set-up I like the couple's emotional transaction - and Kirk's bemused bystander status.
The ship assignment scene in ST09 is interesting, among other reasons, because arguably this is Spock actually trying to break up with Uhura. We can speculate about the different reasons he might have had for this (discomfort with emotional intimacy being top of the list), but the end result is Uhura kept the relationship intact and Spock didn't object.
(Reminds me of the Scrubs episode where JD tries to break up with someone, and she says "No." "You can't just say no. No is the answer to a question, and I clearly wasn't asking a question.")
While a brilliant scientist and capable officer, Spock is something of a man-child when it comes to relationships (due to an upbringing we Terrans might describe as "monastic"), but Uhura is prepared to put in the work, and ultimately there is a convincing emotional intimacy between them that hardly requires words, and which justifies whatever friction is occasionally produced.
I remember right before they kissed, and I was thinking "No way..." and then it happened!
And then SQEEEE!!!!!
the vibes I get in the 'farragut' scene, from the moment Uhura hears it and then confronts Spock, is that she knew it was Spock's fault (and that
he changed her assignment) and was ready to kick his a$$ and when she gets to him he has this 'uh oh' moment but then when they are walking and she's following him and reciting him back everything he had said about her skills, he's definitely grinning at one point.
I have the photo evidence
she's pissed and he's.. amused.
for me, it wasn't really about their relationship (for her) as much as she was angry that he overcompensated well knowing she had worked her a$$ to be on the enterprise. IMO she could care less in that point if her boyfriend was on that ship too or he suddenly was transfered to a base in Machu Picchu. She wanted to be on the enterprise because she had worked for that, she didn't want to be there because Spock was there.
Contrary to what someone said here, they don't have a co-dependent relationship. There are not one but two instances in the movies where there is the possibility they might not be able to work on the same ship (in the end of stxi and then at the beginning of stid when Spock gets transfered to another ship) and in none of those instances it's ever implied that working on different ships would be an issue for them and the continuation of their relationship. Maybe officers are even trained about that and find long distance relationships a normal occurrence - who knows, maybe starfleet even has the rule that only married couples or those with kids can get transfered to the same ship while for the rest of the couples it's a matter of luck?
back to the hangar scene,
if you read the novelization the script says that he was concerned for her and I don't know what to make of that.
I don't think Spock was the one who would make the definitive assignments for all the cadets, since that was an emergency happened right when the cadets were graduating, everyone there got assigned to a ship for that specific emergency, but I'm not convinced those were definitive. (of course this doesn't justify Spock or makes him overcompensating something Uhura had to accept)
Maybe he was scared about what they'd find once they got to vulcan and from his logic, the farragut would get less exposure than the flag ship.
Or maybe, in tune with what you said, he got scared and he really was concerned about favoritism (and his control in general).
I don't think anyone in their right mind would ever accuse a vulcan of favoritism and if the academy did that with Spock they'd essentially project a human prejudice on a member of a different species who might not be able to show favoritism at all (e. g., how could Sarek even be allowed to sit there with the other vulcan elders when Spock got accepted to the vulcan science academy?). In Uhura's case, from her list of accomplishments (the complete one from the script is quite impressive) she really was one of the top students. Maybe Spock's concerns for appearance of favoritism was less about what people would say about him and more about what humans (especially other cadets) would say about her even if unfair because she had all the credits?
or maybe the fact he had faced prejudices since he was a kid (and from the vulcans themselves!) makes him defensive and distrustful about people now.
But that's just suppositions.
The idea that someone like him could be scared and have insecurities is interesting because it's kind of unpredictable...like imagining him being jealous or show other weaknesses typical of the humans.
