Think about all of the things he has seen, all of the worlds he has explored, all of the green women he has slept with, and when he is faced with death, it shocks even him, to the extent that all he can say is, “Oh, my.” I’m not sure how popular this scene is among the Star Trek Zeitgeist, but I imagine it’s probably hated. I, however, love it. Feel free to tell me how I’m wrong in the comments.
I won’t say you’re wrong to love something, but I do disagree with you. Kirk deserved more poetic last words because he spoke with eloquence. He has also been faced with death more than once before that, he just ended up surviving. It felt like a wasted opportunity to me. They didn’t have to give him a long monologue or anything, just something a little more pithy than “oh, my.”
This is the man who said things like:
And, most applicable to this situation:
I don’t think he dealt with death as he dealt with life.
I don’t disagree with you, but I think Kirk was probably the most “human” of the Star Fleet Captains. Sure, he was larger than life in some respects, but he was very grounded and his character flaws were all human traits. Giving him a human reaction to death suited him well, I think. Sure, we all want Shatner to ham it up and give us some spoken word space poetry, but Kirk was human through and through, and I think his final words reflected that.
Exactly this … I think it just displays how no matter how special, significant, intelligent, capable or strong we may think we are or we think any one us can be … when death arrives, none of us know what our final words will be. Sure there is the possibility of being in bed after a long sickness, being fully aware and knowing your time has come and you get some time to think of what to say … or you’re bleeding out and you know you have five more minutes … but for the majority of us when the time comes, we’ll be so frightened, scared and so shocked that it is all happening that we will not be capable of saying anything else other than … ‘oh my’
It’s like what La’an explained to Captain Pike in the first episode of Strange New Worlds …
La’an Noonien-Singh : Yes. Because right up until the last moment, they… couldn’t imagine dying.
Shut the fuck up… let me die in peace.
I was not expecting a flowery speech. I think there’s a happy medium between ‘space poetry’ and “oh my.”
I mean this wouldn’t be the best line either, but I would prefer something like, “now I’m off on a new adventure…”
Kinda like John Leguizamo in Land of the Dead, after he’d been bitten and shrugs off shooting himself.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3qoLdMoWmXw
That would actually work pretty well, considering-
Another line from Peter Pan.
That line is in the film to imply the ship and crew would never age - that for the fans the original show would be timeless. It’s not so much a measure of hope, it’s more a wink and nod to the audience.
Peter Pan and his crew in Neverland never age, they remain perpetual children.
But this would give a similar message… Kirk’s adventures will never end.
They do end. That’s the point.
You don’t think there’s eloquence in a man overwhelmed by seeing the beauty of the journey into afterlife enough that he uses his last breath to express loving wonder?
I think you’re missing the point of the man if you think he should give a speech as he exits stage left - you turn him into a melodramatic buffoon, like the caricature over actor who takes minutes to die delivering a soliloquy in death.
As I said below, I think there is a happy medium between a speech and just two words.
He gave up the chance of being in effectively heaven to give his life saving a planet and an entire civilisation that would never even know he existed.
Starfleet to the end.