Of Star Trek's Original 3 Heroes, Only One Got The Ending They Deserved
Star Trek has been around for 60 years, in all kinds of different incarnations, and throughout that time, the franchise has been filled with lovable characters. The Original Series gave us Uhura and Sulu and Scotty and Chekov. The subsequent sequels and spinoffs gave us Picard, Khan, Data, Garak, Quark, Odo, The Doctor, Sisko, Seven, and a bunch of roles played by Jeffrey Combs. But it all started with the holy trinity: Kirk, Spock, and Bones.
James T. Kirk, played by William Shatner, was the roguish charmer at the helm of the Enterprise; Spock, played by Leonard Nimoy, was his science officer and right-hand man, whose innate Vulcan sense of logic often clashed with Kirk’s passion and emotion; and Dr. Leonard “Bones” McCoy, played by DeForest Kelley, was the ship’s chief medical officer, who often acted as Kirk’s conscience — a sharp counterpoint to Spock’s stone-cold logic. These three characters carried the original Star Trek show, and their dynamic is just as endearing to this day. Shatner, Nimoy, and Kelley all individually captured what made their characters special, and shared the right on-screen chemistry to convey those closeknit bonds.
But a great character needs a great ending. Christian Bale’s Batman got to fly off into the sunset. Robert Downey Jr.’s Tony Stark got to make the ultimate sacrifice for his fellow Avengers. Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine gave the next generation of mutants a fighting chance before being laid to rest in a grave marked with an “X” (at least until he was brought back a few years later). Out of the three original Star Trek heroes, only one of them got the ending he deserved.
Spock's Ending In The J.J. Abrams Reboot Was A Fitting Finale
J.J. Abrams both saved and doomed the Star Trek franchise with his 2009 reboot. Abrams’ movie was a fresh start, recasting all the main roles and telling a new origin story for the Enterprise crew in a brand-new timeline dubbed the “Kelvin Timeline.” But he didn’t abandon the O.G. crew entirely. In a sense, Star Trek ’09 pre-empted the legacy sequel trend. It brought in a whole new cast, but it also brought back a familiar icon. Star Trek ’09 is a multiverse story in which Chris Pine’s Kirk meets Leonard Nimoy’s Spock.
After Zachary Quinto’s Spock maroons Kirk on Delta Vega during a mutiny, Kirk meets an older Spock from the TOS timeline. This Spock — the O.G. Spock, played by Nimoy — explains that both he and Nero are from the year 2387. When Spock tried to save Romulus from a supernova by using red matter, he and Nero were sent back in time, 25 years apart, during which time Nero attacked the Kelvin, altered the course of history, and unwittingly created a parallel universe.
This might just seem like an exposition dump, but it’s the perfect ending for Nimoy’s Spock. It confirms that the last thing he did in his own timeline was an act of heroism, and he even facilitates the development of the new Kirk and Spock’s friendship. This older Spock gives Kirk the guidance he needs to break his tension with the younger Spock and come to a begrudging mutual respect. It was a perfect swansong for Nimoy’s most iconic character, and a bittersweet passing of the torch.
Kirk's Star Trek Generations Death Was A Disappointment
Star Trek attempted another daring crossover with Star Trek Generations, which saw Shatner’s Kirk team up with Patrick Stewart’s Picard to take on a dangerous villain who wants to return to an extradimensional realm known as “The Nexus.” A Kirk/Picard buddy team-up film was a great idea, and a clever way to transition from the TOS-centric movies to the TNG-centric movies, but Generations itself ended up being pretty underwhelming.
The third act of Star Trek Generations was supposed to give Shatner a definitive ending as Kirk. Kirk is fatally wounded in the final fight against Soran, and Picard buries him there. Considering how devastating Spock’s death was a few films earlier, Kirk’s death felt like a let-down. It was too little too late. The best parts of Kirk’s story were already behind him, and killing him off now just felt like a convenient excuse to ditch the TOS cast and start making movies with the TNG cast.
McCoy's Cameo In Star Trek: The Next Generation Was Underwhelming
If Kirk’s ending in Star Trek Generations felt disappointing, it was nothing compared to Bones’ ending in Star Trek: The Next Generation. Kelley reprised his role as Bones for a cameo appearance in the pilot episode of The Next Generation, and it was kept a secret for first-time viewers to be surprised by. In theory, this should’ve been a fitting farewell to Bones, as he passed the torch to the next Enterprise crew and wished them well. But in execution, it was just disappointing.
According to Larry Nemecek’s book Star Trek: The Next Generation Companion, Bones’ scene was only added to pad out the episode’s runtime. Creator Gene Roddenberry wanted to kick off The Next Generation with an hour-long pilot episode, but Paramount wanted a two-hour show, so Roddenberry had to add a few extraneous scenes to make the episode an hour longer. This included the saucer separation sequence, but it also included Bones’ cameo. That cameo is literally superfluous; the episode was working perfectly well without it, and it was only added in as filler to make the episode longer. For such an iconic and important character, Bones deserved so much more.
In a long-running franchise like Star Trek, this is just an occupational hazard. If a franchise keeps making money, then the rights holders will keep churning out sequels and spinoffs until the cashflow dries up. If a character’s journey reaches a natural stopping point before then, it doesn’t matter. The studio won’t let that story end until the audience puts their wallets away. So, iconic characters like Kirk and Bones wind up getting an ending where they’re killed off out of convenience or perfunctorily passing the torch to a new generation. The fact that Spock got such a fitting ending in Star Trek ’09 — a movie born out of this kind of corporate “more, more, more” mindset — is a miracle.