Why Is Star Trek: Strange New Worlds So Obsessed With Giving Spock a Girlfriend?

Three seasons in, Spock (Ethan Peck) is indisputably the romantic lead of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds. So far he's been embroiled in two overlapping love triangles, a conflicted Vulcan betrothal, and, as of this week, a kiss with the Enterprise's security chief, La'an Noonien-Singh (Christina Chong).

Unlike the rare episodic romances given to Leonard Nimoy's Spock in the 1960s, Spock's current love interests all have recurring roles, offering more time to explore each relationship. Strange New Worlds reimagines Spock's antagonistic fiancée, T'Pring (Gia Sandhu), as a self-assured woman with an authentic interest in him as a partner, starring in subplots that poke fun at Spock's youthful inexperience. His relationship with the Enterprise's nurse, Christine Chapel (Jess Bush), receives a similarly drastic reboot, discarding the dated image of Chapel pining after a superior officer.

In Strange New Worlds, Spock and Chapel share a will-they/won't-they situationship, characterizing Chapel as confident and career-focused while Spock grapples with unfamiliar romantic impulses. By Season 3, however, this dynamic has dragged on for too long, dominating both characters' screen time as Spock struggles to accept Chapel's new boyfriend. Of the two Spock-centric episodes we've seen this season, one is a wacky rom-com involving a fake Spock/Chapel wedding, while the other segues into some rather unconvincing sexual tension between Spock and La'an. It's a pairing that comes out of nowhere and doesn't feel entirely plausible for either character. Which leaves us to wonder: Why is this show so obsessed with giving Spock a girlfriend?

Paying tribute to the Original Series in a 21st century format, Strange New Worlds has to take creative liberties with a lot of established characters. Reinterpreting Spock is one of the trickiest propositions, with Ethan Peck playing a more emotive and less mature iteration of Nimoy's controlled and sardonic senior officer.

Within the social structure of Pike's (Anson Mount) Enterprise, Spock socializes with young crewmembers like Uhura (Celia Rose Gooding), Chapel, and Ortegas (Melissa Navia), while Pike acts as a paternal mentor. This version of Spock also appears to be a serial monogamist, moving directly from T'Pring to Chapel to La'an in a cloud of romantic angst. We can interpret this as a facet of the young Spock's emotionalism, but as he embarks on yet another romance, I find myself getting frustrated on two fronts. First, that the show seems disinterested in exploring other elements of Spock's personality, such as foreshadowing his future success as an officer and diplomat. And second, that Strange New Worlds keeps introducing more and more straight romances while queer representation remains on the back burner.

Can Spock work as a romantic lead?

Back in the early years of Star Trek, Spock's popularity among women came as a surprise. Rather than embracing Kirk as a more conventional heartthrob, fans were enraptured by Spock's mystique, as a character whose expressionless facade hid a deep well of emotion.

Analyzing his unexpected ascension as a sex symbol, Leonard Nimoy developed his own theories about Spock's appeal. In one 1970s interview, he noted that Spock was "tall, dark, thoughtful, alien and exotic," lacking the tiresome flaws of human men. The iconic episode "Amok Time" (where Spock participates in a horny Vulcan mating ritual) presents him as a figure of passionate but repressed sexuality — while conveniently avoiding an actual relationship with a woman, thus adding to his unattainable allure. This also marked a crucial moment for Kirk/Spock shippers, one of Star Trek's most influential contributions to pop culture. (If you haven't seen the episode, Spock's Vulcan sex drive basically gets sated by wrestling Kirk in a gladiatorial arena.)

Drawing inspiration from the wealth of storylines where Kirk and Spock showcase their intimate, loyal friendship, Kirk/Spock remains one of the most popular pairings in Star Trek fandom, gaining traction long before the franchise included any intentional queer representation. And regardless of whether you view them as a romantic couple, there's no denying that Kirk is the most important person in Spock's life, and vice versa.

Watching Strange New Worlds, we're aware that Spock's defining relationship is still waiting over the horizon. No matter what happens between Spock and his various love interests now, these relationships will fade into the background once Kirk joins the Enterprise — a fact that makes Spock a doubly puzzling choice as a focal point for romantic drama. For the next 130 years of his life, he'll be more interested in science and exploration than in dating, and his closest relationship will be with his captain.

Strange New Worlds' nostalgia play

Culminating in Spock and La'an's kiss, this week's retro throwback episode, "A Space Adventure Hour," raises questions about how modern Star Trek caters to fan nostalgia. 

Returning to the beloved '90s holodeck trope, this episode doubles as a love letter to 1960s Star Trek itself. Using the holodeck to host a pulpy murder mystery, it stars La'an as a detective in 1960s Hollywood, working with Spock to investigate the cast of a corny sci-fi drama titled The Last Frontier. Paul Wesley (who usually plays Kirk) does a William Shatner impression as the show's obnoxious lead actor, while the other suspects are played by holographic copies of the Enterprise crew. Like many holodeck episodes, it's a chance to play around with genre-savvy clichés and silly costumes. Except instead of parodying James Bond or a cowboy movie, Star Trek is now offering up a pastiche of itself.

At one point, Celia Rose Gooding delivers a monologue about The Last Frontier's cultural importance, doubling as a thinly disguised reference to 1960s Star Trek. According to Gooding's holodeck character, the show gives viewers "a digestible reflection of their own world through the lens of fantasy. Social commentary with rubber masks and furry metaphors." Praising The Last Frontier's optimistic vision of the future, she asks La'an, "You don't find the idea inspiring? You don't think some kid out there is going to see this show, and spend the rest of their life searching the stars?" It's no coincidence that we hear this from the actor who usually plays Uhura, a character who was an early role model for NASA astronaut Mae Jemison, the first Black woman to travel into space.

Strange New Worlds' creative team has a knack for this kind of feel-good messaging, and for zany one-off adventure stories. But this time the nostalgia bait is a little too on the nose. Uhura's speech feels overly self-congratulatory during the current era of Star Trek, when the franchise is obsessed with looking back instead of forward, and Strange New Worlds isn't exactly pushing the envelope in terms of social commentary. That includes its lack of queer representation compared to recent spin-offs like Star Trek: Discovery.

In Strange New Worlds, Christine Chapel is the only canonically queer main character, having mentioned her bisexuality once in Season 1 and never acknowledged it again. Meanwhile, the obviously queer-coded Lieutenant Ortegas has never had a love interest and remains ambiguous in terms of identity. In the midst of numerous straight romance subplots (Pike and his girlfriend; La'an's previous relationship with Kirk; Uhura's new flirtation with Ortegas' brother), this lack of representation begins to feel more pointed, coming at a time when Star Trek's parent company, Paramount, is leaning into conservative values. 

Regarding how this relates back to Spock, I'd like to introduce a brief thought experiment. Imagine, if you will, that Strange New Worlds had moved on to a male love interest instead of La'an. Considering Spock's soulmate-level dedication to Kirk, there's ample canonical support for him to be bisexual. Yet we understand instinctively that this won't happen — even though modern Star Trek has made more drastic changes to Spock's role elsewhere.

The new spin-offs are comfortable with mixing up certain elements of Spock's backstory (for instance, the revelation that he has a human sister), but when it comes to his love life, the subtextual message is clear. Strange New Worlds wants Spock to be straight. In fact, it wants him to be more overtly, concretely straight than he was in the 1960s, spending more time on his love life than on other forms of character development. Coupled with the show's dearth of queer representation, this makes a statement that I don't believe is intentional on the part of the creative team but feels notable nonetheless. Strange New Worlds loves fan service, but it isn't interested in serving the Star Trek fandom's legacy of queer storytelling, returning once again to the safest forms of nostalgia.

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Season 3 streams Thursdays on Paramount+.