Live long and prosper while the force is with us

If you ask Alexa which is better, Star Trek or Star Wars, she tells you she chooses both and adds: “Can’t we all just live long and prosper while the force is with us?” She’s so non-committal and wishy-washy.

Me, I had a long-standing crush on William Shatner’s James T. Kirk character since I first watched the original series in 1966. I was a kid. I was mesmerized. He was so edgy. Those angular sideburns caught my eye. I wasn’t a fan of the flared capris look. Too weird. But the rest of the graphic translation of Gene Rodenberry’s imagination was spectacular. The NCC-1701 USS Starship Enterprise. The hissing hydraulics of the doors. The circular, light twinkling bridge. The sparkly bedspreads. The aliens and the monsters.

The burbling rock monster that “ate” people was one of my favorites. It was called the Horta. Up until Star Trek, television portrayed sci-fi aliens with human bodies sporting weird heads and hands. Star Trek invented new threats, some human-ish, some totally foreign-conceptual aliens. One was just a brain that could transmit thought and hypnotize people.

There were fully developed characters of Klingons and Romulans. And supreme evil manifested as Khan. All the various starships and other M-class planets. Tribbles! Oh my gosh! Best adorable menance ever. Well, until Hoyt Axton brought home the adorable Gizmo that turned into a Gremlin in the movie Gremlins. Gizmo was the model for the Furby toy, an instant hit when it hit the market in the 1990s.

Those oversized cat ears and big almond-shaped eyes were features of Yoda in Star Wars, too.  The stocky, small-statured, wizened Jedi master was an imaginative character created by George Lucas. He doubled down on that creation in the Mandalorian series with Baby Yoda. Later, we learned its name was Grogu. Baby Yoda won over a fan base that spanned all ages. Star Wars is probably the better franchise for merchandizing its good vs. evil saga.

But, in my opinion, Star Trek wields the more cerebral battle of ethics and futuristic challenges. The Prime Directive has a firm hold on the scripts. Its intellectual theory of non-interference with other species encountered in their intergalactic exploration butts up against the emotional demand for empathy and kindness inherent in the mostly human crew. It’s that juxtaposition that made Captain Kirk’s and Spock’s characters work.

As the audience, we get it. We see both sides. It’s the wiliness of the commander and crew to find their way around the cold-hearted, hands-off mandate that engages us. We want that drive for kindness to succeed. It’s the foible of Kirk’s maverick approach to command. He’s a brilliant, often unconventional tactician. We love him. Stodgy Doctor McCoy and eyebrow-quirking, unbudgingly logical Spock are the perfect foils to Kirk’s whip-quick cleverness.

The similarly unbudging directive “the Way” imbues the Mandalorian with a Spock-esque demeanor. When the unbendable Mando gives in to Grogu’s cute little coos, our hearts melt. The supremely lethal, Beskar-clad warrior transforms into a soft-hearted dad to his celery green, wadding sidekick time and time again. It gives us hope for the future of our humanoid, and non-humanoid, counterparts.

Whether green, furry, weird-eared, shiny-armored, handsome or ugly, finding futuristic characters with stories that allow a gentle side in those adventuresome, star-skipping knights captures our hearts and imagination. The message we cling to: Kindness has a path.