Kirk and Spock as Parents

After Ilia vanishes from the bridge in the movie “Star Trek: The Motion Picture,” she reappears aboard the U.S.S. Enterprise.  Dr. McCoy determines that she is a probe, sent by V’ger, and this replica confirms that the beautiful Deltan navigator no longer lives.  Still, the probe possesses not only Ilia’s looks, but also many of the dead woman’s mannerisms.  As Commander Will Decker once had a relationship with Ilia, he gives her replica a tour of the Enterprise, hoping he can learn as much about V’ger through the probe as V’ger learns about the ship and its crew.

Spock is concerned that the Ilia replica is their sole source of information about this vast alien consciousness that is traveling toward Earth, so he steals a space suit and departs the ship.  He travels through vast chambers within V’ger, and amid the darkness, sees immense holographic images, including a planet, the Federation space station Epsilon 9 (which, like the Klingon ships, vanished amid powerful bursts of white energy), and a giant image of Ilia.

In Marvel Comics’ “Star Trek” Vol. 1, Issue #3, writer Marv Wolfman again diverges from Harold Livingston’s script.  In his version, Captain Kirk immediately learns of Spock’s unapproved jaunt, suits up, and pursues him.  

Unlike his half-Vulcan Science Officer, a crystalline swarm attacks Kirk, and must Spock delay his journey ahead of the ship. 

He jets over to Kirk, and banishes the attacking crystals with a few well-aimed phaser shots.  Kirk and Spock then journey together into V’ger. 

Instead of holographic images that illuminate the surrounding darkness, the men travel through lighted caverns.  Instead of projections powered by plasma energy, Spock deduces that V’ger’s memory is stored by highly efficient crystals, which have recorded everything they destroyed, from Ilia, to the Epsilon 9 space station, to the three Klingon ships that attacked the space cloud at the beginning of the film.  

Wolfman’s changes give us more interaction between the story’s two main protagonists, tell us more about how V’ger functions, and better link the Klingons’ disappearance to the overall plot.  By showing us caverns of light, he connects V'ger's destructive energy with its “memory,” as well as how this alien consciousness learns (or gains enlightenment).  People and things may be dead in a corporeal sense, but they remain very much alive to this vast alien entity.  Thus, Wolfman perpetuates the theme he began in Issue #1 (see last month's entry "Klingons and the Book of Genesis"), when he narrated: 

“In the beginning there was darkness.  

Then God said 'Let there be light.'  

...and the light was good.”

Of course, the humans, the Federation, and the Klingons disagree with V’ger’s assessment.  But then, V’ger cannot comprehend how its actions affect others.  As with a child, lecturing it will do no good.  Kirk and Spock must help this growing alien entity develop a more mature viewpoint, one that respects others’ rights and differences, and recognizes its responsibility as a steward of the universe.  Unfortunately, instead of having eighteen years in which to nurture their child, only a few hours remain before the cloud reaches Earth.  But then, whoever said that parenting was easy?

Dragon Dave