How bizarre is that?

Just four short days ago, I posted that it was the 80th birthday of Star Trek legend, William Shatner. Well, today is the 80th birthday of his famous side-kick, Leonard Nimoy (aka Spock). How about that?

Leonard Nimoy - 80 today

So what, you may well obseve. I know that it is no big deal, but it tickles me anyway. Just four days apart in age, with Shatner the elder - after all, he was the captain. But although Kirk was the boss, I think that Spock has soaked a little more deeply into western culture and consequently pops up all over the place.

Commander-in-Ears

We mustn't forget that Star Trek has played its part in the shaping of western civilisation. It was more than just  an intergallactic soap opera of the 1960's, with shaky sets and polystyrene boulders. During the latter part of that turbulent decade, amid huge cultural upheaval and civil rights blood-letting, the programme featured the first inter-racial kiss on U.S. television, when Kirk and Uhuru set american TVs to 'stun'. Although Kirk solved most situations by fighting hand to hand with actors in rubber alien masks, Spock, for his part, represented a more enlightened approach to cooperation across cultural divides.

Kirk & Uhuru - What happens in space can happen on Earth too

And one final point. There has long raged an argument amongst the sci-fi community, which can best be summarised as 'Star Wars or Star Trek - which is best'? I offer just one piece of evidence in this debate. George Lucas invented 'Jar-Jar Binks' as a serious offering to grace the Star Wars canon. If anything represents the pathetic drivel that Star Wars has served up over the years, then this grotesque character sums it up better than I ever could. Lucas designed it to have human eyes and a human smile in order to appeal to children and therefore be marketable as a doll. Can you imagine Gene Roddenberry doing that to any Star Trek character? I think not.

Jar-Jar Binks - proof that Star Wars was complete crap

Anyway, Happy Birthday, Leonard! I have always enjoyed the Star Trek franchises in their many manifestations and I have particularly enjoyed the contribution of Spock and Kirk. May you both keep boldly going for many years to come.