Live long and fuck in Hondas (or 'why that Vulcan salute is way more significant than you think it is')
Hey. Hey Holz. Did you know Deadpool and Wolverine fucked in the Odyessy? Did you know that they now live in a one-bed with Blind Al? Did you know that -
Yes, friend. I know all of it. And you're all super fucking valid for pointing it out.
... But maybe all of you aren't seasoned Trekkies like me. Maybe not all of you gorgeous people understand the true significance of this.
Or maybe you just want a definitive way to win the argument of "are these two fucking?"
But either way, I'm here to help, and to tell you why, amongst all the absurdly homoerotic text of this film, this moment? Might be the gayest of them all.
Now, we must start by saying that although you wouldn't know it from the bullshit Abrams films, these two:
Are the fathers of gay fanfiction. Spock and Kirk here are the reason you're living in the fantastic timeline where you can write/read men fucking without any other shred of plot and that this is a legitimate and normalised internet experience - everyone say thank you, iconic papas. These guys were so homoerotically coded that even in the 60s, the era of wondrously overdramatic performances of all kinds and fairly prevalent homophobia, The Girlies still took notice, still started mailing each other fics and making zines and being just hugely excited at the thought of these two getting space-married. They are fandom as we know it today's beginning, and seventy years later they're still an enduringly popular ship on AO3. (You should all go and watch Amok Time, by the way. Contains the Honda Odyessy scene of the 60s, except there's weird biology and wrestling and just go and put it on your screens, thank me later. They fucked on that planet.)
Anyway, these two were as close as early colour TV could ever allow two men to be, deepening their *coughs* friendship almost every single episode or film - Trek's creator Gene Roddenberry even gave them a unique word in Spock's Vulcan language, with the meaning of 'friend, brother, lover.' (And if that isn't ringing any Poolverine bells, I'm not actually sure what you want out of this post. Enjoy it anyway, love you.)
... And then we get to 1982's The Wrath of Khan, and to that moment that every iconic screen couple must face - the ol' classic, it's you or me and I won't let it be you.
Sure, the set-up's a little different here - the chamber Spock's in is filled with radiation, and the scene's quieter, softer. And Kirk isn't a mutant so he can't smash his way in, he can just sit there and inwardly die as his emotional support Vulcan does.
... But you get where I'm coming from here. Ryan Reynolds doesn't take a million other potential love scenes from across the cinematic ages - no, he takes this. What is for many the romantic acknowledgement of a whole generation. The humble and desperately sweet beginning of it everything we fans know and love nowadays. The most ambiguously romantic homosexual relationship in television, directly comparative to what is now arguably the most ambiguously romantic homosexual relationship in cinema. And lest we forget, Wade doesn't believe in a fourth wall - this is a conscious choice, both in canon and in the writer's room.
Oh it's so clever and so beautiful a girl could weep. Ryan just introduced the MCU to the gays, just as Kirk and Spock did all those years ago to the masses of the time.
And then there's what it means.
This is the Vulcan salute, created to mean either 'live long and prosper' or 'peace and long life' - it's used more or less interchangeably.
But part of that's irrelevant when you're as immortal as these two.
So we're left with the sentiments of prosperity and peace, given to a man who up to this point can't imagine ever prospering again, is the furthest thing away from being at peace. Wade gives Logan the opportunity to go on, to find the things he's been lacking for so long now - things he has already helped him find. Spock tells Kirk during The Wrath that 'the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few,' and that's exactly what Wade's doing here - sacrificing himself for the greater good of his friends and his newly beloved, however much it will hurt them all.
And that's lovely, and poignant, and character-growing, and I think we all would have been content to leave it at that and have our noble sacrifice, however much we would have wept. Kirk goes on to find the remnants of Spock's soul in the next film in the series, to bring him essentially back from the dead because he felt it was more than his own soul's worth not to have done... which, again, ringing a bell anyone?
Because Logan, in not so many words, tells dear Wade to fuck right off, and we get this.
What we've got here is a direct translation of one of cinema's gayest moments, made somehow infinitely more gay. A true achievement here - I genuinely think I spontaneously acquired tetanus in the cinema for a good minute, my jaw dropped so hard on seeing this. The pillars are the same colour as Kirk and Spock's original uniforms, for fuck's sake. I'm dying out here.
What we've done here is create narrative equality. The whole film's kinda done that leading up to this anyway - they're both mentally fucked up men who can't die, who are constantly dying anyway, who are evenly-matched in battle and both enjoy Honda fucking, who have forged a real love even as they piss each other off at every turn.
But here, they place one another in narrative equality for the first time. It's not about a sacrifice, not now, even though they're assuming it is one - it's about what should be done. It's about righting wrongs, being heroes, being together because every option other than that is unacceptable, because neither understands quite how to lose anyone else. They've both made the same choice, and that's not to let the other die alone.
It's about holding hands and loving and never letting go, even if it kills them.
... It's just about the most romantic and gorgeous thing I've ever fucking seen.
There are no more instances of masks, once they're done in this station. They don't need them any longer; they will never need them again.
And that's only emphasised by the parting shot we get of this... almost directly after Vanessa and Wade share a final sweet look.
I don't know, man. It's almost like the true conclusion is hidden behind the acceptable masquerade. Imagine that in the MCU, folks.
They've taken one of the most intimate and sweet moments in screen history, and made even more glorious.
They did The Wrath of Khan better than The Wrath of Khan did it.
And that's... that's gay. That's just about the gayest thing they could ever have done, and I adore it to the smallest pieces.
So remember, the next time your friends disbelieve you... show 'em this. Show them that they redid the very beginnings of slash fandom, and did it better.
(And then you can add on that they now live in a one-bed with their grandma, daughter and dog, and will do for the rest of their lives. Kirk and Spock didn't even get THAT shit.)
