Valentine’s Day is upon us, and what better way to get in the mood than by putting something romantic on the viewscreen and snuggling up with your par’Mach’kai? Star Trek, of course, has so many romances that the A Star to Steer Her By hosts have another blog series to keep our pon farr from flaring up. Some are full episode plots, some are vital relationships that affect the characters all series long, and some are just googoo-eyed moments we wanted to bring up.
We’re starting, as we tend to do, with The Original Series, and you’re going to notice we’re highly curating this list. Just the instances of Kirk smooching women would keep us here all day, so we’re going to narrow things down to only the relationships that matter to our characters in a deeper way. A pattern does emerge that there’s also a LOT of mind-altering conditions (love drugs, spores, Vulcan biological phases, magic tears, etc.) that bring folks out of their shells, which starts to get really overused as a plot device when you notice it. So take a sniff of these psychotropic flowers with us, feel the love in our examples below, and listen to this week’s steamy discussion over on the podcast (swagger over to 1:07:57). Pucker up!
The very first aired episode of TOS is already lighting fires between our characters. “The Man Trap” uses McCoy’s past relationship with Nancy Crater to create some tension, but from what we can tell, the two of them used to be quite in love! Plum clearly would drop everything to get back with Nancy even with her husband right there. Now, he doesn’t know that she’s a salt vampire at the time, but we get the impression that wouldn’t be many points off because these two really clicked!
Spock x Christine Chapel
The mostly one-sided yearning between Chapel and Spock also gets set up very early: in the second aired episode, “The Naked Time.” Spock only ever seems to give her the time of day when he’s affected by the Psi 2000 virus in that episode, when being mind-controlled by the Platonians in “Plato’s Stepchildren,” or when high on love potion in the TAS episode “Mudd’s Passion,” so it actually becomes quite sad that Chapel holds a candle for someone who just isn’t into her. This is before Strange New Worlds entirely changed their dynamic, after all.
James Kirk x Lenore Karidian
The first significant instance of Kirk setting his sights on a woman might be in “The Conscience of the King.” Lenore Karidian seems like a lovely woman at first, and we can see what Kirk sees in her as a romantic interest. The two have chemistry, the mood of their scenes is always teeming with hormones, and she’s just so pretty! Who would have thought that she’d turn out to be a serial killer?!
Spock x Leila Kalomi
As we got with the Spock/Chapel relationship, we also get the impression that his relationship with Leila before “This Side of Paradise” was mostly one-sided. And again, the only way the writers are able to let Spock embrace the love of a partner is with mind-altering affects, this time in the form of spores from those pesky flowers. Spock only being able to date a woman and be happy if he’s not in control of his own mind really is becoming a theme, which is kinda sad because Leila was super into him.
James Kirk x Edith Keeler
One of the most cited romances in the whole series—if not the whole franchise—is Jim and Edith in “The City on the Edge of Forever” because Joan Collins just makes Edith so damn likeable. Is it weird that Kirk seems to fall head-over-heels for this woman in no time flat? Well, there’s a little wiggle room in just how much time passes in the episode, so it’s probably more believable than most insta-romances in television. And it’s definitely clear that he feels enough for her by then for the tragic ending to be that much more devastating because of their love.
Spock x T’Pring
We have another Spock relationship that Strange New Worlds has tried to retcon a bit, because if you’re just going by what’s in “Amok Time,” he and T’Pring really don’t have any spark between them. They don’t even seem to have kept up with each other at all since their arranged marriage to each other as children, so it’s really no wonder that T’Pring’s heart wasn’t in it. Oh, and the only reason Spock is even here is because otherwise his pon farr will kill him, so again, he’s not in his right mind to be making big relationship decisions. The pattern continues.
Montgomery Scott x Carolyn Palamas
Poor Scott. Palamas really doesn’t seem at all interested in the miracle-working engineer in “Who Mourns for Adonais?” It’s another one-sided crush, further besmirched by some problematic comments from McCoy about how Palamas will meet the right guy one day and leave Starfleet (because women can’t do both apparently?). But watching Scotty coming to Palamas’s aid time and again only to get his ass handed to him by his romantic rival—literal god, Apollo—gets real sad real fast. Even when Apollo is finally thwarted at the end, Palamas barely gives the loyal Scott the time of day.
Pavel Chekov x Martha Landon
Chekov comes across as such a romantic novice in “The Apple” that it’s hilarious. Yeoman Landon is a catch, so I don’t blame him for setting his sights on her, but damn is he punching above his weight here. Even though she does get in the mood and suck face with the Russian a little bit, she always seems a little bit perturbed to be in his company while he tries to come onto her.
James Kirk x Janet Wallace
Kirk has a list of exgirlfriends the length of his arm, and he crosses paths with most of them at one point or another. In “The Deadly Years,” Janet Wallace seems like she just plain has an older man fetish, and that’s probably why things didn’t originally work out between them. But now Kirk is rapidly becoming an older man, aging right into her type, and their chemistry really clicks. Sadly for her, he becomes a young man again, but maybe she can wait him out.
Spock x Nevesa
These two really have some fire between them! Spock might be playing Nevesa, the Romulan Commander, in “The Enterprise Incident” and it might just be me reading between the lines, but he really does seem tempted at times. And he’s not even under the influence of some love drug or other for a change! The sizzle between them is so palpable that we are certain that it’s a major reason why Spock pushes so hard later in life to unify Vulcan and Romulan again! For love!
Kirok x Miramanee
Uff. Prepare to cringe. Now to be fair to Kirk, he has full-on amnesia in “The Paradise Syndrome” so he doesn’t know what’s going on. And if you had a babe like Miramanee coming onto you, memories or no, what would you do? But with the full perspective, this whole episode is just uncomfortable all over the place. And to add injury to insult, they kill off a pregnant Miramanee at the end so that Kirk won’t be a deadbeat dad twice over.
Leonard McCoy x Natira
Normally, it’s hard to suspend your disbelief when two characters fall desperately in love in literal minutes, but we’ve really got to give it to McCoy and Natira in “For the World Is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky.” With them, it just works. It might be the fact that McCoy’s days are numbered and he meets Natira at just the right time to decide that his happiness can finally be a priority, which it’s apparently never been throughout his life. They’re just so tender and lovely together, and she gives McCoy something to live for. We really hope these two hooked back up later in life because they SO work.
James Kirk x Elaan
Wow, another instance of someone being influenced by some kind of love drug. I swear I didn’t plan this when I assembled this list. This time, it’s the tears of an Elasian woman in “Elaan of Troyius,” which frankly seems like overkill because it would have been way more interesting if these two just connected on a deeper level instead of through something gross and manipulative. Elaan is so interesting as someone who disrespects conventions and likes to do things her own way, and Kirk could really have found something in common with her. But nope. Magic tears.
Montgomery Scott x Mira Romaine
Finally, it’s Scotty’s time to shine! After that kind of pathetic courtship with Palamas, Scott finally has someone who seems interested when he gets close to Lt. Romaine in “The Lights of Zetar.” Their little flirtation is actually quite cute. Scott proves himself a caring partner, protecting her and supporting her whenever those darned lights keep thwarting her. We never really learn what happens to her after the lights incident, so it’s a little disappointing to presume that it must not have worked out.
James Kirk x Rayna Kapec
This one’s a weird little episode. “Requiem for Methuselah” starts out gross because Flint is basically letting his android ward Rayna hit it off with Kirk as romance practice? Or something? Again, it’s weird. And Rayna herself is a fascinating character, though it’s clear she’s never had her own agency her whole life. But evidently she really left a mark on Kirk because her death absolutely wrecks him! So much that Spock does that really squicky, nonconsensual mind meld on him to remove any memory of her. Bad, Spock! Bad!
Pavel Chekov x Irina Galliulin
If you thought Chekov/Landon was a strange little relationship, it’s an entirely different kind of strange between him and his past flame Irina in “The Way to Eden.” It’s like the writers have entirely made up a new character description for Chekov in this episode just to contrast with the free-spirited nature of the hippies. What stick is up Pavel’s ass this episode? He’s just so militaristic and serious all episode long, and you don’t get a sense that he and Irina ever had anything together. I blame the writing.
Spock x Zarabeth
It’s another Spock relationship and you know what that means: he’s probably not in his right mind! In “All Our Yesterdays,” there’s some time shenanigans going on and the contrivance for the sake of plot is that Spock’s biology is reverting back to that of historic Vulcans before they embraced logic. The more primitive-minded Spock is actually able to develop feelings for Zarabeth in our final example of Spock getting it on with a woman only because of mind alterations. It’s just weird how often this happened, right?
James Kirk x Carol Marcus
We’ve got yet another of Kirk’s exes here in The Wrath of Khan, and we haven’t even mentioned Ruth or Areel Shaw or Helen Noel or Janice Lester or Antonia! But you really get the impression that Carol Marcus really meant something to Kirk, even after their breakup and subsequent separation from each other’s lives despite having a child together. There’s still cordiality between them in the film, which really makes you wonder: what if?
Montgomery Scott x Nyota Uhura
This one doesn’t get a lot of screentime, but even before Sybok comes and effectively brainwashes most of the crew, there’s something between Uhura and Scotty in The Final Frontier. When did this happen? We don’t see much, but we were actually liking what we did see, as the crew’s loneliest characters must’ve found some comfort in each other over the years. Cute!
James Kirk x Janice Rand
I do want to bring up the missed opportunity that was building anything between Kirk and his yeoman, Janice Rand. Grace Lee Whitney says in her autobiography that it was always the idea to develop a romance between the two over the course of the show, but having a ball and chain back on the ship would complicate the captain’s freedom to kiss woman after woman after woman. So after just a few sparse “will they/won’t they” moments together across episodes like “The Naked Time,” “Balance of Terror,” and “Miri,” Rand just plain disappears when Whitney got canned from the show. What a shame.
All that doesn’t even count all the times Kirk has put his mouth on various women he was seducing for espionage purposes (which is MOST of the ones you’ll see in this video compilation). Seriously, come season 3, Kirk just couldn’t keep his lips to himself, but I wouldn’t qualify a lot of them as romances, per se, since there weren’t romantic feelings between the two involved.
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We hope that was as good for you as it was for us. We’re still in the romantic mood, so make sure you’re following along because next week we’ve got more Trek romances to talk about. You can also listen along to the rest of our podcast chatter as we watch through the rest of Star Trek: Discovery over on SoundCloud or whatever your favorite podcatcher is. Give us your best pick up lines over on Facebook or Bluesky. You must be a type-2 phaser, because you’re stunning!
Watching the TAS episode S1E10 “Mudd’s Passion” and ONCE AGAIN Spock is interested in a woman only because he has been drugged. I don’t know whether to be pissed off or laugh my ass off.
