Making Older Media Aspec: A Thought Experiment
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| Image description: Captain Kirk from the Star Trek: The Original Series episode "The Apple." He looks very thoughtful, just like me today. Join me for a bit of a lighter discussion this week as I ask the question: what would some of my favorite older media look like if their stories were aspec allegories? For more details on what I mean, keep reading! |
As an aspec person and a geek, I find myself constantly
asking whether I’m allowed to find “aspec vibes” in places where they clearly
weren’t intended. If you’ve read my posts about media like Star Trek or
if you’ve seen my miscellaneous headcanons, you’ve probably glimpsed some of
that struggle, where the intention of media bumps up against what I myself
bring to the table as a modern-day aspec viewer. While these characters and
stories were not created with aspec identities in mind, what new and unique
interpretations can aspec people bring to them? Do those stories take on a new
quality when looked at through that lens?
Usually, I try to walk the line between those two extremes,
but sometimes I find myself wondering: in a world where I could freely and
fully interpret these stories through my own personal aspec lens, what would
those stories look like? If their themes were explicitly aspec, what message
would those stories have? Of course, I love this media as it is, and I’m
certainly not saying it should be changed or redone; rather, I think of this
more as a fun thought experiment than anything else. When a piece of media
already has some recognizably aspec elements unintentionally baked into the
narrative, the temptation is there to let my mind go wandering and so these
thought experiments are just the musings of an aspec fangirl and writer who
loves looking for stories wherever I can.
So, for a fun change of pace this week, I thought I’d do
exactly that. I want to look at a few pieces of media where the “aspec vibes”
aren’t intentional, but where circumstances, characters, or plot points feel
very recognizable to me from my own aspec perspective. After I discuss how
these things resonate with me and why, I’d like to play around a little with
how these stories or their plot points could easily be rearranged to be aspec
in nature. Again, I’m not saying these things should happen, nor am I saying
these things would resonate for all aspec people – after all, my own aspec
experience and journey is very different from those of many other people on the asexual and/or aromantic spectrums – but I do hope these story experiments serve as interesting jumping
off points for other thoughts and discussion.
Star Trek: The Original Series ("The Apple")
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“The Apple”
from Star Trek: The Original Series
First up is a show and episode I’ve discussed before – “The
Apple,” an episode in season two of Star Trek: The Original Series. If
you’ve read previous posts where I discuss this episode, you’ll know I secretly
love it because it’s just so dang goofy. However, it’s also intensely bad from
an aspec perspective, and so my ideal reworking of this episode would involve
removing the worst elements of the plot while also keeping it an appropriate
level of silly. But before we get into how this episode could be made aspec,
let me recap what this episode is actually about in the first place.
The episode begins when the Enterprise arrives at an
alien planet that appears to be an uninhabited Eden-like paradise (hence the
title of the episode). However, the away team quickly discovers three things –
firstly, the planet is not quite as idyllic as it seems, with many crewmembers falling
victim to the dangers of the natural landscape; secondly, it’s not uninhabited;
and thirdly, they can’t return to the Enterprise due to a strange energy
field that seems to be coming from the planet itself. Forced to find their way
through the deadly landscape, the crew encounters the inhabitants of the planet
and realize these primitive people are the subjects of a god-like entity known
as “Vaal.”
During their time with the people, the Enterprise is
surprised to discover that there are no children among the Vaalians and begin
asking them questions about their lives. The chief of the Vaalians – a man
named Akuta – explains that Vaal forbids “the holding and the touching,” and
that the people are effectively immortal, meaning that they do not need to procreate.
This is where the episode gets truly bonkers (as if it hasn’t been up until
this point), although also somewhat interesting.
When the away team learns that the Vaalians are unfamiliar
with either love or sex, they’re befuddled; Doctor McCoy even makes a sarcastic
remark that the planet can no longer be classified as a paradise. However, Spock
points out that viewing this alien culture through their human lens is unjust,
and that if the Enterprise truly believes in freedom for the Vaalians as
they say, they’ll allow them to choose their own way of doing things. This is a
fascinating argument, but unfortunately it’s turned into a joke by the end of
the episode, and is proved to be an invalid way of thinking because Vaal is
actually an evil supercomputer controlling the Vaalians, eventually turning
them towards violent outcomes.
Naturally, to free the Enterprise, Kirk is forced to
destroy Vaal. And yet, because Vaal is the thing that’s keeping the people immortal,
he has also forced them to not only age and die, but has necessitated the need
for “replacements” – children. The Vaalians are understandably distraught by
the loss of Vaal and worried for their future, but Kirk tells them everything
will be fine; he especially says they’ll now be able to love one another and
have sex, which he claims they’ll both like and “figure out” for themselves.
Even as Spock points out that they’ve essentially forced the Vaalians into what
the Enterprise claim is freedom, the episode ends with some joking at
Spock’s expense, and we never see the Vaalians again.
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| The away team, chiefly Kirk and Spock, meet the Vaalian leader Akuta |
Now, if I were reworking “The Apple,” I would center that reworking around Spock’s arguments, which are not only extremely valid and accurate, but impressive for TOS. These types of ideas and concepts are often brought up in more serious ways in future Star Trek series, and it would have been quite interesting if they had been allowed to take more serious root here and influence future arguments throughout those series yet to come. The idea of forced freedom reminds me of Seven of Nine’s arguments with Janeway in Voyager, for instance, and the idea of not judging or condemning that which you can’t understand was a huge theme for Odo in Deep Space Nine. Although “The Apple” is far sillier than many of these thought-provoking episodes of future series, it still could have served as a springboard for further discussions if these arguments had been allowed to stand.
I also don’t think it would be too out of place to reframe
the discussion about the Vaalians as an actual serious discussion, nor do I
think it would negate the episode’s more entertaining elements. Most of the
reason why “The Apple” is so ridiculous (and terrific) is because the special
effects and set pieces are endearingly corny; for instance, as I’ve said many
times before, Vaal itself looks like it’s made out of papier mâché. But even past
these silly elements or things like the over-the-top ludicrous ways the
episode’s unlucky redshirts die, there is a lot of serious or somber elements
built into the episode. Despite the goofy nature of the redshirts meeting their
end, Kirk is obviously distraught by these deaths and horrified by the idea of
losing everyone onboard the Enterprise, whose peril is actually quite serious.
Therefore, having a serious discussion would be right at home.
Additionally, reframing this episode and making it more
aspec-friendly wouldn’t even require it to actually answer any questions or
commit to any conclusion. In fact, even if the plot still necessitated that
Vaal be destroyed, I believe an aspec-friendly conclusion is still possible.
The main reason why this episode bothers me is the notion that the Vaalians’
sexuality can just be magically flipped back on once Vaal is no longer there to
suppress it or forbid them from engaging in it. It’s also a bit dodgy for the Enterprise
crew to alter the planet’s inhabitants so dramatically and then essentially
shrug and go home. Both things could be avoided, however, by simply giving
Spock’s arguments some level of credibility.
For example, what if Vaal wasn’t the thing keeping the
Vaalians asexual as the away team thinks? Imagine a version of this episode
where Vaal was merely creating the strange energy fluctuations or was
responsible for the hazardous conditions of the planet, but wasn’t actually
causing the people to stagnate like McCoy postulates. Or imagine instead that
it’s left open-ended if the Vaalians will choose love and sex for themselves
now that it’s offered. Even just a few changes to Kirk’s speech would create a
better atmosphere – or, at that rate, let Spock give the speech. He can tell
them that their society doesn’t need to be a human one, it just needs to be one
that works for them, and this speech lets us think that maybe there will be
some Vaalians who don’t need these “normal” relationships after all.
As I said, “The Apple” is an extremely silly episode of TOS
and I love that fact. But it can still be silly while also being thought
provoking, since both of these things are right at home in Star Trek. What
makes the series so iconic is contained right in its opening narration –
seeking out new life and new civilizations, something which isn’t always going
to be recognizably human. I’d love to see a society like the Vaalians explored
in a future episode of a Star Trek series and this time bring these
thoughts and ideas to the forefront. And, because Star Trek is indeed
making new shows and still seeking out new civilizations, it’s all the more
reason to play around with thought experiments such as this one.
“Miniature”
from The Twilight Zone
As mentioned in a previous “Ace Safe Space” post, I love The
Twilight Zone and I have for many years. However, it wasn’t until recently
that I discovered the entire fourth season of the iconic 1959 science fiction
serial contains hour-long episodes, none of which I’d ever seen. One of those
episodes is called “Miniature,” and features the story of Charley Parkes, a
quiet, unassuming man who lives an equally unassuming life. Non-social, working
an empty job, and living with his overbearing mother, Charley’s life changes
one day when he goes to the local museum and finds himself observing an antique
doll house.
Soon, he is amazed to see the figure in the house – a young
woman named Alice – moving around and playing a tune on the piano. However,
when he asks the guard how the figure moves, the guard is completely puzzled.
No less puzzled, Charley continues to go back to the museum, especially when he
faces personal setbacks such as losing his job due to his non-social nature
making the people around him uncomfortable. Each time he goes to the museum, he
sees the figure of the young woman (as well as figures of other people) come
alive, and watches scenes play out almost as if watching a story unfold.
It becomes clear to Charley that the young woman is lonely, isolated,
and misunderstood much like he is. Meanwhile, as he continues to eschew
“normal” human social interaction and goes to the museum with increasing
frequency, his family begins to get worried. His mother enlists the help of his
older sister Myra, who sits him down and tells him bluntly that there’s a
solution to his problems, as well as the recent oddness of his behavior: he
needs a girlfriend. She describes him as being “in that time of life” –
ostensibly, the time of life in which he needs to get married and have children,
which is also what his mother says she wants for him, even though she often
treats him like a child himself.
Given both conflicting opinions are aphobic tropes I’ve discussed before, this episode really seems appropriate to analyze from an aspec lens, despite the fact that it aired over sixty years ago. Even more than just the tropey attitudes of Charley’s family, his own reactions to Myra’s proclamations are even more aspec. Not only does the narrative confirm that Charley has never dated, but many of his awkward responses – while partially because he’s already smitten with Alice – make it clear he has no interest in what Myra is describing. Even so, his sister attempts to set him up with a girl at her job, and the date goes very poorly, for reasons that cement my belief that this episode is a good example of today’s topic.
When he and this woman go out on their date, she tries to
rush him into kissing her despite his dismay at the idea, considering they’ve
only just met one another. When he refuses (leading to an awkward situation),
she dismissively declares, “You don’t need a girl, you need a doctor!” The
appalled Charley expresses his frustration with the situation as he watches the
dollhouse again the next day, stating he knows it must seem surprising compared
to Alice’s time period, but that this is just how things are these days. Based
on his behavior, however, and how he’s drawn to Alice, it’s clear this type of
thing is not how Charley wants to live his life.
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| Image description: Charley Parkes (played by a young Robert Duvall) visiting the museum dollhouse |
In the introduction, I mentioned how some of this media unintentionally has aspec themes. I think this episode is a prime example, since Charley accidentally seems like he could be demisexual and/or demiromantic when you consider his dismay at the quickly cultivated and ultimately hollow nature of the relationship his family wants him to have. Essentially, everyone in Charley’s life wants him to act a certain way, and people telling him how they think he should live his life is a running theme; he’s even fired from his job literally for nothing more than the fact that he doesn’t fit in. In fact, his boss describes him as the proverbial square peg in a round hole, and this plays out in how he interacts with his family too.
It seems to me like no one in Charley’s life actually cares
about what he wants or how he feels; at times, it doesn’t even really seem like
they care if he’s happy. Rather, they only care that he appears as normal as
possible, lives as normally as possible, and is someone they can relate to,
which is certainly what it feels like when his sister suggests he needs to date.
While she frames it by saying Charley has stagnated (there’s that word again),
she doesn’t seem interested in helping him achieve his own goals or live his
own independent life, only making him normal. Of course, the twist ending is
that [Spoiler alert!] Charley is in fact able to be with Alice after all, so he does find love,
but it’s in an extremely un-normal and non-conventional way, which could once
again have some aspec parallels.
Furthermore, I find it interesting that everyone tries to
convince Charley that the world he’s yearning for – the oldentimes world of the
dollhouse – is “simple.” However, Charley himself understands that there’s
nothing simple about it. This is something of a staple in The Twilight Zone,
where men who are dissatisfied with the pace or demands of their lives yearn
for a simpler time, only to learn or realize that these simple worlds either
are unattainable or not quite so idyllic as they imagine them to be. But because
Charley knows that Alice’s world isn’t easy or simple, it frames his desire to
be there as something entirely unique. It’s not that he longs for perfect or
simple; rather, he just longs for something different, an emotion I can
certainly understand as an aspec person.
As such, making this story more aspec wouldn’t be difficult
at all; in fact, most of the framework is already there and would just have to
be leaned into even further. If I were making this story aspec, I would allow
there to be more time for Charley’s feelings about Alice to be explored. Near
the end of the episode, he makes it clear that he feels they could love one
another as they deserve to be loved and could understand one another, and I’d
play that up. Additionally, I’d make Charley’s alienation from the world even
more about not relating to modern ideas of romance – a notion which makes me
realize this story could be easily and fascinatingly played out in a present day
setting as well.
The only thing that keeps me from hailing this episode as
perfect accidental representation is that Charley’s interactions with Alice could
have a potentially voyeuristic quality depending on how you frame things.
Additionally, he sort of idealizes Alice as being unlike other women in a way
that could, again, be framed as somewhat problematic. But from my lens, I think
this could be framed to reinforce the idea of him being on the asexual
spectrum, because Alice provides him with something that no one else has
offered – understanding. When analyzed that way, you could perhaps say that
understanding is what Charley needs even more than the romance, and that’s a
very interesting thought.
“Number 12
Looks Just Like You” from The Twilight Zone
Speaking of the need for understanding, another episode of The
Twilight Zone that I feel could work for this thought experiment is one of
the regular shorter episodes, “Number 12 Looks Just Like You.” I discussed this
episode in the aforementioned “Ace Safe Space” post, not because it’s
particularly comforting, but because I feel it’s deeply recognizable from an
aspec perspective, even though it’s technically about physical appearance more
than anything.
The episode centers on a futuristic society (although the
narration chillingly postulates it to be the year 2000) where, upon turning
nineteen, everyone goes through a procedure known as “The Transformation.”
Thanks to technology, their bodies are altered so their lifespans are extended,
any physical deformities are “corrected,” and in appearance they are made to
fit a societal standard of beauty. This is accomplished by allowing the
individual to pick their desired form from a set of numbered models – hence the
title.
The story centers on eighteen-year-old Marilyn Cuberle, a
plain, clever girl who doesn’t want to undergo the Transformation, an attitude understood
only by her late father, who respected and cherished Marilyn for herself, not
an artificial metric of beauty. Marilyn longs for depth of intellect and
emotion that her society doesn’t allow and finds this society of attractiveness
to be ultimately shallow, superficial, and hollow; to quote her father, “if
everyone is beautiful, then no one will be.” However, no one else can
understand why she feels this way and, when she repeatedly expresses her desire
not to be changed, she realizes the dark undercurrent that runs through her
society.
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| Image description: Marilyn (right) with her mother, discussing the Transformation |
As I said, this story is obviously one about beauty and what it means to be an individual; but it also discusses the horror of homogeny and the ever-present fear of loss of self that conforming to certain societal standards brings with it, both of which resonate with me as an aspec person. Marilyn is extremely different from other people in her society, and her refusal to conform to the conventional metrics of “normal” life is considered unthinkable. Her ideas about her own worth are looked upon as almost freakish, which in turn leads her to feeling alone in the world.
Whenever I watch the episode, I’m especially struck by the
scene in which Marilyn watches her friend Valerie chirpily describe how
wonderful and happy life is while Marilyn herself suffers. She stares at
Valerie in wide-eyed horror and realizes for the first time that the people
around her can’t possibly understand her pain. It’s a gut-wrenching scene
because, although I’ve never been in a situation as horrifying as Marilyn’s, I’ve
definitely felt like people sometimes refuse to see what I’m going through or
literally can’t understand it no matter how much I may desperately try to make
them see.
In fact, it's somewhat ironic that I’m discussing this
episode now, given my previous post about my own frustrations as an aspec
person in fandom. Although I’ve had this post planned for a while and its date
is set in stone, the fact that it coincides with a lot of relevant emotions
makes it especially salient to be writing about. Unfortunately, a lot of the
world and society wants people to conform to a certain standard and, in many
ways, I neither want to nor can conform to that standard. Because of that, I
can deeply relate to Marilyn’s pains and fears, as well as the ever-present
struggle of coming into conflict with something that everyone else thinks is
good and “normal”.
For that reason, if I were making this episode an aspec
allegory instead of a beauty one, I would keep a great deal of it the same.
Even the Transformation could retain its elements of making a person beautiful,
and I’d lean even more heavily into the superficial nature of it and what it
does to society. This would be especially appropriate, since the episode goes out
of its way to show that many people’s relationships are shallow and short-lived
in this world, such as by pointing out that people have dozens of marriages
throughout their lifetime.
My Marilyn character would also remain the same. Something I’ve
always loved about the episode is that Marilyn is a clever, well-read
individual and the Transformation (an allegory for over-obsession with changing
one’s self to fit the standard) is seen as a force that would crush her to make
her more “acceptable.” So again, her story, her personality, and her struggles
could remain very similar. In particular, my mind goes to something she says
about the Transformation and the way it breaks people down: “Being like
everybody is the same as being nobody,” a sentiment which I think could be especially
appropriate if the story were an aspec allegory instead.
If you’re familiar with the episode, you know it has a very
downbeat ending, and the horrifying nature of it is effective. Would I keep that
type of ending if I were making an aspec version of this episode? That would depend
entirely on what I wanted my message to be. If I wanted to really drive home
the insidious nature of making people conform – something which a lot of
trope-filled media makes seem like a simple and unimpactful process – then yes,
the downbeat ending would be perfect.
But if I wanted to give a bit of hope that it’s possible to
be your own person… well, maybe the Transformation wouldn’t work out after all.
Or maybe Marilyn would, against all odds, find someone who believes in the same
things she does. Maybe somehow, she can escape her society and see what lies
beyond a place that demands conformity, or can learn to fight back. As an aspec
person, I’m still figuring out how to do any of these things myself, so it’s
hard to say for sure. But maybe there’s a place where these things are indeed
possible beyond the confines of… the Twilight Zone.
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| Image description: Spoiler alert! The downbeat ending of "Number 12 Looks Just Like You" actually provides some interesting thoughts about where this type of story could go in future. |
Whether old or new, I think we could have a very bright future
indeed if more people stopped to ask themselves what aspec stories would look
like. The media I’ve discussed here was all groundbreaking and influential for
its time in large part because it dared to ask the questions no one else would
ask and never stopped imagining “what if?” If we learn anything from classic
media – and if I did anything with this post – I hope it’s the lesson that we too
can ask “what if” and that, when it comes to our imaginations, not even the sky
is the limit.
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