Spock Must Die!

The title of this post is drawn by a Star Trek novel by the great James Blish I read when I was young. http://www.amazon.com/Spock-Must-Die-Star-Trek/dp/0553246348 The thought was prompted by yesterday's death of Leonard Nimoy, who lamentably can not be brought back by the Genesis project and implanted memories (katra) (DeForest Kelly having predeceased him such memories are lost anyway). When I was a boy no more than 4, my father and I watched the original series which, if I'm correct, was delayed a year to be shown in Germany or on the American army bases there. Later in America, who ever got to the T.V. first (we had only one), me or my sisters got to pick whether to watch Star Trek (Channel 11) or the Brady Bunch(Channel 5). Because of this I grew to hate the story of a man named Brady. Now I watch Star Trek (or TOS to geeks) on Netflix with my boys. Scotty and Bones are gone, and now Spock played by Nimoy, who always seemed like the most serious of the Star Trek actors. He did narrate "In Search Of.." which cashed in on the ancient astronauts built the pyramids and Big Foot crazes of the 70's but somehow always kept a straight face. The later Star Treks never had the same frisson of excitement. The Next Generation (TNG) seemed way to derivative and I mostly stopped watching before the Borg appeared. My favorite character in that series is Worf but he never achieved the cultural impact of Spock. Star Trek Voyager was even less compelling. I barely count the star base series except for Quark's bar. Finally, came Enterprise which was fine but the hot Vulcan is no Spock. The reboot is pretty good and Quinto is fine. But Nimoy imbued the role with some of his own personality. He took care of the character for 40 years. Spock is now an immortal of fiction almost as much so as Sherlock Holmes or Superman. Nimoy will share in that immortality. But with his passing one of the great pop culture influences of my youth has passed away. Nimoy lived long and prospered, and deserved to.