Trek Tropes
universe
- Cool Starship
- Standard Sci-Fi Setting
- The World Is Just Awesome
settings
USS Enterprise
- The Bridge: Enterprise contains one.
- Close-Knit Community: 400 people + confined space + 5+ years.
- Crazy Workplace: A murder on ship? Evil doppelgangers of your officers? Abraham Lincoln appearing on the viewscreen, or Surak on a world you beam down to? Somebody stole your friend's brain? Just another Alpha Shift.
Hellguard
- Death World: It's called Hellguard.
- I Don't Like the Sound of That Place: Again, it's called Hellguard.
Vulcan
- Sand Worm: The (semi-mythical) Underlier(s).
- Solar Flare Disaster: In the prehistoric past.
species, cultures, & organisations
the Federation
- Alien Non-Interference Clause: The Prime Directive.
- The Federation: Trope namer!
- Fictional United Nations: TVTropes disagrees with me. I think that's nonsense because I watched Journey to Babel & read Spock's World.
- Melting Pot Sci-Fi Setting
Horta
the Klingon Empire
- Martyrdom Culture: Death in battle is heavily idealised, if not expected.
Romulans
Starfleet
- Mildly Military: Starfleet is not, per se, a military. Starfleet is also not, per se, not a military. As the offical trope page puts it, Starfleet wants to be primarily an exploration and science service, but it becomes a proper military when it has to.
Vulcans
- Brutal Honesty
- Did You Think I Can't Feel?: An unfortunately common misconception.
Rule of Silences redaction
- Mating Season Mayhem: Pon Farr.
- Mindlink Mates: Vulcans share a mental bond with their spouse, sensing each other's consciousnesses and feeling each other's emotions unless they are deliberately concealed.
- Pointy Ears
- The Stoic
- Telepathic Spacemen
characters
James T. Kirk
- Benevolent Boss
- Big Beautiful Man
- The Captain
- Determinator
Privacy redaction
- Genocide Survivor: One of nine survivors of the Tarsus IV massacres perpetrated by Kodos.
- The Men First: Consistently priotises the welfare of his crew members above his own.
Kevin
- An Alien Named Bob: A Klingon named Kevin. His mother was Human.
- Half-Human Hybrid: The son of Korsal, a Klingon scientist, and a Human Starfleet officer.
Leonard McCoy
- Determined Doctor: He will prioritise treating his patients - which includes anyone injured or unwell in his vicinity - above anything.
- Frontier Doctor: Final frontier doctor.
- The Heart
- I'm a Doctor, Not a Placeholder: Trope namer, trope originator, trope codifier.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold
- Tough Love
- Super Doc: Using liquid concrete as a bandage? Getting both participants in a duel to the death out alive? Healing an infection on a person using telekinetic powers to throw things and strangle people? Performing open heart surgery while using an experimental drug on your close friend? Kidney repair on someone not your patient? Rewiring a brain, manually? No wonder he says he's beginning to think he can cure a rainy day.
Montgomery Scott
Nyota Uhura
- Communications Officer: Naturally.
Saavik
- Children Forced to Kill
- Constantly Curious: Something which is considered almost a virtue among Vulcans.
- Foster Kid
- Half-Breed Angst
- Hiding Your Heritage
- Little Miss Badass
- Taking You With Me: To Hellguard. Ye'll be killed, man. not make it out alive! [...] "You won't get him, you bastard world! I've sold my soul to see you die! And I'm coming to kill you-myself!"
- Troubling Unchildlike Behaviour
- Unadoptable Orphan
- Wild Child
Sarek
- Ambadassador: At least twice has had to - and easily succeeded to - hold his own in physical fights in what was supposed to be a diplomatic setting. Also, apparently, "quite capable" of killing if he were to deem it neccessary.
- Badass Bookworm
- Cunning Linguist: He learned several languages and dialects on Terra, was noted to be especially good at teaching English, and also learned to navigate lies and subterfuge.
- Diplomatic Cover Spy: Played with; T'Pau originally sent him to the Earth consulate to report back to her.
- Intrigued by Humanity: He quickly found this after being posted to Terra's Vulcan Embassy.
- Not So Above It All: Apparently, with his non-Vulcan students, he is a "comedian".
- Will Not Tell a Lie
Spock
- Arranged Marriage: A situation thankfully dealt with by Jim and Leonard.
- Blue Blood: A direct descendant of Surak, and a member of T'Pau's clan.
- Character Catchphrase: "Fascinating."
- Character Tics: When in great distress, will often tug his shirt down.
- Constantly Curious: Considered almost a virtue among Vulcans.
- Child of Two Worlds: Trope namer.
- Deuteragonist: With Kirk.
- Death Seeker: "I shall do neither."
- Friendless Background
- Half-Breed Angst
- Half-Human Hybrid: The first surviving Vulcan-Human hybrid.
- Jewish and Nerdy
- Martial Pacifist: "I am a Vulcan, bred to peace" - and trained in combat.
- Spock Speak: Trope namer. Spock speaks very precisely, frequently utilising jargon.
- Token Nonhuman: During his first few years aboard Enterprise, the only visibly nonhuman officer aboard.
- Virtuous Vegetarianism
relationships
Amanda + Sarek
- Attracted to Humor: Amanda makes Sarek laugh for the first time in years, and laugh so hard he can't breathe.
- Authoritative in Public, Docile in Private: Sarek, to a certain extent.
- Boldly Coming: "then I met your father… and decided to practice a different form of cooperation between intelligent life forms," as Amanda phrases it later.
- Converting for Love: Amanda, to an extent.
- Garden of Love: Sarek made a garden for Amanda.
- Happily Married
- Interspecies Romance: Human; Vulcan.
- Learning to Swim: Amanda taught Sarek to swim.
- Maligned Mixed Marriage
- Marry For Love
- Sickeningly Sweethearts: Certainly by Vulcan standards of body language and public affection.
Amanada + Sarek + Spock
- Our Phlebotinum Child: The first surviving Vulcan-Human hybrid, with thanks to the VSA's genetics labs.
Daniel Corrigan + Sorel
- Interspecies Romance: Human; Vulcan.
- Maligned Mixed Marriage
the family Enterprise
Bones, Hikaru, Jim, Nyota, Pavel, Scotty, & Spock; sometimes also Saavik.
- Everyone's Baby Sister: Everyone is quick to become protective of Saavik after meeting her.
- Rescued from the Underworld: Genesis, with Spock.
- True Companions
Hikaru + Pavel
- Those Two Guys: Especially on the bridge.
James T. Kirk + Leonard McCoy + Spock
- Freudian Trio: Id (makes decisions from emotion and instinct - McCoy), superego (makes decisions from rules and logic - Spock), superego (balances both factors - Kirk).
- Power Trio
- Take a Third Option: "I will do what I must... but not with him." In Amok Time, thanks to Jim's refusal to fight to kill, Bones is spurred on to find a solution - to, as he puts it, cheat - where neither of his friends die.
James T. Kirk + Spock
- Celebrity Power Couple: Both are quite famous and influential.
- Flowers of Romance: "Husbandry would be quite efficacious." "[holding a flower, staring adoringly] Are you sure about that?" "Oh, quite sure."
- Happily Married
- Interspecies Romance: Human; Vulcan.
- Marry For Love: Arranged marriages and marriaged of convenience are the norm in Vulcan society. Spock chooses to marry the man he loves instead.
Leonard McCoy + Spock
- Red Oni, Blue Oni: While they both wear Sciences blue (McCoy in the ligher medical shade), they are close friends with very different worldviews - passion ('red oni') vs. intellect ('blue oni').
- Hypocritial Heartwarming: They will argue and insult each other ad nauseum - but will defend one another.
- Science Hero
- Vitriolic Best Buds
Saavik + Spock
- Adult Adoptee: After being fostered by Spock in childhood, and an ongoing mentorship, she was officially adopted into the family.
- Happily Adopted
- Parent-Child Team
Sarek + Spock
- Follow in My Footsteps: Sarek wanted Spock to study at the Vulcan Science Academy like he and his own father had done, and was disappointed when Spock chose to instead attend Starfleet Academy.
- It Runs in the Family: As Salok says, "so difficult for fathers when sons are like themselves."
