Spock's rank
- Thread starter Ultramann
- Start date
Why not? Gary Mitchell was LtCmdr at 23 already, as per "Where No Man"...
Also, McCoy seems to start out with LtCmdr rank: he appears to enroll to the Academy simultaneously with Kirk (or at least is the only other passenger on the Academy flight who wears civvies), and three years later is wearing the appropriate braid for LtCmdr and serving aboard the Enterprise as a regular, apparently having graduated faster than Kirk. Probably has got to do with him holding an academic degree. Now, doesn't it appear rather likely that Spock would hold a degree or three as well?
Timo Saloniemi
Also, McCoy seems to start out with LtCmdr rank: he appears to enroll to the Academy simultaneously with Kirk (or at least is the only other passenger on the Academy flight who wears civvies), and three years later is wearing the appropriate braid for LtCmdr and serving aboard the Enterprise as a regular, apparently having graduated faster than Kirk. Probably has got to do with him holding an academic degree. Now, doesn't it appear rather likely that Spock would hold a degree or three as well?
Timo Saloniemi
As Pike said to Kirk in the Shipyard Bar, "You can be an officer in four years, have your own ship in eight."
Not everyone's Harry Kim!
Not everyone's Harry Kim!
He's Spock. There's little he can't do.
...Assuming, of course, that Medical advances in a special fashion. Could be that McCoy simply was personally very good at climbing the rank ladder.
The curious thing is, specialists in fields other than medicine ought to hold degrees, too, yet for example starship engineers don't appear to receive any sort of rank compensation. Or then "old men" like Scotty or Sisko stagnate at the LtCmdr rank despite receiving it early on. McCoy didn't appear to get promoted for more than a decade, either, after all.
Timo Saloniemi
The curious thing is, specialists in fields other than medicine ought to hold degrees, too, yet for example starship engineers don't appear to receive any sort of rank compensation. Or then "old men" like Scotty or Sisko stagnate at the LtCmdr rank despite receiving it early on. McCoy didn't appear to get promoted for more than a decade, either, after all.
Timo Saloniemi
All the Doctors, seem to be at least aLt, if not LtCmdr, by the pure and simple fact of being Doctors (See especially Bashir, who we know was pretty fresh out of the Academy when being assiged to DS9 as Chief Med Officer). I believe Ezri was pretty fresh out of the Academy as well, and wasn't she a Lt?
As King Daniel basically mentioned, we're talking about the best of the best, here. That's what TOS was. They were excpetional, and to me, anyway, that's the only necessary explanation for their seemingly quick advancement in this movie. Even Chekov is only 17 when he becomes navigator of the flagship of the fleet by the end of the movie.
For what it's worth, in my "in head canon," I tend to think McCoy was in the Starfleet reserve, having done a prior hitch years ago (which obviously left a bitter taste in his mouth given his rant to Kirk when we meet him).
When his personal life fell apart, he had nowhere else to go, and he simply re-upped. He went to the Academy to bring his training up to date. That wouldn't take too long.
McCoy must've held some prior rank. After all, he tells the guy at the shuttle during the scramble for the Vulcan mission that if he didn't board, the Enterprise would go off without one of its "senior" medical officers on board. That Spock made him Chief Medical Officer also would be evidence that he was already the number two man in Sick Bay.
For what it's worth, in my "in head canon," I tend to think McCoy was in the Starfleet reserve, having done a prior hitch years ago (which obviously left a bitter taste in his mouth given his rant to Kirk when we meet him).
When his personal life fell apart, he had nowhere else to go, and he simply re-upped. He went to the Academy to bring his training up to date. That wouldn't take too long.
McCoy must've held some prior rank. After all, he tells the guy at the shuttle during the scramble for the Vulcan mission that if he didn't board, the Enterprise would go off without one of its "senior" medical officers on board. That Spock made him Chief Medical Officer also would be evidence that he was already the number two man in Sick Bay.
Yes, he's even specifically called a "whiz kid". Whether he was one of the hastily drafted (and perhaps insta-graduated) cadets, or had already been through the Academy, was not explicated. But since we know Wesley had some hope of getting in while underage, simply by taking the special whiz kid exam, it shouldn't be impossible for Chekov here to have done the full four years after getting in at thirteen - or just two years by enrolling at fifteen and then being a very good student.
In contrast, nothing about the TOS ship pointed at a collection of Starfleet's finest. We just saw a random starship crew at work, admittedly with a pretty young captain and with a celebrity halfbreed for XO/SO.
Then again, we mostly see doctors when they serve as starship CMOs. Bashir is the only one whose career we follow when he doesn't (yet?) hold that prestigious position. And he does start out as a junior Lieutenant, from which it still is a good distance to LtCmdr or Cmdr.
Since we only ever see this one MD at such an early stage, we can't really tell whether he's a typical or atypical case (apart from being the second brightest in his class, or at least pretending to be). For all we know, MDs graduate as Ensigns just like everybody else, and Bashir just got his first promotion very quickly, perhaps for performing demanding postgrad studies.
The STXI version of McCoy is at odds with Bashir's story, apparently never holding any rank below LtCmdr. But rather than setting a pattern, he simply makes every option and interpretation equally likely for us fans, eager to rationalize. For all we know, he didn't have a previous history in Starfleet - but, aiming for a purely medical role, he skipped most of the Academy, graduated years ahead of Kirk, and then earned lots of extra brownie points in various medical tasks and studies while Kirk struggled with Kobayashi Maru.
Timo Saloniemi
Granted. I didn't mean that the TOS crew was a collection of Starfleet's finest put together from the start by design. Indeed, coicidence and contrivance brought them together in ST09, and it was probably a far more ordinary way in TOS. Either way, it was soon obvious they weren't just a random collection of competent officers.
I think it would be safe to say that after a few adventures together, Starfleet had to begin to notice what they had, and the crew developed an extraordinary reputation. Let's face it, it was obvious they were an exceptional crew. Kirk became famous for his leadership. Spock was acknowledged as the best first officer in the fleet. Scotty was the "miracle worker," and so on. The TNG Enteprise crew developed pretty much the same reputation as the best in Starfleet in their time.
Even though Spock and Kirk may be roughly the same age, we don't know when Spock actually entered the Academy. He could have been there for a few years before Kirk even arrived. (especially in the Abramsverse)
Admiral Bernett says "He's one of our most distinuished graduates. He's programmed the Kobayashi Maru test for the past four years."
Assuming he graduated before he started programming the simulations, Spock's way ahead of Kirk, experience-wise. I suspect he joined up at 18, or therabouts.
Assuming he graduated before he started programming the simulations, Spock's way ahead of Kirk, experience-wise. I suspect he joined up at 18, or therabouts.
In the Prime timeline what was Spock's rank at this time? Lt Cmdr I assume since he started TOS at that rank. So what changed in the timeline accelerated his promotion? Starfleet becoming more militaristic after the first Nero incursion?
McCoys rank and position could be based around being a practicing MD for a number of years, possibly even a leader in his field. When his Wife left him he signed up to Starfleet and didnt have to go through Starfleet Medical training and instead just did regular training and was commissioned as appropriate to his experience level.
This would also explain why he was in the same year as Uhura who was already one year into the 4 year training when he boarded the shuttle (we can assume anyway) and finished in 3 years the same as Kirk did.
Uhura also graduated as an Lt, possibly as it was mentioned she was at the top of her class, Sulu was also an Lt but we dont know if he came straight from the Academy or if he had already graduated.
This would also explain why he was in the same year as Uhura who was already one year into the 4 year training when he boarded the shuttle (we can assume anyway) and finished in 3 years the same as Kirk did.
Uhura also graduated as an Lt, possibly as it was mentioned she was at the top of her class, Sulu was also an Lt but we dont know if he came straight from the Academy or if he had already graduated.
^ McCoy's rank is not surprising, as it's standard practice for military doctors to be commissioned directly at higher ranks (usually an O-3 at least) and bypass the lower ones.
Yes, we could argue that Uhura and McCoy are cadets because they are seen wearing red uniforms at SF Academy.
However, we could just as easily argue that they are graduated officers and instructors both - a good reason for them to take part in the Kobayashi Maru simulation that Cadet Kirk is still struggling with. Saavik's simulation also featured a large number of graduated officers, after all. (This regardless of whether we consider her an undergraduate or a postgraduate herself.)
Also note that we are never told that those red uniforms would be specific to cadets. People who were never indicated to be cadets, such as Sulu, are wearing these at the conclusion of the movie.
Kirk calls Uhura "cadet" once in the bar, three years before the main events. Pike calls her "cadet" once during the main events, but what would he know? His ship is being swarmed by cadets and other people unfamiliar to him.
Timo Saloniemi
