Star Trek Would Never Have Worked Without Breaking Its Own Golden Rule, Says William Shatner

Star Trek was always famously built on rules: in the case of The Next Generation, creator Gene Roddenberry drew up commandments to shape the franchise’s second iteration. They weren’t always rigidly followed – like the suggestion we’d never see the Original Series cast being dropped more than 10 times – but they were designed to offer order. When thousands of years of sci-fi lore come into it, order is necessary, but rigidity is fatal. But no matter how fluid rules became, one supposedly unbreakable rule prevailed: the Prime Directive.

No Star Trek fan needs to be told what the Prime Directive is – but for the sake of completion, it’s the fundamental Starfleet commitment to not interfering with the natural development of alien civilizations. The only problem, of course, is that pretty much every Star Trek show ignored the Prime Directive as soon as the plot demanded it. And now Captain Kirk himself – William Shatner – has succinctly confirmed what every Trek fan should already know. Star Trek simply wouldn’t work without breaking the Prime Directive. The Star Trek legend headlined Creation’s ST: CHI Trek to Chicago convention, as reported by TrekMovie, and gave his thoughts on the supposedly golden rule:

“The Directive was infinitely malleable. If you didn’t improve—I think one of them was: you can’t interfere with a civilization. Sorry, no show. That was the plot! You got to go down there and kick somebody’s ass. That was the show! You are worshiping a rock? Are you crazy. Blow the rock up.”

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The idea was that Starfleet crew had to act like David Attenborough and his natural history teams, and avoid messing with nature’s will. No matter how sexually attractive Captain Kirk might have found a particular species. It would never have worked, and that’s sort of the point. As Shatner went on:

“Of course we interfered with the Prime Directive. How do you spell Prime Directive? I mean it was a beautiful—’Thou shalt not kill.’ Except in warfare. Except in when you are angry. Except when you can’t control yourself. Except in self-defense. I mean, you can go on. Thou shalt not kill. The worst thing, to kill someone, take somebody’s life? Yeah! Self-defense!”

This is, remember, the actor behind the character who reprogrammed the Kobayashi Maru training exercise to be winnable, and who was commended for his novel approach. Both versions of Kirk were mostly respectful, buccaneering rebels. Even the far more officious Picard proved repeatedly that he’d do the right thing even in the face of seemingly insurmountable legislative hurdles. It was always the willingness to break the Prime Directive that made the Captains the right candidates to lead. In fact, the entire subplots of Spock and Data being taught to be “more human” leaned heavily on the idea of dispensing with rules.

Shatner’s assessment should be considered a more canonical translation of the true Prime Directive than the actual meaning. Crucially, that meaning should come with an apostrophe to add the many caveats Shatner pointed out (and numerous others). It’s just something of a shame for the Vulcan-cosplaying convention attendee who happened to ask the thoughtful question that they appear to have received both barrels from Shatner. Read the full story over at TrekMovie.

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