Did you know? Nicholas Meyer regrets one Spock scene

Nicholas Meyer has been a part of Star Trek since he helped rewrite the script for Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.

Nicholas Meyer was hired as the director for Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan and that turned into his rewriting the script, which, as we all know, resulted in an extraordinary movie. Though Meyer didn’t direct Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, he co-wrote the screenplay with Harve Bennett, which was another success. So it came as no surprise that he was asked to be the director of the final movie that would include the entire cast of Star Trek: The Original Series. Once again, he co-wrote the screenplay for Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, after developing the story with Leonard Nimoy. Even though the movie was another success, there is one scene that, looking back so many years later, Meyer regrets putting into the film.

Looper unearthed an IGN interview with Meyer from 2016 who revealed a scene that doesn’t make him happy now.

"“But I also think that the scene where Spock is doing the Vulcan mind meld on [Kim Cattrall’s character] Valeris to get information sort of looks like waterboarding to me, and doesn’t make me very happy to see it.”"

Nicholas Meyer didn’t have a problem with the scene until later.

Meyer said that, at the time, it didn’t occur to anyone involved in the film that there was something wrong with the scene. But it doesn’t seem like it was the right thing for Spock to do.

While the scene is intense and makes Meyer cringe now, it was necessary for the information to be revealed, and Valeris (Kim Cattrall) wasn’t going to give it up willingly. Spock (Leonard Nimoy) used the only means he had at his disposal to extract that information. It might have been out of character for Spock to be that aggressive, but he was trying to save millions of lives. That wasn’t the time for logic; it was the time for action.

Most fans will agree it’s the most intense mind-meld ever in the history of Star Trek, but it served a purpose. Spock wasn’t trying to hurt Valeris just because he could; she would not disclose anything so he had to result to drastic measures. Of the comments I’ve seen about this scene, most agree that Leonard Nimoy handled it perfectly, with a show of anger and regret at the end. It wasn’t a pleasant scene, but it is a powerful, necessary one that made the movie that much better.

What do you think? Was the scene too harsh? Did Spock essentially torture Valeris?