William Shatner Boldly Went to Space for a Few Minutes and Came Back With Some Thoughts

William Shatner went to space with Jeff Bezos like a Star Trek episode that went off the rails. With Shatner heading to the stars in Blue Origin’s New Shepard, it was a big deal for fans of Star Trek because the second-best Captain Kirk was finally taking to space. (I say second best wholeheartedly because Chris Pine is a better James Tiberius Kirk, and this is the hill I’m willing to die on.)

The trip only lasted minutes, and yet somehow it did the impossible: It humbled William Shatner.

Coming back from space, Shatner seemed speechless, just taking in what he just saw, and honestly, Shatner being speechless is a miracle all on its own, let alone a 90-year-old man going to space and back and being okay. That’s right! In case you forgot, Shatner is 90 and went to space.

Shatner said the following: “I do not know what I may appear to the world, but to myself I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the seashore … whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me.”

As much as I want to make fun of Shatner (and have the right to), there’s still a bit of room, next to our massive frustration with millionaire+ space tourism, for a sense of childlike wonder that Captain Kirk himself was actually in space. And Twitter went from making fun of Shatner to genuinely being excited to see Captain Kirk in the final frontier.

What sucks is that I wish it were Leonard Nimoy instead. I wish he got to go and got to experience space, but alas, that’s not the way the world works. As much as we all love to hate William Shatner, it is cool to get to see someone who gave generations the promise of hope for the future through space exploration go to space and explore where many men went before.

(image: CBS)

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Rachel Leishman

Rachel Leishman (She/Her) is an Assistant Editor at the Mary Sue. She's been a writer professionally since 2016 but was always obsessed with movies and television and writing about them growing up. A lover of Spider-Man and Wanda Maximoff's biggest defender, she has interests in all things nerdy and a cat named Benjamin Wyatt the cat. If you want to talk classic rock music or all things Harrison Ford, she's your girl but her interests span far and wide. Yes, she knows she looks like Florence Pugh. She has multiple podcasts, normally has opinions on any bit of pop culture, and can tell you can actors entire filmography off the top of her head. Her current obsession is Glen Powell's dog, Brisket. Her work at the Mary Sue often includes Star Wars, Marvel, DC, movie reviews, and interviews.

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