- Sarek
Star Trek character|if=
bgcolor = #90ee90
Title = Sarek
Caption = Sarek of Vulcan
Size = 250px
Species = Vulcan
Gender =Male
Planet = Vulcan
Affiliation =United Federation of Planets
Posting = Vulcan ambassador to the Federation
Rank =Ambassador
Portrayed =Mark Lenard Jonathan Simpson Ben Cross In the fictional
Star Trek universe, Sarek is a Vulcanambassador , and father ofSpock . He was portrayed byMark Lenard .Jonathan Simpson played a younger Sarek in "", although Lenard provided thevoiceover .Ben Cross will play Sarek in the upcoming eleventh Star Trek film.The character appears in the original ' series, the , four "Star Trek" movies, two episodes of ', and numerous "Star Trek" novels and comics.
History
A legendary Vulcan
ambassador to theUnited Federation of Planets , Sarek was born in2165 [Sarek gives his age as 102.437 in "Journey to Babel".] to Skon and a never-identified Vulcan woman. His grandfather,Solkar , was the first Vulcan ambassador to Earth.Sarek was married twice during the course of an illustrious career that was taught in Vulcan and Federation history classes well before his death at age 203. Prior to his first marriage, he was involved with a Vulcan princess, T'Rea. Sarek later married a Human,
Amanda Grayson . After Amanda's death, he married Perrin, another Human, who survived him.Sarek's accomplishments were many, and included the Coridan admission debate in
2267 before the Federation Council, earlyKlingon treaties, and his incredible 93-year effort to bring about a Federation-Legaran treaty. Contrastingly, his personal life was stormy, even for a Vulcan. T'Rea bore Sarek his first son,Sybok , in2224 . At some point, T'Rea died and Sybok came to live with Sarek, his stepmother, and his half-brother. Sybok would later be banished from Vulcan for rejecting his logical upbringing and encouraging others to follow him in his futile attempt of religious awakenings.Sarek's second son,
Spock , enteredStarfleet Academy . Sarek opposed the decision, and the two were estranged for years. Following an "Enterprise" mission where Spock helped save Sarek's life, father and son reconciled.After Spock's apparent death in ', it was Sarek who went to Rear Admiral
James T. Kirk to ask him to bring Spock's body and Dr. Leonard McCoy — who was holding Spock's "katra", or living essence — back to Vulcan. At first, Sarek assumed that Kirk had Spock's katra, but a mind-meld with Kirk proved that this was not the case. It was only the video recordings of the engine room that proved McCoy carried the katra. In the meantime, Spock's body had been regenerated by theGenesis Device . Kirk brought Spock's body and McCoy back to Vulcan, where Sarek then asked for "fal-tor-pan" to be performed, and Spock's body and his katra were then rejoined. (')Shortly after Spock's resurrection, Sarek traveled to Earth in order to intercede on behalf of Kirk and the remainder of the "Enterprise" crew, who had violated orders to rescue Spock. He remained on Earth when an alien probe approached Earth seeking answers as to why it lost contact with
humpback whale s. Kirk went back in time and recovered two humpback whales. Sarek was the first to spot theKlingon Bird-of-Prey as it made planet-fall nearStarfleet headquarters. Later, after the probe had left Earth's orbit, Sarek witnessed the session in which the Federation Council pronounced judgment on Kirk and permanently demoted him to Captain. Afterward, Sarek had a private discussion with Spock in which he admitted his son had done well in his life with a group of friends of rare caliber. ("")Sarek's next appearance was in '. Here he is shown participating in the Khitomer Conference, which was where the first diplomatic breakthroughs with the Klingons took place. This would also be
Mark Lenard 's final appearance in the role; Sarek's appearances on ' were filmed before this movie.Sarek continued to work as an ambassador and negotiator for the Federation for more than a century. Some of his activities in this timeframe have been explored in novels. Sarek and Spock would continue to argue from time to time after Amanda's death (Spock did not approve of Sarek remarrying). During debates regarding the
Cardassian s, Spock would publicly criticize Sarek's position. While Sarek did not react and himself did not appear offended by Spock's criticisms, his third wife, Perrin, was deeply offended by them.In the "" episode "Sarek", set in
2366 , Sarek was discovered to haveBendii syndrome , an incurable, degenerative disease of the mind that resulted in him being unable to control his emotions. In order to complete the Legaran negotiations, he entered into a mind-meld with CaptainJean-Luc Picard , and was able to use Picard's emotional stability to complete the negotiations; in return, Picard received (and later retained) elements of Sarek's memory and even some Vulcan abilities, such as knowledge of theVulcan nerve pinch . Because of this mind-meld, Picard became the second captain of a starship named "Enterprise" to be shown on-screen entering into a mind-meld with Sarek (although Kirk held the rank of Admiral and was not in command of the "Enterprise" at the time of his mind meld).Sarek then retired to Vulcan where he continued to fight the Bendii syndrome for two more years. He ultimately lost his battle against the disease. Shortly before his death, Sarek met one final time with Picard and provided him with valuable information as to why Spock went to Romulus. As a final request, Sarek asked Picard to tell his son that he loved him. A short while later, Sarek died in
2368 . ("Unification") Picard later offered Spock the chance to touch what he and Sarek shared in their mind-meld.In books written by
William Shatner , it is stated that Sarek had not actually been suffering from Bendii syndrome. Instead, Sarek had been poisoned in a manner which made him appear to have Bendii Syndrome as part of a conspiracy. When these same conspirators tried to poison Spock in a similar manner, their complicity in Sarek's death was also discovered.Appearances
Sarek appears in the following episodes and films:
;""
*"Journey to Babel ";""
*"Yesteryear";
Star Trek films
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*"Star Trek";""
*"Sarek"
*"Unification, Part I"References
External links
* [http://www.startrek.com/startrek/view/features/documentaries/article/8126.html Startrek.com article on Sarek]
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