Discussion Main / TinMan

Chopped out this mess from Star Trek, if someone wants to add any of these examples back in a not enraged sense, it'd help. Five asterisks followed by the word "actually" is always a bad omen:

• Spock from Star Trek was usually portrayed as completely calm and logical, but it wasn't until the famous episode "Amok Time" that we learned more about Vulcan psychology. Vulcans learn to control their base emotions all the time and strive to to be calm and logical (their brains produce huge amounts of neurotransmitters responsible for reflexes, recall, etc... and temper. Without that control,they are literally insane Hot-Blooded bloodthirsty maniacs.). But they are not like machines. Otherwise they'd have no intellectual curiosity, either. Many authors (and actors) have had a hard time wrapping their head around that.
  • In the case of "Amok Time", Spock is undergoing the time of his life where all of his pent-up sexual frustration comes forth.
    • The Vulcans on Star Trek Enterprise were even worse. Despite their claims of "no emotions," they looked down on humans with disdain, were cold and arrogant towards other races, and generally like grade-A jerk asses.
    • While it is hard to tell how far they planned in advance, there were exceptions like a middle-aged female Vulcan diplomat, who was calm, witty, charismatic and pleasant, like a favorite grandmother, but still displayed a sharp intellect and a no-nonsense attitude. The idea was that logic can be manipulated based on interpretation, and the current Vulcan government had fallen away from the true logic given by the spiritual father Surak. An arc during the fourth season shows the shift from these Vulcans toward the version of their society we're more familiar with.
      • Vulcans in general pride themselves on being completely without emotion (that alone says it all, but their friends are too polite to call them on it) but clearly have them, while understated. Being the Star Trek universe's answer to Our Elves Are Better, they do irritation and pride reeeeeeal well. Justified, though, because, as mentioned earlier, they're not without emotion - they've learned to suppress their emotions due to nearly destroying themselves in their violent past.
        • Actually, it is possible there is a distinction between Vulcans who suppress their emotions (such as ENT's T'Pol, who was actually VERY emotional) and those who control their emotions (TOS's Spock, with a few exceptions such as the biological Pon Farr, which invariably makes male vulcans become very emotional or conditions of obscene emotional stress, such as when he thought he had killed his captain, or when he lost his planet in the new movie). At the very least, it's a decent theory to keep Vulcans from looking bad as a whole.
    • Celia Lovsky's T'Pau showed you a bit of the Star Trek: Enterprise kind of Vulcan, with her withering "Are thee Vulcan — or are thee human?" And she said "human" like it was "hyena turds". I'm going to assume she was a little affected by the ceremony too.
      • Although she apparently didn't have enough "intellectual curiosity" to bother to learn the difference between thee and thou.
  • In any case, Vulcans are only a few thousand years removed (in a species that lives around three hundred years on average) from their most common ancestors with Romulans, who are at least as emotional as Humans. So whatever Vulcans are doing about their emotions, it's almost entirely cultural. And in addition to Ponn Farr (which, according to the Expanded Universe, can be induced in Romulans who participate in Vulcan marriage practices), there are neurological conditions that result in gradual loss of emotional control, which Vulcans see no logic in discussing with aliens unless they have absolutely no other options (or maybe they just don't like to talk about it).

This entry in Literature:

• In Zepplins West by Joe R. Lansdale, the Tin Man and the Frankenstein Monster enter into a gay relationship. Anthropomorphic personifications of Plug 'n' Play Technology.

Does this have anything to do with the trope? I guess the fact that they're in a relationship shows that they have emotions, but the entry doesn't seem to address the actual trope at all.

Scarecrow dos not get a Trop? :(

Pulled this, because if it's not an example, it doesn't just need a note saying it's not an example; it needs to be gone.

• Castlevania Symphony Of The Night: has normal monsters called Tin Man, being a reference to the original Oz Tin Man, along with other monsters Scarecrow and Lion.
  • Which really has nothing to do with this trope.