#mcspirk cowboy au

[captain-kermit]

long story short this story absolutely wont be

[i-actually-post-stuff]

Final entry in @mcspirkevents Mcspirk month (for now). Here's my piece for SFW; 3-26; Western AU.

A03 collection and context below:

Not so much an AU as opposed to them getting dressed up like it's the cowboy version of a Renfair. I'd love to round out Spock's ears and do something actually AU with this though.

[fuckyeahspones]

1. How did you start shipping Spones?

I started shipping spones when I somehow got it into my head that Spock would have an irrational desire to pick McCoy up and carry him around! I think adestroy’s comics first introduced me to the concept of spones, and it didn’t hurt that the first episode of TOS that I ever saw was All Our Yesterdays lol

Great spones fics (Surgeon’s Mate by belmanoir springs to mind), regular content from sleepymccoy throughout 2015-2017 or so, and excellent fanvids on YouTube by Danzinora Switch all helped to keep me interested in the ship.

2. Why did you ship them?

My “true” ship is McSpirk, but the great thing that the spones relationship has over the spirk relationship is the tension. Spones has what every romcom wants (and usually fails) to have: two people who are clearly well-matched for each other in terms of intellect, ideals, lifestyle and personality, but who have got off on the wrong foot due to relatively minor differences in temperament, mode of expression, prejudices and insecurities.

This tension can be played equally well for comedy and for angst. Furthermore, they are both such honest and loyal people that a serious meaningful relationship is totally plausible, opening up possibilities for fluff or epic romance. So you can have anything you want, with spones!

Also (unlike Kirk, unlike Spock), McCoy simply will not experience fulfilment without marriage. He is lonely and his career and friendships cannot fully sate that loneliness. He needs total commitment to and from one person. And Spock is the best match for him.

3. What are some reasons you like Spock and McCoy as characters?

Well I only fell into the Star Trek fandom because of Leonard Nimoy’s expressive face! Spock has remained my favourite character because I admire his stoicism, his utter integrity, his deadpan wit; and I relate to his reticence, awkwardness and (imo) demisexuality.

It took me a while to really like McCoy. In the show, the writers sometimes didn’t do the character justice, and the spones arguments don’t always make sense. But the fandom has really developed McCoy’s character as it was meant to be and as DeForest Kelley portrayed him. I love his sass, his selflessness, his mistrust of space and technology, the way he covers up his deep emotions with cantankerousness and surface emotions.

Above all, the great thing about McCoy from a shipper’s point of view is his boundless potential for pining! He breaks his own heart at the slightest provocation – which means he has limitless potential for bliss once things work out in the end.

4. Some of your fave things about liking Spones: tropes, fics, headcanons etc?

I like that spones works particularly well as an AU. Now normally I don’t even like AUs. With spirk, for instance, I can’t stand AUs because they can never be better than the actual spirk relationship in TOS, so what’s the point?

With spones, though, it seems as though TOS is almost the worst possible outcome, as though Spock and McCoy would, in any other universe or circumstances, have come together more quickly, easily and completely? So whether it’s a completely different AU (like Regency era or cowboys or something) or just a “what if this episode had gone a little differently” AU, there’s endless scope.

I’m sorry for the late reply! I saw this submission in the inbox but, before I could do anything, my power went out for days so I’m now just taking a chance to look at your answers!

That is a hell of an introduction to Spones! All Our Yesterdays has a lot of Spones content, Adestroy has such great comics, but when sleepymccoy made all that spones content from 2014-2017, it actually was one of the reasons I actually made a tumblr. Danzinora Switch’s videos are WONDERFUL but honestly her fics? Such good gen fic I’m cry. I can see how you got sucked into the Spones very quickly.

I, too, love McSpirk! (My multishipping butt collects ships like no one’s business lmao) You do make a great point about Spones having what most romcom movies want but don’t always succeed at with their main interests.

You are so very right about the writer’s not always doing justice to McCoy’s character (sometimes they write him antithesis to what has been established AS his character in other episodes -- I’ve discussed this before with Trek-Tracks, but Bev and I agreed that some of these writers would write Spock & McCoy as opposites, even on positions that would definitely be very out of character for McCoy, if it meant it was the “opposite” of what Spock was presenting, and it’s just very frustrating) and the amount of thought Deforest Kelley put into McCoy is quite amazing (I have a press release where he talks really in-depth about it, it’s a wonderful read!) and it’s nicer that fans have seen through some of that OOC bs and came up what maybe they were trying to establish with him at the time but didn’t always succeed.

And yes, to the boundless potential for McCoy angst, whump and pining. Goodness.

You have a good point about AUs! They really do work well transposed into all kinds of AUs (I know, I’ve accumulated to many in my fic wips lmao) which is a shame because there aren’t enough AU fics for this pair. In recent years, I’ve started to see more of them, but there is definitely room for more!

It’s been awhile since I’ve read Surgeon’s Mate, but I remembered it to be pretty good, and if anyone wants to read it, you can find it on AO3 here. I do remember it’s a pretty “old” fic, like 2011? 2012? It’s been awhile.

If you like Danzinora Switch’s fanvids, I think y’all would enjoy the gen fics. The fics are SUCH a joy to read, especially like that one where Spock & McCoy time travel to Vulcan’s past. It can be all found and read here, on fanfiction.net.

[captain-kermit]

the spreadsheet. btw

i had to zoom google out as far as it could go, and then zoom my screen out as far as i could go and i still cut off the bottom

long story short this story absolutely wont be