I hope Gary Mitchell will show up at some point since he has to be there. Kirk requested him for his first mission…

Mitchell was in a class or more below Kirk. Kirk was his instructor (I presume “teaching assistant”) in a course or two, and since Mitchell described Kirk as “walking book with legs”, I’m presuming he was TA’ing a math or physics lab course. Or perhaps computer simulation programming… (heh)

Their friendship may have begun there, but not as peers. Later, when Kirk got his first command (whatever ship before Enterprise), he asked for Mitchell.

That’s if you’re going with dialogue.

Spock *became* Kirk’s best friend, right before our eyes during the first season of TOS.

Mitchell is a logical choice too though, but it goes against it being stated he doesn’t interact (much?) with the major players. Perhaps if we’re seeing a flashback to Kirk taking the KM test, doing a semester “command line training” and serving as a TA as part of this responsibility… then Mitchell could be one of his students who might be involved in the “reprogramming”. In that regard, this would tie Mitchell, Marcus and Kirk together…. Now if we could only figure out if someone was assigned to portray Marcus. (Though, I still think the Orion girl character is a ruse to cover the appearance of Carol Marcus…)

(Wicked thought… could that RED uniform we’ve seen Chris Pine in be this “command line training” graduate student uniform, designed to contrast with the GREY of an undergrad at Starfleet?)

If he’s someone who interacts *only* with Kirk… Mitchell sort of doesn’t make sense, whereas Sam Kirk does make sense. Sam choosing not to follow his father’s career path into Starfleet, might just have been the reason a young 16-ish year-old wild child Jim Kirk suddenly straightens out and decides to pursue his father’s footsteps… At least that’s an “origins scene” I’d like to see for Jim Kirk. That would require a early 20’s actor to portray Sam.

Since in WNMHGB – The TOS Episode with this title, not the TNG one, it was established that both Kirk and Mitchell were at the Academy together and that Mitchell was Kirk`s best friend then. NOT Spock!!!!!