Spock in SNW brings his portrayal in The Cage in alignment with the rest of TOS. In that episode, he smiles and has a more relaxed demeanor. If you watch TOS again, Leonard Nimoy plays Spock as oblivious to human emotional expression without being robotic. I actually find Ethan Peck’s portrayal to be more rigid than Nimoy’s. The Peck Spock tends to either suppress his emotion to the degree that he can appear monotonous and stiff, or fail to suppress emotions and experience outbursts. Around 10 years later, the Spock in TOS finds a balance and seems to have found a balance between emotional expression (including sarcasm and low-key passive aggressiveness against Dr. McCoy) and logic. That’s good character development imo
Edit: Not to mention Spock’s final words in the 2009 movie where he tells his alternate self not to think too hard about logic and do what feels right. That’s Spock’s arc ends and resolves his internal conflict that lasted over decades.
