Star Trek 2 The Wrath of Khan - Why did Kirk yell "KHAAAAAN!"?

Summed up nicely. I've always seen the rage as genuine, the '2 hours' thing is just the usual card Kirk always kept up his sleeve, him being the master tactician that tries to stay one step ahead of any situation and all that...

 

Thanks much. There are a lot of reasons why TWOK is the best Star Trek film and one of the best sci-fi films of all time. But I think it's often overlooked that the fact Shatner was portrayed with more emotions and vulnerability then we'd ever seen from before was a key part of the success of the film. I don't think it's any accident that the film widely regarded as the best was the one that showed Kirk dealing with issues of age and loss and anger and the emotions he displayed as a result, not the cocky swashbuckling 35 year old Kirk from the original series we were used to. It simply wouldn't have worked to have a 50 year old Kirk swaggering around all smug that he knew he'd prevail in the end.....Especially given that, aside from actually escaping from Khan and the Reliant at the last second, not a whole hell of a lot went right for Kirk in this film.

I know the Khan scream gets mocked a lot and people are like "There goes Shatner over the top again" But I pose the question over and over that, given all that had happened so far because of a man who was devoting his life to getting revenge on Kirk and was now mocking him in the most cruel of ways, how was Kirk supposed to react? How would you react? And noone is able to give me a really convincing alternative.

I guess he could have just said F U a-hole and slammed the communicator on the floor in anger, but I personally it was the exact response from a man who had had enough and snapped and Shatner did a great job with that line.

I also don't think its any accident that the worst film of the original series "The Final Frontier" was the one where Kirk most tried to act like the cocky macho never lose your cool Kirk of TOS (Obviously because Shatner as director wanted to make himself look like he was 35 again). It just doesn't work to portray a 35 year old man and a 62 year old man in the same way. That's why they change James Bond actors, because a 50 year old Roger Moore in "A View to a Kill" just looks silly doing things a 30 year old would have a hard time doing.

BTW I'm not saying Kirk's portrayal in "The Final Frontier" was the only reason it was bad, there were many, many other factors. But trying to knock 30 years off Kirk's current age certanly didn't help.

 

Exactly, the themes you mention are central to TWOK and what makes it work so well.

 

I'd like to see a copy of the script from TWOK.....

Scene 244A Close up of Kirk.

(Squinting his eyes, wrinkling his nose, clenching his teeth and screaming into the camera)

"KHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN!!!!!!!"

 

IMHO he was NOT faking. He was angry and felt partly responsible because Khan had tortured and killed so many innocent people close to Kirk, such as Scotty's Nephew, the researchers on Regula I station who worked for his g/f, the scientist who Terrell shot when David rushed Terrell, Captain Terrell, Checkov. He was angry along the lines: "You've got a problem with me, fine! But you keep killing innocent people, and not even intentionally to hurt me, but b/c of mistakes. Come on! Let's settle this between you and me!"

He wasn't thinking about his plans to escape the underground. He was hoping Khan would agree to fight him personally and leave others out of it. That's the first thing Kirk asked of Khan when he revealed himself on the viewscreen after his first attack.

 

I agree with everything you said in your posts.

I would add that if Kirk had asked if he wanted people to check on their progress, he would have said no. He wanted to be left alone to rule. Luck turns against him and causes him 15 years of great suffering. He irrationally starts to blame Kirk. He wanted to take over Kirk's ship and then the galaxy because he really believe he was a better person and the galaxy would be better off. Now bad luck has him languishing. It's easy to see how he would come to hate Kirk, even though it's illogical.