Ive always thought of Wrath of Khan as not so much a Trek film, more a deadly serious R rated SF/horror like Alien, Terminator or Scanners. It helped that it was rated ‘15’ when released on ‘uncut’ VHS in the UK (15 and 18 rated films usually = ‘R’ in the US), but later downgraded to ‘12’ for the Directors Cut dvd (12 = PG13). The Terminator was also downgraded from 18 on VHS (hard R) to 15 (not so hard R).
the tone is just too adult for kids, the themes too lofty, the violence feels too real and graphic (the disturbing ear scenes are almost like Alien chestburster or Cronenberg levels in terms of disturbing goriness), there seems to be frequent bloodletting (this movie is steeped in red - red uniforms, red alerts, red rum), mind torture(like Scanners), people being killed in violent nasty ways - vicious radiation burns, burned alive from Reliant phaser hit, the Regular torture aftermath (the guy Bones backs in to hanging upside down throat slit blood all over the floor), Khans bloody injuries, and the hand phaser deaths on Regular - the scientist caught in the phaser fire being vaporized and Terrells suicide (you really feel the agony of his struggle) - i know disintegrations happened loads of times in TOS but that was 60s tv budget almost comic book violence - here it was in big budget big screen Trek never seen before..it felt totally real as if that’s what super advanced ‘ray guns’ 200 years in the future would do to a person (it also helped that TWOK felt totally real so the danger/threat felt real) - the horrible scream the scientist does as hes destroyed feels like something out of a Cronenberg film- in fact the whole scene is like something out of an 80s Cronenberg tech chiller - its not so much SF/Fantasy violence, its more like REAL violence. (even Paul Winfield lends the film a harder edge in retrospect as he was in the hard R rated Terminator two years later).
but mainly the tone of the movie - very serious, realistic thanks to the great acting from everyone (Montoban and Shatner shouldve been oscar nominated - best supporting actor and best actor - in fact i think Khan is one of the few Trek movies that didnt get any nominations - not even for FX which had the first use of CGI!!) stuff feels like its happening for real (much more so than any of the other Trek films - although maybe III and TMP come closest to capturing that element of realism). i imagine Khan himself would be pretty terrifying for kids - a raving superhuman madman who kills at any given moment ...they mustve been pretty scared seeing it, I know I was when I saw it at the cinema as a kid. And then theres the eerie dark silence of space with the haunting background noises in the spaceship/planet scenes - this dosnt feel like the star trek universe of TOS, any of the other movies, or the TNG era, - its almost like the Alien universe, complete with horrible, truly alien creatures that will crawl inside your body given half a chance. (in retrospect the James Horner Aliens score in places makes it feel of that universe too - and the whole scientists playing god and developing Genesis/terraforming with a substance that can either create life on lifeless worlds or destroy it on worlds where life exists now feels all very Prometheus)
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Who knows. Who says QT wants Pine & Quinto.
