About the KHAN scream.

[UFO]

As per my later post, you have to understand Kirk as Khan does. He knows even a gilded cage would grind Kirk down over time. It’s insidious how evil that guy is!

Khan missed his calling,he should have been a psychologist. He only knew Kirk for a few hours.

Well Khan isn't supposed to be stupid and he would have to be a good judge of character as a sucessful err, "politian", but it really isn't that hard to pick that the type of person who captains a Starship exploring unknown worlds would not be happy being imprisioned in any way much less what was on offer. That's why the line works so well imo.

 

[Nerys Myk]

Montalban's delivery is what sells it. I like to quote it, often for no apparent reason.

 

[Franklin]

My favorite Khan is Space Seed.

Me too. It wasn't a big action episode, but the dialog was smart and crisp, and I liked the Kirk and Khan scenes.

I know conflicts prevented Shatner and Montalban from ever being able to be at a shooting on the same day, but in my opinion, TWOK suffered from Kirk and Khan never meeting face to face. Most of their dialog was also simply Khan threatening Kirk and Kirk tweaking or taunting Khan.

Yeppers. Of the three, Space Seed is the superior production. You could have put a new villain into either of the movies and told the same story.

STID didn't need to make Harrison Khan. They had an interesting, engaging, villain that would have served the story as well, if not better. I think making Harrison Khan tied their hands to some of the story telling potentials they might have otherwise had.

I didn't mind him being Khan, but I wouldn't have run out of the theater demanding a refund if he wasn't.

I think a lot of the opinions about the episode and both movies with Khan depend on whether or not one drags baggage from one into the other. Khan is different in all three because he's facing different situations. Which is the real Khan? Well, all three are in total. Which is the better Khan? That's a question of personal taste.

Spock's shout in the context of the STID story is perfect, in my opinion. It's appropriateness is debatable only in the context deliberately comparing it to Kirk's shout.

Did the writers invite that comparison? Certainly. But it was an original use of the shout. They recreated nothing, I don't see it as an homage, and so to me, the shout stands as independent event. Still, if it broke the moment for some in the audience, even those being thoroughly entertained to that point, I can see that. But my question would be, if the shout in TWOK never made it to the screen, would the reaction to Spock's shout in STID still be so negative or jarring?

 

[Psion]

Humans don't like forced confinement!

Was it ideal? No. But the situation was certainly not the eye for an eye scenario Khan made it out to be. The fact of the matter is, if Khan really wanted revenge, his best options was always to beam Kirk up and do whatever to him.

As per my later post, you have to understand Kirk as Khan does. He knows even a gilded cage would grind Kirk down over time. It’s insidious how evil that guy is!

Add to this that Khan thought he was stranding Kirk in the center of a dead planet. Emphasis on dead. He hadn't been to the Genesis Cave. Khan's men never got any further than the station. He didn't know there was a natural paradise waiting for Kirk's landing party. He'd have been as amazed as Kirk was at what they found there.

 

[F. King Daniel]

Spock's "Khaaaaan!" was pretty bad, but it's not so out-of-character as some think. Spock screamed wordlessly before attacking the Vulcan bully and later Kirk in the '09 movie. Since Khan was out of punching range at the time, he screamed his name (and then got into punching range ASAP)

Ultimately, the writers put it in as a fanwank too far. It reminded me of the overuse of "Kneel before Zod!" in Smallville (something I was glad they kept out of Man of Steel)

 

[BillJ]

Add to this that Khan thought he was stranding Kirk in the center of a dead planet. Emphasis on dead. He hadn't been to the Genesis Cave. Khan's men never got any further than the station. He didn't know there was a natural paradise waiting for Kirk's landing party. He'd have been as amazed as Kirk was at what they found there.

But if he scanned the planet to locate the Genesis Device, wouldn't he have noticed all the flora down inside a dead world? Any other time, sensors can locate a pimple on an ant's ass but here completely miss a giant cave full of plant life and water?

It really is no more complicated than they wrote themselves into a corner so they changed Khan's motivation. It works because Shatner and Montalban chew enough scenery that you get lost in the performances.

 

[Franklin]

It really is no more complicated than they wrote themselves into a corner so they changed Khan's motivation. It works because Shatner and Montalban chew enough scenery that you get lost in the performances.

You, sir, above all of us, have finally had the courage to say the truth. You've said that which some of us have only allowed ourselves to think. I take my hat off to you. My finest meats and cheeses are yours for the taking.

The story requires Khan scanning the area and beaming up Kirk, not Genesis. But that won't work. It's end of story if that happens. What happened instead would be like Captain Ahab finally having Moby Dick in his sites for the kill and then saying, "Look! Over there! A school of red snapper. I'm hungry and I love red snapper. Helm, hard to port. Nets in the water, men. We eat, tonight!"

Of course, Khan's motivation conveniently changed back to being target fixated on Kirk after he found out Kirk "escaped." Joachim should've led a mutiny. Khan had Genesis. That was a game changer. Khan could've had anything he wanted with Genesis as a bargaining chip, including Kirk. If Khan had become crazed enough not to see that, and still wanted Kirk worse at that point, he still could've said, "Kirk I offer you a trade. Genesis for you." How could Kirk refuse? Superior intellect my ass.

 

[SeerSGB]

One of the things that stuck out at me was the lack of "superior ambition" among Khan's people. They have a super-weapon, a WMD, now. Joachim calls him down on chasing Kirk, but why didn't he try to take Khan out and become the leader?

 

[Franklin]

One of the things that stuck out at me was the lack of "superior ambition" among Khan's people. They have a super-weapon, a WMD, now. Joachim calls him down on chasing Kirk, but why didn't he try to take Khan out and become the leader?

Judson Scott, who played Joachim, was 30 in 1982. That means he's either playing someone much older who aged very well, or that he (and some of the others on the Reliant who looked equally as young) were teenagers in 1996 when they were frozen and went into space.

It could be that Khan was a father-like figure to the younger ones, and so their ambitions were tempered in deference to Khan. After all, if they were nothing but teenagers when Ceti Alpha VI went haywire, they owe at least their initial survival and further education to Khan's abilities.

 

[BigJake]

One of the things that stuck out at me was the lack of "superior ambition" among Khan's people. They have a super-weapon, a WMD, now. Joachim calls him down on chasing Kirk, but why didn't he try to take Khan out and become the leader?

Khan had the ability to inspire actual loyalty in his people, as we see also in "Space Seed." Presumably because they believed as he did that he was the best of them (his having successfully kept them alive after the unexpected cataclysm on Ceti Alpha V would have reinforced that aura of superiority). That Joachim wanted to restore him to rationality didn't mean his loyalty had lessened.

Also note that even through his mania Khan retains a parallel fixation on Genesis once he's learned of its existence? He would have learned from Chekov and Tyrell that it was more than a "superweapon," it could also provide his people with a new planet. I always took this to mean that even at his maddest, some part of him was still thinking like a prince. It was not so hard to see why his people remained loyal.

(Incidentally, it's instructive to watch TWOK having read Moby Dick. The Trek film is nowhere near Melville's league artistically, but it makes it easier to see what kind of character they were aiming for in their version of Khan once you know the original Ahab. Also Moby Dick is just a really good adventure novel.)

 

[Psion]

Add to this that Khan thought he was stranding Kirk in the center of a dead planet. Emphasis on dead. He hadn't been to the Genesis Cave. Khan's men never got any further than the station. He didn't know there was a natural paradise waiting for Kirk's landing party. He'd have been as amazed as Kirk was at what they found there.

But if he scanned the planet to locate the Genesis Device, wouldn't he have noticed all the flora down inside a dead world? Any other time, sensors can locate a pimple on an ant's ass but here completely miss a giant cave full of plant life and water?

It really is no more complicated than they wrote themselves into a corner so they changed Khan's motivation. It works because Shatner and Montalban chew enough scenery that you get lost in the performances.

What's he scanning for? It's pretty clear that his interest isn't solely one of revenge. As soon as he hears about Genesis, he wants to know more. "I agree to your terms. If ... IF! In addition to yourself you hand over all data and materials regarding the project called ... Genesis." He's tricked Kirk into stranding himself in the center of a dead planet. He's got his revenge, now he wants Genesis. Captain Terrell has given Khan the location of the Genesis device itself, so Khan and his people don't even have to scan any further than to operate the transporter. Terrell and Chekov were Khan's eyes and ears prior to that and he knew as much as Kirk did and likely came to the same conclusions. "I thought this was Genesis?"

Under all that rock, it was a miracle the transporters worked ... It's even easier to conceive of a skeleton crew of refugees from the 20th century lacking the competence required to notice the life-filled bubble scores of meters away from the center of attention.

 

[BigJake]

Under all that rock, it was a miracle the transporters worked ... It's even easier to conceive of a skeleton crew of refugees from the 20th century lacking the competence required to notice the life-filled bubble scores of meters away from the center of attention.

The writers pre-established that sensors could not detect the Genesis cave. Enterprise's sensors didn't detect it either. While it's an example of sensors working at the power of drama -- perhaps there were Plot-Convenient Deposits above the cave -- both ship's sensors play by the same rules throughout the film and Khan's motivation does not change. Bill is just wrong on this one.

 

[SeerSGB]

One of the things that stuck out at me was the lack of "superior ambition" among Khan's people. They have a super-weapon, a WMD, now. Joachim calls him down on chasing Kirk, but why didn't he try to take Khan out and become the leader?

Khan had the ability to inspire actual loyalty in his people, as we see also in "Space Seed." Presumably because they believed as he did that he was the best of them (his having successfully kept them alive after the unexpected cataclysm on Ceti Alpha V would have reinforced that aura of superiority). That Joachim wanted to restore him to rationality didn't mean his loyalty had lessened.

Also note that even through his mania Khan retains a parallel fixation on Genesis once he's learned of its existence? He would have learned from Chekov and Tyrell that it was more than a "superweapon," it could also provide his people with a new planet. I always took this to mean that even at his maddest, some part of him was still thinking like a prince. It was not so hard to see why his people remained loyal.

(Incidentally, it's instructive to watch TWOK having read Moby Dick. The Trek film is nowhere near Melville's league artistically, but it makes it easier to see what kind of character they were aiming for in their version of Khan once you know the original Ahab. Also Moby Dick is just a really good adventure novel.)

Read Moby Dick; TWOK is a highschool drama club production in comparison. The similarities are on the surface, at best. What they aimed for and what they got were two very different creations.

 

[BigJake]

Read Moby Dick; TWOK is a highschool drama club production in comparison.

I think I might have just said something like that.

What they aimed for and what they got were two very different creations.

What they got was very concentrated and simplified. But the similarities in spirit between the two characters are quite evident. (Frankly, of the two, it's actually Khan that has the more psychologically believable revenge motive -- at least his is a human enemy and he's lost more than a leg -- though Ahab's madness is worse for being the more irrational and animistic and Melville does a brilliant job at developing it.)

 

[SeerSGB]

By dumbing down Khan, making him just focused on revenge, you loose a lot of his threat, his menace. Which is one of TWOK's failing: Khan simply isn't a big enough threat as he's as he's portrayed. He's more of a Joker or Mr. Freeze type mentality than a Ahab.

 

[Ln X]

By dumbing down Khan, making him just focused on revenge, you loose a lot of his threat, his menace. Which is one of TWOK's failing: Khan simply isn't a big enough threat as he's as he's portrayed. He's more of a Joker or Mr. Freeze type mentality than a Ahab.

Was Khan dumbed down in STID?

 

[BigJake]

By dumbing down Khan, making him just focused on revenge, you loose a lot of his threat, his menace.

Well, I personally think "dumbing down" is a bit of a skewed description and that Khan's progression to an Ahab-analogue was one of TWOK's deftest touches. In part because it was unexpected and in part because it provided a way to reintroduce him that didn't make Kirk's original decision to maroon him on Ceti Alpha 5 look completely nuts. (Only moderately nuts. )

For my money the revenge motive also actually made him more interesting, not less, than his previous Oriental Despot power-madness; and it also made him more believably flawed and his errors in judgment explicable.

(Conversely, STiD Khan had no similar excuse for having loaded the people he supposedly cares about into seventy-two pieces of explosive ordnance, just for example. And his Emperor Palpatine-like "no ship should go down without her Captain" line is motiveless B-villain malice, of much the same type that Marcus is suddenly afflicted with at a certain point in the story -- rather at odds, one might say, with the nutty but still patriotic "bombs away" mentality he'd hitherto displayed. I like the way Cumberbatch sells Khan at other points but I don't think this in any way diminishes or eclipses what Montalban did with the character, not by a long shot.)

 

[M'Sharak]

By dumbing down Khan, making him just focused on revenge, you loose a lot of his threat, his menace. Which is one of TWOK's failing: Khan simply isn't a big enough threat as he's as he's portrayed. He's more of a Joker or Mr. Freeze type mentality than a Ahab.

Was Khan dumbed down in STID?

He's talking there about Khan in The Wrath of Khan.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

(Conversely, STiD Khan had no similar excuse for having loaded the people he supposedly cares about into seventy-two pieces of explosive ordnance, just for example. And his Emperor Palpatine-like "no ship should go down without her Captain" line is motiveless B-villain malice, of much the same type that Marcus is suddenly afflicted with at a certain point in the story -- rather at odds, one might say, with the nutty but still patriotic "bombs away" mentality he'd hitherto displayed. I like the way Cumberbatch sells Khan at other points but I don't think this in any way diminishes or eclipses what Montalban did with the character, not by a long shot.)

I've already specifically said on the board that I'm bowing out of further discussion about whether this or that happened in STID until I pick up the disk, so I can rewind it infinity times to split hairs on all the minutia.

That said, one of the questions I have is whether the torpedoes really are live ordnance or not. They can't be scanned, so how do we know? I don't even recall Spock or anyone saying exactly what they did (if anything at all) to turn one (or more) of the torpedoes into something live for the beam over to the Vengeance.

If you tell me they said this or that, I'll just keep my eyes open for it when I do that rewatch in due course.

 

[Shazam!]

People do realize the reason Shatner's "Khan!" scream is remembered is because most people think it's funny

Well the writers of STiD apparently didn't.