Just what was so special about Marla McGivers?

[Timo]

I suspect that she was so submissive and adoring of Khan that made her "special." Not only was her adoration of him a nice stroke to his ego but her being so submissive also satisfied his domineering personality.

Speaking from the BDSM perspective, not only is McGivers the perfect bottom, she also has the art of "topping from the bottom" down pat. By the end of the episode, she has wrapped Khan completely around her finger. Hers is the ultimate have-the-cake-and-eat-it-too award: she betrays Khan at his moment of triumph, turning it into utter defeat, and actually earns Khan's undying admiration for the act!

Khan may be egoistic, inexperienced and ignorant, but he isn't blind or stupid. If he's any good at his mind-fucking games, he will recognize he has been bested here. What better mother for his untold numbers of superior children (many of whom we probably see in ST2) than a woman who is his match in both soul and skill?

Timo Saloniemi

 

[A beaker full of death]

Babaganoosh said:
They probably aren't the same people. Khan's original group might all be dead - killed after Ceti Alpha VI exploded - by the time ST II comes around. These people we see in the film are probably their children (and, being genetically 'super', would grow quicker and be stronger, so they wouldn't look so young).

"These people have all sworn to live or die at my command 200 years before you were born."

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

A beaker full of death said:

Babaganoosh said:
They probably aren't the same people. Khan's original group might all be dead - killed after Ceti Alpha VI exploded - by the time ST II comes around. These people we see in the film are probably their children (and, being genetically 'super', would grow quicker and be stronger, so they wouldn't look so young).

"These people have all sworn to live or die at my command 200 years before you were born."

You don't think Khan was exaggerating just to scare Chekov and Terrell?

 

[darkwing_duck1]

Babaganoosh said:

A beaker full of death said:

Babaganoosh said:
They probably aren't the same people. Khan's original group might all be dead - killed after Ceti Alpha VI exploded - by the time ST II comes around. These people we see in the film are probably their children (and, being genetically 'super', would grow quicker and be stronger, so they wouldn't look so young).

"These people have all sworn to live or die at my command 200 years before you were born."

You don't think Khan was exaggerating just to scare Chekov and Terrell?

And the fact they'd spent 170 years in cryosleep wouldn't have an effect on that at all...

 

[Hambone]

Babaganoosh said:

AJBryant said:
No, in the episode Joachim was a full-grown man about Khan's age. In the movie, they made him a young guy.

Different characters.

In the episode, the character was JoaQUIN.

The film had a character named JoaCHIM.

Note the spellings.

(In Greg Cox's novels, Joachim is the son of Joaquin and another 'super' person, Ling.)

Plus, in "Space Seed" Khan calls Joaquin "wah-KEEN" and in the movie it's "YO-kim". No way were they supposed to be the same guy.

A lot of early reviews indicated that Joachim was indeed Khan and Marla's son. I never got that. ALL of Khan's followers in STII are way too young to be part of the Botany Bay crew, but too old to have been born on Ceti Alpha V. What gives? Maybe genetic engineering screws up your aging process.

 

[Timo]

I don't see the "too old" thing at all. It's between 15 and 20 years since we last saw Khan's bunch - which, BTW, did not include any infants or toddlers, or there would have been explicit comment on it when the lifesigns of the ship were analyzed, or when the gender ratio of Khan's crew was discussed by our heroes. So Khan's posse should have children in that age bracket.

Surely most of Khan's extras would fit with the Hollywood teen image, at least in the Marty McFly sense. Were Joachim to explicitly be, say, 17, he'd still be played by the same type of actor.

As for the one or two slightly older-looking followers of Khan, well, we can always allow for some of Khan's original crew to survive. Presumably the youngest and fittest of the original eighty would stay alive - the people we didn't exactly see in "Space Seed" - while the older ones would perish as they didn't enjoy Khan's status as protected leader. Hell, it wouldn't be difficult to think that Khan killed off most of his competitors, and sired most of those kids himself; hence the racial uniformity.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Trevacious]

Maybe genetic engineering screws up your aging process.

Maybe it was the steady stress of leadership in such a hellish place and gnashing his teeth over "Kirrrk."

 

[T'Bonz]

As a woman, Marla McGivers embarrassed the hell out of me. What a doormat. And a traitor. First betraying Kirk, then her lover. Great specimen of womenhood.

 

[Timo]

<shrug> It's a living. Some of the greatest heroes of mankind have earned that particular honor because they were traitors.

And from her point of view, she just weeded out those things that she found beneath her level: the weaklings that were no match for the mighty Khan, then the disappointment that Khan turned out to be. In the end, everybody looked up to her, and she got the sort of life she had always dreamed of...

...No matter how brief that would be.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Plum]

TBonz said:
As a woman, Marla McGivers embarrassed the hell out of me. What a doormat. And a traitor. First betraying Kirk, then her lover. Great specimen of womenhood.

Relax, she wasn't exactly Ben Finny. She balked at killing Kirk and saved him too. She ain't all that bad, right?

 

[T'Bonz]

She got her just rewards. Stuck going off with Khan and his snobs.

 

[Kagan]

Plum said:

TBonz said:
As a woman, Marla McGivers embarrassed the hell out of me. What a doormat. And a traitor. First betraying Kirk, then her lover. Great specimen of womenhood.

Relax, she wasn't exactly Ben Finny. She balked at killing Kirk and saved him too. She ain't all that bad, right?

Just plain fickle...that's what she is!

Going back to the topic's question...
Even when I was a kid, I didn't get what people saw in McGivers. Her attractiveness doesn't measure up to the other Season 1 guest females. Ahem, on that list are the following: Yeoman Colt, Dr Dehner, Lt Uhura, Dr Noel, Andrea, Yeoman Barrows, Edith Keeler, and Leila Kolomi to name a few. McGivers' character development is awful. There's 10 times more female character development in the Mother Horta of The Devil in the Dark than in McGivers. IMHO, I've just never gotten that McGivers is a Star Trek babe.

 

[Plum]

I find it amusing she's considered 'fickle' when men are just as fickle when it comes to a charismatic leader.

I believe even Kirk commented on Khan's charm in the briefing room scene.

 

[Therin of Andor]

Hambone said:
A lot of early reviews indicated that Joachim was indeed Khan and Marla's son.

The reviewers were guessing - wrongly. Yes, it's a father/son relationship, reflecting the pairings of Spock/Saavik, Kirk/David and Scotty/Peter. But as I said earlier, there was a painting made, and a toddler filmed, intended to be Khan's offspring.

 

[MANT!]

Just what was so special about Marla McGivers?

Vague on the inside, Vogue on the outside..

'nuff said..

 

[Starfury]

She had superior boobs

 

[Timo]

But as I said earlier, there was a painting made, and a toddler filmed, intended to be Khan's offspring.

Which doesn't mean Joachim wouldn't be. Indeed, we are to think that things went to hell within half a year of "Space Seed", and we can also assume that Marla died fairly early on; the toddler clearly wouldn't be her child. Joachim (and a bunch of the others) could be.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Anubis]

darkwing_duck1 said:
I was rewatching "Space Seed" the other day, and the question popped into my head: just what DID Khan see in Marla?

She puts out.

 

[C.E. Evans]

Starfury said:
She had superior boobs

I really think that was all there was...

 

[Kagan]

C.E. Evans said:

Starfury said:
She had superior boobs

I really think that was all there was...

*sigh*
Yep, we men are easily stereotyped.

*music begins*
"Watch it jiggle; see it wiggle.
Make some Jell-O brand gelatin,
and have some fun."
*music ends*

Now, why did this topic make me sing that song.