I think Khan's crew were followers and devoted to him. Not all the "supermen" were Napoleons in the making. Khan might have hand picked his 70 plus crewmates to be "rival" free.
True.
But he can't guarantee that with all their children. Plus, he'll die eventually from old age (assuming no accidents or... "accidents"). Once he's gone, it'll be a free for all for who'll be in charge.
Khan II would be in quite the pickle if they're not up to snuff.
I feel like the logical outcome of putting a bunch of prisoners on a harsh wildness to form a colony based around Botany Bay is Australia.
Will he? I'm not exactly sure we have any data points on how long an Augment will live. Khan looked older in TWoK because he had lived a hard twenty years on Ceti Alpha V.
Australia populated by supermen. Khangaroos.
I don't mean Khan's kids. I mean his followers' kids. Khan can't truly guarantee the loyalty of them.
Even an augmented human can only live so long. I doubt Khan would be alive 100 years after "SPACE SEED", even in ideal conditions. That'd make him around the 140s. (And even though we see McCoy in TNG close to that age, he seems to be the very rare anomaly. Plus, he had 24th century medicine to aid him during the 24th century. Khan and his people don't have access to that benefit.)
I was talking more about hypotheticals. We've never really been privy to how long Augments will live in any conditions. If their bodies are constantly repairing themselves, then they should be expected to have extended lifespans.
I'm talking about the followers kids too. Khan's heir would need to keep them under control. If they were weak, the Khan Dynasty ends with them.
Extended, sure. But that much greater?
I can buy 100 or 110. Maybe 120, but I think that's still pushing it hard.
But 140 or more years? I just don't see it.
A cellular regeneration and entertainment chamber might help with that... but that's still got a ways to go.
Which still has the same result... they kill each other off.
It's possible one would rise to the top.
The whole point is that we just don't know. That entire branch has very little to it. I can see someone creative coming in and using an extended lifespan to use Khan farther in the future or an alternate timeline where Ceti Alpha VI doesn't explode.
One question I have is, what was given to Khan and his exiles by the Enterprise? Stone knives and bearskins? Or more sophisticated equipment? Looking through the MA screencaps there is some tech in the cargo containers.
TWOK shows some equipment that previously shows up in TMP, so Kirk definitely left them some extra supplies beyond what was on the Botany Bay. Mostly medical stuff I expect. The Botany Bay itself would have been well supplied, since starting a colony was the plan in the first place.
This has a problem: Without The Wrath of Khan then Space Seed isn't that highly regarded of an episode.
Roddenberry was very stubborn about not going back to literal TOS episodes. Probably correctly. (The Naked Now is as much a remake as it is a sequel, intended to do the same "Hey, here is our crew" job that people came to think of it having done.)
So without TWOK he has no more reason to go back to Space Seed than, say A Piece of the Action or The Apple. And with TWOK then, well, we got what we got along the latter Trek obsession with the Eugenics Wars.
Roddenberry was very stubborn about not going back to literal TOS episodes. Probably correctly. (The Naked Now is as much a remake as it is a sequel, intended to do the same "Hey, here is our crew" job that people came to think of it having done.)
So without TWOK he has no more reason to go back to Space Seed than, say A Piece of the Action or The Apple. And with TWOK then, well, we got what we got along the latter Trek obsession with the Eugenics Wars.
This episode could have been done at any point in TNG's run, so, after Roddenberry left. There has always been a rumor that "Too Short a Season" was originally a sequel to "A Private Little War" with Kirk as the Admiral involved.
But Space Seed has the distinction of characters wondering onscreen about the long term ramifications of their actions, so if you had to pick one, it's the logical choice to get a sequel.
- H. Bennett, 1981
After all, it would have been a hundred years later, as speculated.
Sure there is. The same thing that lured Harve Bennett to it all those years ago. What happened to the seed they planted?
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