Space Seed's sudden ending

[3D ChessMaster]

And I think wrath of Khan to some extent guts Space Seed. That hopeful moment at the end of SS is ruined.

I think Kirk giving Khan and company a chance of building a new world is a good ending, as some one else mentioned it is analogous to Hornblower dropping someone of on an island. It is sad th Kirk then has to suffer for this, but Khan acted by Montabaln is such a great opponent for Kirk in the movie.
After all if Kirk had sent him to jail Khan could easily have been freed or escaped to come back and seek revenge on Kirk.

 

[diankra]

Catching a UK repeat yesterday, I noticed that Khan only crushes the 'grip' of the phaser; the phaser one section is left intact (edit: just spotted that formerlurker pointed this out). Obviously it's just an accident of the way Montalbahn crushed the prop, but for a second I wondered if I'd forgotten a plot detail, and Kirk was going to spot this, retrieve the phaser one, and turn it on him.

 

[FormerLurker]

Catching a UK repeat yesterday, I noticed that Khan only crushes the 'grip' of the phaser; the phaser one section is left intact. Obviously it's just an accident of the way Montalbahn crushed the prop, but for a second I wondered if I'd forgotten a plot detail, and Kirk was going to spot this, retrieve the phaser one, and turn it on him.

Already mentioned. See here:

If you go back and watch, he doesn't crumple the Phaser I or the handle/powerpack, just the main body. What he was doing was making it unusable, not rendering it inert or powerless. If Kirk had had the time, he could have removed the Phaser I and still used it against Khan. Khan wanted Kirk to know he was several steps ahead of him.

Also, it may not have been accidental. The propmaster may have instructed Montalban to crush it that way, as the Phaser One prop on a hero prop is still a prop in itself. And he didn't damage the Phaser Two handle/powerpack, as I noted before. This one prop may have been put together explicitly for this shot, to show both Khan's strength, and which parts of the Phaser Two are "expendable", if you will.