Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan
Wrath of Khan is widely celebrated as one of the best Star Trek films, if not the best—you'd be hard-pressed to find a fan who wouldn't list Wrath of Khan in their top five, let alone top three. This is a film with a stirring and memorable soundtrack, an iconic villain, strong dialogue, powerful character moments, tense action sequences, dynamic camera work, excellent theming and foreshadowing, snappy new uniforms...the list goes on. On top of all that, you'd have to look hard to find any irreconcilable continuity issues or utterly unbelievable science. Of course it's a fan favorite.
That being said, I can probably get away with a minimal discussion of what the movie does right. I want to talk about what the movie does wrong, or at least not entirely to my liking. For, you see, I am a heretic: Wrath of Khan is not one of my favorite Star Trek films. Now, hear me out before you break out the phasers and painstiks: I agree that the film is well made and deserving of all the praise and favoritism it gets. It's a superb film. But I believe it could be better in some ways—ways that would make a minor difference for most viewers but a huge difference for me.
For starters: I'm not a big fan of Saavik in this one. She doesn't look or feel quite Vulcan enough. Kirstie Alley has lighter-colored hair and softer features than we usually see in a Vulcan, and it's even harder not to perceive her as human when she lacks the characteristic pointy eyebrows. Her Vulcan stoicism reads less like controlled passion and more like restrained acting; I don't get much of a sense of discipline or inner strength from her body language or dialogue delivery. The dialogue lets her down once or twice, too—I find it hard to believe that a logical Vulcan would never have considered the possibility of a no-win scenario, let alone object to the unfairness of an entirely plausible command situation.
Moreover, Scotty—my second-favorite Star Trek character—doesn't really contribute to the story. He's got one or two memorable lines, but his primary purpose is to respond anytime Kirk asks for a status report. At least in The Motion Picture, Scotty gives orders and suggestions and unsolicited status reports, and he participates in back-and-forth conversations that help flesh out how unfit for duty the Enterprise is. Here, Scotty is so peripheral to the story that he can somehow afford to leave his post in the middle of a battle in order to distract everyone on the bridge with his dying nephew. And let's not overlook that Scotty deprives Preston of his best chance for survival by not bringing him directly to sickbay. This ties into the problem with Preston—he's not a properly developed character; he's a prop to provide a cheap emotional punch. The better way to handle Preston would be to devote just a little screen time to Scotty overseeing some of the trainees who are allegedly on board; we'd get a better sense of who Preston is and why we should care about him, and this would give Scotty a more meaningful role.
Khan, too, falls short of his full potential. We're talking about a man with super strength and a superior intellect, but how much do those attributes inform the story? Take away his strength, and we miss out on a brief moment where Chekov gets lifted off the ground. The film pays lip service to Khan's intellect, but there's little evidence that Khan and only Khan could have crippled the Enterprise and captured the Genesis device in this manner. Khan succeeds because he's got a jar of mind-control bugs and the element of surprise, not because he's exceptionally knowledgeable or clever. In fact, it's because he's not exceptionally knowledgeable or clever that Khan ultimately fails. In "Space Seed," he catches up on some important reading before trying to take over the Enterprise, but here, he zooms off in the Reliant without reading the instruction manual, and without bothering to check whether anything of strategic interest has happened in the last 15 years or so. I can accept that Khan isn't experienced in space combat like Kirk is, but a superior intellect would surely consider three-dimensional tactics in space. Heaven help us if Khan ever teaches himself to fly an airplane; he'll probably fly around all the mountains instead of over them. "Blinded by revenge" excuses a few bad decisions on the villain's part, but it doesn't excuse an entire story that leverages the villain's charisma and bloodlust but not the strength and intelligence that are equally essential to his character.
Khan's motivation to seek revenge seems a little flimsy, too. At the end of "Space Seed," Kirk made an offer: instead of going to prison, Khan would be left on a savage, inhospitable planet where it would be a struggle even to stay alive—which Khan accepted with relish. Fast-forward to where Khan is out to seek revenge on Kirk for leaving him on a savage, inhospitable planet where it's a struggle even to stay alive. There was never any discussion of annual check-ins or Federation oversight of any kind, and it's sure as heck not Kirk's fault that Ceti Alpha VI exploded. Yes, Khan has every reason to be frustrated and angry about the death of his wife and his failure to tame an untameable world—and maybe it's just easier to direct his wrath at Kirk than to accept that life's unfair and coming here was a mistake. But with Khan's superior ability and superior ambition, I am really surprised that his superficial grudge against Kirk doesn't abate when a starship falls into his lap. Khan laments his loss of status as a prince with power over millions—and he could get that back a hundredfold if he actually tried. But no, Captain Ahab has to go hunt his whale. I can only assume that Khan's madness is the a result of a Ceti eel secretly wrapped around his cerebral cortex.
I'm disappointed that Wrath of Khan loses track of the little details that would make for stronger continuity with "Space Seed." During the first encounter with Khan, we get a good look at the other passengers of the Botany Bay, and they are...well, a bit more diverse than what we see in Wrath of Khan. It's feasible that everyone we saw in "Space Seed" was dead by the start of this movie, but it strains credibility that the survivors are all young and blonde. The youngest survivors could well have been born on Ceti Alpha V, but most of them look to be in their 20s or early 30s...which would have made them small children when the Botany Bay left Earth, yet all the dialogue suggests the original passengers were all adults. Additionally, there's a missed opportunity to have one of Marla McGivers' paintings visible in the background somewhere; if the death of Khan's wife is such a strong motivator in his vengeance, then a constant reminder of her absence would help drive that home. It's also inadvertently comedic that Khan distinctly remembers Chekov...who didn't appear in "Space Seed" and wasn't even part of the cast at that point.
A number of miscellaneous things bother me, too. I'm not big on stories where characters lose control of themselves to someone or something else, so even though Terrell and Chekov bring some interesting texture to the story, I wish they had been involved in some other way. Chekov also becomes essentially irrelevant after returning to normal; sure, it's nice to see him resume his post on the bridge for the final battle, but it doesn't feel like it makes a difference. For that matter, Sulu and Uhura don't have much to do beyond their basic job functions. I know that's par for the course with the TOS crew, and that Saavik uses up air time that probably would've gone to the other secondary characters, but I still think that Sulu and Uhura (and Chekov, once he was himself again) still could've all had a brief moment of triumph, or at least a one-liner worth remembering.
But wait; there's more! The Ceti eel should have been removed from Chekov's head by McCoy, not by plot convenience. At the climax of the movie, when McCoy gets nerve pinched by Spock, it doesn't sound like McCoy gets cut off mid-sentence--it sounds like "Well, I don't think that he..." was never intended to be a complete sentence in the first place (which, I realize, is a minor quibble even for someone as nitpicky as me, but it takes me out of the moment to remember these people are acting at such a critical moment). And as someone else pointed out, it should've been Kirk, not Spock, to recognize that Khan was thinking two-dimensionally in the final battle. Kirk is a strategist, and this is a battle of wits between Kirk and Khan; Spock already does more than enough to save the day.
I will reiterate that Wrath of Khan is a great film and well deserving of the love it gets. But boy, are there plenty of things I'd change about it.
[Last updated March 7, 2018]
That being said, I can probably get away with a minimal discussion of what the movie does right. I want to talk about what the movie does wrong, or at least not entirely to my liking. For, you see, I am a heretic: Wrath of Khan is not one of my favorite Star Trek films. Now, hear me out before you break out the phasers and painstiks: I agree that the film is well made and deserving of all the praise and favoritism it gets. It's a superb film. But I believe it could be better in some ways—ways that would make a minor difference for most viewers but a huge difference for me.
For starters: I'm not a big fan of Saavik in this one. She doesn't look or feel quite Vulcan enough. Kirstie Alley has lighter-colored hair and softer features than we usually see in a Vulcan, and it's even harder not to perceive her as human when she lacks the characteristic pointy eyebrows. Her Vulcan stoicism reads less like controlled passion and more like restrained acting; I don't get much of a sense of discipline or inner strength from her body language or dialogue delivery. The dialogue lets her down once or twice, too—I find it hard to believe that a logical Vulcan would never have considered the possibility of a no-win scenario, let alone object to the unfairness of an entirely plausible command situation.
Moreover, Scotty—my second-favorite Star Trek character—doesn't really contribute to the story. He's got one or two memorable lines, but his primary purpose is to respond anytime Kirk asks for a status report. At least in The Motion Picture, Scotty gives orders and suggestions and unsolicited status reports, and he participates in back-and-forth conversations that help flesh out how unfit for duty the Enterprise is. Here, Scotty is so peripheral to the story that he can somehow afford to leave his post in the middle of a battle in order to distract everyone on the bridge with his dying nephew. And let's not overlook that Scotty deprives Preston of his best chance for survival by not bringing him directly to sickbay. This ties into the problem with Preston—he's not a properly developed character; he's a prop to provide a cheap emotional punch. The better way to handle Preston would be to devote just a little screen time to Scotty overseeing some of the trainees who are allegedly on board; we'd get a better sense of who Preston is and why we should care about him, and this would give Scotty a more meaningful role.
Khan, too, falls short of his full potential. We're talking about a man with super strength and a superior intellect, but how much do those attributes inform the story? Take away his strength, and we miss out on a brief moment where Chekov gets lifted off the ground. The film pays lip service to Khan's intellect, but there's little evidence that Khan and only Khan could have crippled the Enterprise and captured the Genesis device in this manner. Khan succeeds because he's got a jar of mind-control bugs and the element of surprise, not because he's exceptionally knowledgeable or clever. In fact, it's because he's not exceptionally knowledgeable or clever that Khan ultimately fails. In "Space Seed," he catches up on some important reading before trying to take over the Enterprise, but here, he zooms off in the Reliant without reading the instruction manual, and without bothering to check whether anything of strategic interest has happened in the last 15 years or so. I can accept that Khan isn't experienced in space combat like Kirk is, but a superior intellect would surely consider three-dimensional tactics in space. Heaven help us if Khan ever teaches himself to fly an airplane; he'll probably fly around all the mountains instead of over them. "Blinded by revenge" excuses a few bad decisions on the villain's part, but it doesn't excuse an entire story that leverages the villain's charisma and bloodlust but not the strength and intelligence that are equally essential to his character.
Khan's motivation to seek revenge seems a little flimsy, too. At the end of "Space Seed," Kirk made an offer: instead of going to prison, Khan would be left on a savage, inhospitable planet where it would be a struggle even to stay alive—which Khan accepted with relish. Fast-forward to where Khan is out to seek revenge on Kirk for leaving him on a savage, inhospitable planet where it's a struggle even to stay alive. There was never any discussion of annual check-ins or Federation oversight of any kind, and it's sure as heck not Kirk's fault that Ceti Alpha VI exploded. Yes, Khan has every reason to be frustrated and angry about the death of his wife and his failure to tame an untameable world—and maybe it's just easier to direct his wrath at Kirk than to accept that life's unfair and coming here was a mistake. But with Khan's superior ability and superior ambition, I am really surprised that his superficial grudge against Kirk doesn't abate when a starship falls into his lap. Khan laments his loss of status as a prince with power over millions—and he could get that back a hundredfold if he actually tried. But no, Captain Ahab has to go hunt his whale. I can only assume that Khan's madness is the a result of a Ceti eel secretly wrapped around his cerebral cortex.
I'm disappointed that Wrath of Khan loses track of the little details that would make for stronger continuity with "Space Seed." During the first encounter with Khan, we get a good look at the other passengers of the Botany Bay, and they are...well, a bit more diverse than what we see in Wrath of Khan. It's feasible that everyone we saw in "Space Seed" was dead by the start of this movie, but it strains credibility that the survivors are all young and blonde. The youngest survivors could well have been born on Ceti Alpha V, but most of them look to be in their 20s or early 30s...which would have made them small children when the Botany Bay left Earth, yet all the dialogue suggests the original passengers were all adults. Additionally, there's a missed opportunity to have one of Marla McGivers' paintings visible in the background somewhere; if the death of Khan's wife is such a strong motivator in his vengeance, then a constant reminder of her absence would help drive that home. It's also inadvertently comedic that Khan distinctly remembers Chekov...who didn't appear in "Space Seed" and wasn't even part of the cast at that point.
A number of miscellaneous things bother me, too. I'm not big on stories where characters lose control of themselves to someone or something else, so even though Terrell and Chekov bring some interesting texture to the story, I wish they had been involved in some other way. Chekov also becomes essentially irrelevant after returning to normal; sure, it's nice to see him resume his post on the bridge for the final battle, but it doesn't feel like it makes a difference. For that matter, Sulu and Uhura don't have much to do beyond their basic job functions. I know that's par for the course with the TOS crew, and that Saavik uses up air time that probably would've gone to the other secondary characters, but I still think that Sulu and Uhura (and Chekov, once he was himself again) still could've all had a brief moment of triumph, or at least a one-liner worth remembering.
But wait; there's more! The Ceti eel should have been removed from Chekov's head by McCoy, not by plot convenience. At the climax of the movie, when McCoy gets nerve pinched by Spock, it doesn't sound like McCoy gets cut off mid-sentence--it sounds like "Well, I don't think that he..." was never intended to be a complete sentence in the first place (which, I realize, is a minor quibble even for someone as nitpicky as me, but it takes me out of the moment to remember these people are acting at such a critical moment). And as someone else pointed out, it should've been Kirk, not Spock, to recognize that Khan was thinking two-dimensionally in the final battle. Kirk is a strategist, and this is a battle of wits between Kirk and Khan; Spock already does more than enough to save the day.
I will reiterate that Wrath of Khan is a great film and well deserving of the love it gets. But boy, are there plenty of things I'd change about it.
[Last updated March 7, 2018]
