If you want to read my previous obsessive and silly
rumination, on Star Trek: The Motion Picture, you may view it here.
This one starts with Courage’s fanfare.
When
the action starts at 3:00, notice the 1980s state-of-the-art computer graphics
in Spock’s console.
A
minute or two later, we see the starboard turbolift, over Saavik’s right
shoulder. For some reason there’s some
sort of transparent covering over it.
Throughout
this scene, the reverse angles on Saavik still show the starboard turbolift’s
label “A” – for Deck A – still with its tape covering.
But
when the simulation is over, Kirk walks past Saavik, completing his round of
the bridge, in front of the starboard lift.
It’s still labeled A, but now without the taped covering!
Note
Saavik’s shoulder at the extreme right of the frame.
Don’t
forget that part of this Kobayashi Maru sequence was intended
as a nod to the vociferous fandom rumors that “they” (Paramount) were going to
bump off Spock. When you watch this
sequence and Spock falls “dead,” and then gets up, you can almost imagine the
suits at Paramount elbowing each other and chortling as they think of the trick
being played on those dumb Trekkies.
“They said he was going to die.
There … we killed him!”
After
Spock gives A Tale of Two Cities to Kirk outside the blown-up Kobayashi
Maru bridge, they march on down the hall, and while Kirk is gigging
Spock about the messy simulation, Kirk notices a vacuum cleaner guy.
This
is only notable because we see that same equipment later on in the movie, with
the implication that it’s something needed when going on Red Alert.
When
Kirk reads off the first lines of A Tale of Two Cities, it’s kind of
cute that he does the ol’ in-out-to-focus thing.
In White
Christmas, Bing Crosby called this “playing the trombone.”
When
Kirk gets the eyeglasses from McCoy, we get the first of the lines that weren’t
in the theatrical release, when the doctor says, “More antiques for your
collection.” A bit more dialogue tells
us the spectacles are 400 years old.
Since this film takes place “in the 23rd century,” as the
opening tells us, the glasses are from the 19th century, the 1800s.
I
think there’s a nice audio touch at the end of this scene. Just as McCoy is warning Kirk about becoming
“part of this collection,” a clock starts to chime, reminding us of the passage
of time.
We
cut to the Reliant and Chekov’s technobabble about the Genesis Project and
fluxes and dynoscanners. Don’t forget
those particles of pre-animate matter, caught in the matrix! Walter Koenig’s performance is doubly fun
here. Not only does he say these things
with a straight face, he says them with a straight face in a Russian accent!
But
on the bright side, we get to see that the Reliant’s comm officer is good ol’ Mister Kyle, from the
original series!
Meanwhile,
on Space Station Regula One, Dr Carol Marcus has a lab with pretty red neon
flashing tubes.
Interestingly,
these same pretty red flashing tubes were used in another Paramount film about
the same time, Airplane II: The Sequel.
It was released in December, 1982, six months after Khan.
These
props had a respectable life, turning up again in the January, 1988 Star
Trek: The Next Generation episode “Datalore.”
And Data doesn’t tell us what these pretty red lights do,
either.
And now, back to our story … We begin to gather that whatever Genesis is, it has
to be tested on a sterile, lifeless planet.
Hmmm … sounds like another Democrat’s social experiment to me: sounds great in theory, but causes
devastation when it’s introduced to real life.
Meanwhile,
down on Ceti Alpha VI, there’s a slight dust storm. As you may have read in Allan Asherman’s
fun-but-short The
Making of Star Trek II -- although post-production SFX added to the
haze, a lot of those dusty clouds were caused by huge airplane-propeller-type
fans and lots of Fuller’s Earth.
When
they get inside the cargo carriers, Chekov glances at the library. We’ll skip over the legal statutes books, and
consider the other ones:
- ·
John
Ciardi’s translation of Dante’s The Inferno – which describes an
interesting punishment for traitors.
Circle 9 of Dante’s cosmology of Hell is for traitors, and Zone 3 is
named Ptolomea. It’s the realm of those
who betrayed friends or guests (based on I Maccabees 16). Further, of course, the bottom rung of Hell
is ice, all ice … How appropriate for the fate Khan eventually tries to lay on
Kirk!
- ·
Milton’s
Paradise
Lost – Remember that in “Space Seed,” Khan quoted Paradise Lost?
“Here we may reign secure, and in my choyce
To reign is worth ambition though in Hell:
Better to reign in Hell, then serve in Heav'n”
·
Milton’s
Paradise
Regained – perhaps the appropriate quotation from this work is,
“Know'st thou not that my rising is thy fall,
And my promotion will be thy destruction?”
-
Melville’s
Moby-Dick
provides another obsessional commentary, leading of course to Khan’s final
lines to Kirk, even after Kirk can’t hear him.
As Ahab mutters in chapter 135, “Towards thee I roll, thou
all-destroying but unconquering whale; to the last I grapple with thee; from
hell’s heart I stab at thee; for hate’s sake I spit my last breath at thee.”
-
Shakespeare’s
King
Lear depicts Lear’s gradual descent into madness. Hmmm … sounds like a certain genetic superman
we both know! You may also recall that
the title of the animated “How Sharper Than a Serpent’s Tooth,” is from Lear. Some might say that the line, “The prince of
darkness is a gentleman!” is a fine description of Khan – or, “But I am bound
upon a wheel of fire, that mine own tears do scald like moulten lead.” – or, of
course, “I am a man more sinn'd against than sinning” – in khan’s own opinion,
anyway.
Oh, boy. Chekov figures out “Botany Bay” on the seat belt
buckles, but it’s too late. He and
Terrell stumble outside to meet the sand people – only these are a little
taller than the Jawas on Tattooine.
Then comes the grand unveiling of Khan. Note that from here on out, Khan keeps that
right-hand glove on!
And we’re all familiar with the joking explanation of how
Khan recognizes Chekov, when Chekov wasn’t in the original Khan episode? The story goes that during an untold moment
in “Space Seed,” Khan really had to hit the head – galactic Montezuma’s
Revenge, perhaps – and he almost lost control before the potty was vacated by …
Pavel Chekov, whom Khan then swore never to forget (or forgive).
When Khan shows off his crew, marooned with him 15 years
ago, it’s pretty obvious that most are a lot younger than him.
Also note the close-up of Judson Scott, who plays Khan’s
aide-de-camp. He’s evidently Khan’s
second-hand man, but did you know why his name isn’t in the credits? Because he and his agent did something
dumb. While arguing over Scott’s
billing, Paramount wasn’t willing to list Scott in a high-enough place to
satisfy the actor’s representative. So
during the negotiations, Scott’s agent threatened to “waive billing,” as some
sort of odd bargaining tactic against Paramount, and Scott gave his agent
permission to take this tack. He thought
that meant that his role would not be in the opening credits, but prominent in
the closing credits. DUMB! “Waive” means to forego completely! So, the name Judson Scott isn’t listed at
all!
Soon afterwards, there’s a pretty obvious redub of a line
as Khan asks Terrell if he knows who Khan is.
Ricardo Montalban’s face is averted, but the line “To amuse your
captain?” still somehow sounds different from the next line. Probably because that looped line was
recorded in a booth and not on the set.
Khan thunders that “THIS is Ceti Alpha 5!” and you start
to wonder how Starfleet numbers the planets in a system. If you count planets from the sun outward,
then you wouldn’t mistake Planet Six for Planet Five, unless somebody threw an
extra planet into a closer orbit, bumping Planet Five down a number. Then you wonder what kind of record-keeping
Starfleet science uses, if they’ve lost track of a whole planet and didn’t
notice one blowing up. And this star
system is one that they were going to use for an important experiment?!?
A minute ago, Khan said that he was from 1996. Now he reminisces about how he was “a
prince,” two hundred years ago. That
reference makes “now” to be around 2200.
This barely gets us into the “23rd century” mentioned in the
opening titles.
On the other hand, you’ll have to credit Starfleet with
designing spacesuits with a handy handle for lifting by genetic supermen. Of course, when Chekov is lifted by Khan, it
was really on a wire. Some claim to see
those wires, but I can’t. However, it’s
kinda funny that, to “let” Chekov down, Montalban has to YANK down on Koenig’s
spacesuit, against the wire holding Koenig up.
As reaches into the plastic eel tub, Khan refers to his
wife. In the original “Space Seed,” the
backstory of this film, Khan’s “wife” was Marla McGivers, a mutinous Starfleet
member who defected from Kirk’s ship because she’d never been swyved like that
before (check your Chaucer if you don’t know that word). This character was also intended to be part
of the film, until producer Harve Bennett discovered that actress Madlyn Rhue
was suffering from MS and was wheelchair-bound.
So her character was merely addressed and then dismissed through a
couple of clumsy references.
Now, I think the Ceti Alpha eel is pretty cool-looking,
in a creepy way. Although part of its
menace is mitigated by its cheesy-sounding voice. After Khan removes the babies from under its
shell and withdraws his tweezers, the angry thing makes a sound almost
identical to an angry, sputtering Donald Duck!
We cut to Kirk’s shuttle approaching the Enterprise.
What’s that image on the wall behind Kirk?
To me, it seems strangely familiar. But probably only to a few long-memoried
people in the OKC area. Why?
Because something eerily similar was used in 1979 as a logo
for one form of STAR OKC, a club of which I am one of a few survivors!
See you next Monday for Part II of this exhausting look
at the movie that saved Star Trek.
