In Kirk's defense, he lived in a time where basically nothing that happens matters later. Continuity was discovered in the Delta Quadrant and was quickly distributed in the Federation.
@@luvmenow33 season one makes a lot more sense if you watch it in production order not broadcast. That one midseason episode that opens where spock is very robotic and emphasis on the procedural part of the ships activities is way out of place.
Kirk did have an edge. Khan was still operating in a two dimensional, twentieth century mindset. Kirk on the other hand was well versed in twenty-third century, three dimensional tactics. If Khan had thought of their battle more as an aerial dogfight, and not as a surface ship engagement, he might have won. It strikes me as incongruent that a mind as advanced, and quick to adapt as Khans, didn’t grasp this paradigm more rapidly.🤔
Had Khan heeded the advice of Jaquin they'd both be alive. They escaped from Ceti Alpha V, and had a star ship at their disposal. His revenge vendetta backfired.
My favorite part of Wrath of Khan is right after the first battle when Sulu says" you did it sir" and Kirk immediately snaps " I DID NOTHING! Except get caught with my britches down! I use be going senile."
He was so great, i found him scary as a kid, possibly because id saw this alien character with a similar hair cut in the He-Man movie and er cause of those, pecks. But mostly because he had very real presence and was quite imposing.
Having grown up with Original Trek (in my fifties now), I've seen this movie probably fifteen or so times. The latest was last summer. And I'm not ashamed to say I cry every damned time at Spock's death scene. Shatner went between extremes in his acting, from complete ham to knock it out of the park, but the last few minutes of Wrath is without doubt his best work, at least in emotional terms.
You're right and wrong at the same time. It is Kirk's fault but not for the reasons you say. Khan's is at fault for all of Khan's actions. When Kirk offers him Ceti Alpha V it is known as a harsh planet that, as Khan points out, they will "struggle to find food" even before CA VI goes the way of Krypton. Khan's hatred of Kirk is stupid because there is no way he would have wanted Kirk to come check up on him even if Kirk offered. Khan is suffering from buyers remorse and irrationally blaming for his own actions. No, its Kirk's fault because he ignored Star Fleet regulation and didn't raise his shields when the regs and common sense told him he should have. (I'm amazed he didn't get court-martialed for this.) If he had raised them when he should Khan wouldn't have gotten those cheap shots off disabling the Enterprise. The Constitution class heavy cruiser would have easily outgunned the Miranda class light cruiser in relatively short order. Very quickly if they did the prefix code trick at the same time. Its sad the first Enterprise ended its life facing off against two ships it could easily out class. That was almost as bad as the Enterprise D!
Agree completely... Spock should have doubled down on Kirk after saving his face with Saavik... quietly Jim we should raise shields... remember Spock is officially the ship's Captain now... very selfish of him to assume command. He should have refused Spock's offer out of hand. You're Head of Starfleet Operations for Christ's sake... act like it. Don't get me started on the D... it was worse than watching Battlestar Galactica ...either show and watch a Battlestar get taken out with one to two or three hits. Yesterday's Enterprise is painful to watch.
Jeremy Perron It doesn’t matter what Kahn’s take on the matter is, Kahn wasn’t the captain. He didn’t have a say in the matter and all the responsibility for what happens after taking the ship back lays with the captain. Not that what he did was particularly wrong, if he sent a ship to check on them and that ship got hijacked that would also be Kirks fault.
It was Kirk's fault: He let him go! ( in the original series.) Like letting Hitler or Bin Laden go. ILLOGICAL! The President of the Federation should have overridden Kirk's bad decision and arrested Khan and his crew and put them in a special prison or cryogenic prison.
''When Kirk offers him Ceti Alpha V it is known as a harsh planet that, as Khan points out, they will "struggle to find food" even before CA VI goes the way of Krypton. Khan's hatred of Kirk is stupid because there is no way he would have wanted Kirk to come check up on him even if Kirk offered. Khan is suffering from buyers remorse and irrationally blaming for his own actions.'' Exactly. Khan bought CA V as is.
@@DrewLSsix Nope Khan's fault. Khan is grown and responsible for his own actions. Kirk ceases to be his captain when leaves the Enterprise. At this point he is on his and responsible for his destiny. It's Khan's fault it he does something bad and his credit if he does something good. Not Kirk's.
The Federation also has some blame in all of this. When they went to the Ceti-Alpha system to scan for a suitable planet for testing the planet scale Genesis device, they never bothered to check their records on this system to see what information there was on it, such as Kirk's logs about Khan and him being exiled to this system. They also never bothered to look at their maps of this system otherwise they would have known an entire planet was missing with nothing but debris where it was and that the orbits of nearby planets got fucked up. Keep in mind that the tests were very thorough to the point where there couldn't be as much as one microbe on the planet or it was being called off. If anything, trying to test in such an unstable system would not be ideal and they would have moved on to one of the bajillion uninhabited systems with planets in life sustaining conditions and where no nearby planets are due to explode. This is more of a case of making the Feds stupid to move the story along, but I think it could have been handled better without the need of making the Feds stupid. Chekhov for one wasn't there in Space Seed, so they could have played up his ignorance rather than retcon him being there to be an exposition dump to the other captain and we the audience when Khan reveals himself. They could have brought up a computer glitch in their system preventing data from the system to show up to again given them a reason for their ignorance of what had happened in this system.
oh, and the federation tells Kirk, the Enterprise is the only ship in the quadrant when they know Reliant was sent to Regula 1. And maybe warn Enterprise that Reliant is there but not responding...
Not to mention that Captain Terrell and Chekov beamed down to an unexplored planet with no security (red shirts) force. Another violation of Star Fleet regulations.
Although Chekhov wasn't aboard Enterprise during that mission. I am sure mandatory that Bridge crew keep updated on Captain's mission logs. The Federation has monitored thousands of planetary systems since Botany Bay incident, a minor oversight during first survey of Ceti Alpha system in more 25 years not impossible.
The screw up was that Star fleet thought Khan was on the planet that exploded. Thats why they never sent a welfare check for Khan and why they thought the planet was to totally uninhabited.
It's wrong to say that Kirk never faced the "no-win" scenario. Spock says that Kirk took the test _three times._ Kirk faced it; he just didn't think of it as a no-win, but as an opportunity to adjust his thinking and methods. In other words, as a *learning opportunity.* They make a similar mistake in the next movie when they say that Kirk has never had to deal with the death of a loved one. They completely forget that Kirk's brother was killed in "Operation Annihilate" and that his parents were executed right before his eyes by Kodos the Executioner when he was a kid.
Nicholas Meyer's contribution to the franchise is hard to overstate. He was one of the first people on the creative team to introduce a sense of realism to the franchise, which we see in Star Trek II and also in Star Trek VI (the only one that rivals it in terms of merit among the original series feature films).
Agreed. The texting bits were irrelevant & not humorous AT ALL. They just ended up disrupting the value of the presentation. If you want to send a message about annoying texts - DON'T ACKNOWLEDGE THEM and especially - DON'T ANSWER THEM!
A really great episode. I do agree that Wrath of Khan was Kirk's fault, as the episode "Space Seed" from the original series showed Kirk giving Khan all the knowledge he would need to takeover a starship. Then, when Khan is defeated in that episode his crew is captured, Kirk sends them all to exile on a planet which is near another unstable planetary body. This meant that Kirk either intentionally wanted to wipe out Khan and his crew without having to get his hands dirty, or that it was unintentional. And, instead of letting the knowledge of Khan be sent throughout the starships of the Federation of Planets as well as neglecting to keep an eye on Khan or sending someone else to do the job, Kirk forgets the whole thing. As such, Khan and his crew are left on a planet which becomes very harsh, loses half their number due to space parasites and a war between the crew, and the death of Khan's wife drives him mad. Thus, when the USS Reliant sends people to Khan's new home, without knowledge of the dangers of this system, Khan takes over the ship and uses it on a mission of revenge which costs many lives.
Luteniant savick was completely right tho Enterprise should have raised her shields when communications could not be achieved with reliant poor engineering personal like Peter Preston were slaughted when the reliant phasers penetrated the engine room ruptured the warp core realising massive amounts of radiation only option was to shut off the power a catastrophic amount of errors leading to the death of spock who had to sacrifice himself to just reactivate the warp engine temporarily so enterprise could get away from the genesis explosion wave...... you should have raised those damm shields kirk
I must say this is one spin I haven't seen anyone tackle on the movie yet, that of Spock's deus ex vulcana being an intentional plot point here. Well done, Steve! Just when you think there isn't any more to KHAAAAN out of the film, someone always finds an angle.
The point of this video crashes down on Kirk toward the end of TWoK, and he himself acknowledges it: _I haven't faced death. I've cheated death. I've tricked my way out of death and patted myself on the back for my ingenuity._ Here's a thought, though: what does Kirk do if he DOESN'T plant Khan & Co. on Ceti Alpha V? Return them to Earth for trial and judgment? Wouldn't THAT have been a party? What if, in that whole process, there is "Marcus" or his equivalent from *Star Trek: Into Darkness* who manages to take control of and exploit Khan for his own purposes in THIS universe? I wonder if there is ANY scenario that comes out well from the introduction of Khan Noonien Singh? Of course, as C. S. Lewis says in his Narnia tales, no one is ever told what _would_ have happened.
Daniel Appleton . They would likely still revive them, possibly not knowing the dangers. Kahn probably would have tried taking over the Federation once freed. Also, if you keep them in cryo, how is that any better than sentencing them to death. Sure they could be revived one day, but it seems no one wants to take that risk.
Judging from what we know of Harry Mudd, the security of the Federation's prison system is a joke, so dropping someone on a deserted planet may well be the best way to deal with them without simply executing them. Kirk seems to like that approach and uses it on a few occasions. What Kirk apparently did wrong was not put a satellite network around the planet to instruct people to stay away from it. That said, even if he'd done that, whether others would have obeyed that instruction is another matter entirely.
Actually, Khan himself said that right at the start: "'Admiral' Kirk...never bothered to check on our progress." :) What *should* have been done was for the Federation to have sent someone to check up on them at least once a year. Then they would have seen what was going on, and caught Khan off-guard before he was used to the climate change. Chances are Khan would have tried something back then, and the Federation would have just zapped them for being murderous troublemakers. End of story, no need for The Wrath of Khan. :)
Sorry, but Khan comes off as a whiny little bitch with that line, by comparison with his attitude at the end of "Space Seed," where he's all ready to tackle an entire planet. His words _then_ were, "... a world to win, an empire to build." He failed to take Murphy's Law into account ... or the simple fact that shit happens.
Here's something to think about. This whole incident would generate a pretty big heap of paperwork, including a lost crew member report. What if the paperwork was "lost" at Star Fleet Command via the auspices of Section 31? We know that in the Kelvin timeline, the Botany Bay was intercepted by another ship and Khan got the ULTIMATE makeover and brainwashing(which later failed) and was essentially "weaponized" compliments of Section 31. What if Section 31 decided that it might be a good idea to have a secret planet of "supermen" in the event of doomsday scenario that might require the services of a race of Khans? One little digital "tapeworm" like they used on the Borg incident in Enterprise and the general populace is none the wiser.
Though not explicitly stated in Space Seed, Kirk often sent logs/reports/status to Star Fleet. So the Federation knew Khan was there and shoulda/woulda followed-up the situation by either accepting Kirk's judgment and doing regular check-up visits, or retrieving Khan and exacting their own punishment.
When I first viewed Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan I was six years old. I understood Khan. His character was very straight forward. He hated Kirk and wanted revenge. You didn't even need to watch Space Seed to understand that. But it took me a long time to understand Kirk. When I was young I didn't understand why Kirk was so miserable in the first forty minutes of the film. He looked young enough to me. But later as middle age began to settle itself opon me I understood Kirk perfectly. And I also realized the film's conflict reinvigorated his spirit and reminded him he was still vital enough to outsmart an old rival. But that hubris cost him his best friend in the end making Kirk realize that the best age to be is the age you are. Great video as always Steve. Six
Kirk never seems to learn. Much as he spends the episode ignoring Spock's warnings, he spends half the movie ignore Saavik's advice on Starfleet's rules. Rules which were, it turns out, written for a reason.
When I first saw the title, I assumed Steve was talking about ignoring Saavik and Starfleet General Order 12 which, you know, may have also prevented the rest of the movie: Sir, may I quote General Order Twelve, "On the approach of any vessel, when communications have not been established..."
He had learned his lesson in Star Trek 3, targeting the distortion rather than waiting until it made a move. And he was able to get the jump on the Klingons
What about the fact that Lt.Savik quoted regulation that could have prevented the Reliant from wreaking havoc on the Enterprise when first encountered.
Fun little fact: The tool Kirk uses in Space Seed to overcome Khan is not an oversized switch, it´s meant to resemble a tool used on old sailing ships, can´t remember the name but I saw an interview with Nicolas Meyer where he mentions this small detail that impressed him.
Heh, A friend of mine once ran a Star Trek RPG campaign that revolved around a Federation crew that followed in Kirk's wake, fixing the various problems that he'd caused, settling paternity suits etc, etc.
I love this movie. I was in Jr High when it came out, TOS was the only Star Trek then, I mowed lawns to get money to go watch this movie and I did so once a week for 4 months(at the dollar movie house) Also purchased the sound track at the record store. RIP James Horner. Guess I'll get to the point, good analysis, You are spot on. Never looked at this way but Kirk brought this on himself and more importantly others.....
This is all summarized by the first battle between Khan and Kirk: Kirk ignores the good advice from regulations and Saavik (more Kirk ignoring Vulcan logic there), fails to properly protect the Enterprise, and thus gets somebody else killed and a few others seriously injured. Had he raised his shields when specifically told to do so, he could have pulled the exact same hacking maneuver that he uses to get out of that mess and blown the Reliant out of the water.
If the events of TWOK never took place Admiral Kirk would have been on Earth drinking Romulan Ale while the Whale probe destroys Earth with no one to stop it.
@@DrewLSsix Only reason Kirk HAD an excuse to get command of the Enterprise again was the incident at Regula 1, which was caused by Khan. Had this single event not happened the Federation, based out of Earth would cease to exist. Then in the near future both the Alpha and Beta quadrants would be occupied by the Borg... Sometimes breaking the rules and doing things Kirk's way saves more lives than were lost in the long run.
@@Dave102693 the Borg are vastly superior to the Dominion. Every attack on Borg ships even if it successfully destroyed the ship caused a query by the collective. Borg queries look for ways of improving their ships against known weaknesses. The Dominion however had weaknesses that once discovered were never corrected. In theory, if Janeway had not stopped the Borg with her virus, they would have overwhelmed the Dominion with numbers. Assimilating their technology would have made the Borg a real nightmare. The Borg by the way are still active, but in what sense is unknown. Are they free of the collective? Destroyed? Unplugged from their nanites? Adapting to the virus? Officially, Picard's new show may finally answer that question.
Bit of a jump. If TWOK didn't happen then kirk would've probably had to deal with some other aliens hell bent on a failed genesis project. Probably the klingons. In which case the probe would've still come to earth and very likely destroyed it before Kirk got back with the enterprise.
@@richardsmall2855 You could argue the Borg are more powerful than the Dominion from the perspective of the Alpha quadrant powers, and the strengths and weaknesses of said powers. But I'd argue in a head to head match between the two, the Dominion has the edge. The founders could pose as drones to sabotage ships without risking their lives since they would be incompatible with assimilation, and even if they weren't, their strengths would be squandered by the collective. The Jem Hadar are reliant on Ketracel White on a genetic level, which ensures that any drones made out of Jem Hadar would suffer withdrawal and die. Not to mention, with the Dominion's genetic mastery, I'm sure they could make the Vorta and Jem Hadar resistant to the Borg nanites. The Dominion has weaknesses, sure, but they could seriously cripple the Borg before they even registered them as a threat.
Had an interesting dream last night that gave me an idea for an alternate way the movie could have ended. Usually these things are full of holes, and this one would require a few edits to the movie, and probably has some other issues, but the premise is interesting enough I wanted to share it. Anyway, at the end of the movie, Khan is the only living person left on the Reliant. In the movie, he is near death, however with a little editing you could leave things a bit more ambiguous after he activates the Genesis device. Suppose in that time he managed to get down to one of Reliant’s shuttlebays and use a warp-capable shuttlecraft (I think these exist in the TOS movie era) to escape the nebula just before the device detonates and somehow isn’t detected due to nebula interference and whatnot, and he obviously decides not to engage the Enterprise (we’ll assume they don’t have enough shuttlecraft to do something similar on the Enterprise or the bay doors aren’t working at this point in the movie, or whatever) with a lone shuttle. As such, he decides to lay low for a while and wait for another opportunity. Speaking of opportunities, maybe I’m just looking for a way to replace Star Trek V. Do I get a commendation for original thinking? 😉 I suppose it’s kind of like the blink-and-you’ll-miss-it “save the animals” ending variant in Super Metroid.
Great video as per usual :). Two things I'd like to say: 1) To give another perspective: The way I always thought of this, and do in the case of any and all crimes comitted by anyone, the victim can never be at fault. They can be held responsible for putting others in danger through neglegence, but ultimately Khan is always the one at fault. If you leave your car unlocked, you can be called stupid if it's stolen, but the burden of responsibility and blame should ALWAYS be on the person who stole it. The underlying message of Star Trek in general, with no capital punishment, good and fair treatment for all under any circumstances, I always took to mean that any individual, no matter their history or crime, can be granted the right to make amends, learn, and change, and should be given the chance to do so. Sure, they're likely to break the rules, but let THEM be the ones to prove that, don't assume that they will. Here, Kirk's only responsibility would be to minimise the likelihood that Khan and his followers can cause harm to others in the future. Leaving them on an abandoned planet out of reach of anyone without the technology required to leave would seem to be a good start. Now, an orbiting beacon would have been handy, proper reporting to the federation that to stay away from the planet or system would be wise, but it's understandable that with the destruction of Ceti Alpha 6, and the complete transformation of Ceti Alpha 5, the Reliant was unable to identify the planet in question as the one the Enterprise had left Khan on previously. Following on this, after their escape to the Reliant, one of Khan's crew tries to convince him to just leave Kirk and the Enterprise, now they have a ship, to persue a new life for themselves with their new found freedom. It was Khans decision to exact revenge upon Kirk, thus cementing it as him being the enemy and the one determined to attack Kirk and the Enterprise no matter the risk or cost. Kirk understandably then had to bear the burden and feeling of responsibility for the deaths, injuries and heartbreak that followed, due to not better confining Khan, and he may well feel at fault, but I would argue that the fault was never his. He should, however, have raised his shields, good shout Mr Saavik! 2) Please... don't do the texting thing again, I was genuinely interested in the conversation and this interupted the flow as others have said.
Khan was clearly competent and dangerous man and Star Trek is really hyper-optimistic and naive world where nobody could even think that John Headeater von Bodymangler would be worth of that name even when he is sharpening his knives. Actually Kirk's decision to dump Khan on Ceti Alpha V was smart as it gave that superhuman something to do. Then harsh life became struggle by planetary disaster. Apparently Captains of Starfleet have huge authority to work on their own and they even don't have to report of their specific doings. Thus nobody knew or cared that Ceti Alpha V was recently colonized by temperamental superhumans or that its neighboring planet has caused severe changes to its climate by blowing up.
Great video! I remember thinking even as a 10-yr-old in the 70s what a bad idea it seemed to give Khan access to the Enterprise computer files. But as a bit of tangent, another interesting aspect of "Space Seed" is the behavior of Marla McGivers. The original series was most definitely sexist by today's standards, though they didn't think of it that way in those days. The absolute ease with which McGivers was convinced to commit treason and mutiny was most directly because she was literally turned on by Khan AND his physical and psychologically abusive behavior towards her. She swore allegiance to him AS he was crushing her hand! Khan wouldn't even giver her a token promise that he wouldn't harm anyone when she asked, he just rebuked her for even questioning him, and she went along with it! I think it's safe to say that this was the prevailing attitude at the time about how women would behave if serving in the military. So perhaps the blame could be spread between Kirk and McGivers. After crushing McGivers hand, if she had just alerted Kirk to the danger, crisis could still have been avoided, even with Khan's access to the computer!
Putting them back into hibernation would have been a more sensible option. The hibernation pods from Khan's ship could have been transported to the Enterprise or perhaps they would have built new ones or modified the old ones with 23rd century technology. Fewer resources would be wasted keeping them alive until they reached a starbase or a Federation planet.
I would agree, but throwing politics into the bit after it was already overused made it a bit stale, and made it obvious that he was also prone to shallow criticisms. Example, implying that a lawfully elected leader who has respect for the system is a tyrant.
I've heard that in Ancient Greek tragedy, from which "I know nothing" comes from, most stories ended with the protagonist learning that he's not the hero he thought himself to be ... making Kirk's appropriation of the phrase that more ... appropriate.
If any of you are interested, about 6.5 minutes into Space Seed it is mentioned that suspended animation was necessary for long-term space travel until the year 2018.
One reason for Kirk dropping Khan on the planet: They were on a five year exploratory mission, so they supposedly were outside the bounds of Federation space or at the very edges. Their ships weren't that fast, and the decision was either to incarcerate Khan and his people for months or years on the Enterprise, or mete out justice then and there. Since there's no death penalty in the Federation (except for one specific case), that was the choice he had to make.
@@stanleyjedrzejczyk2966 That's basically a death sentence, which was practically nonexistent in the Federation. Remember Trek is an utopian image of our future. You know, what utopian means, right? Khan was dangerous, but still had his rights. Killing him off was not an option unless in self defence.
And just think how the events of TWOK would have been altered if Kirk had followed procedure and treated the initial encounter with the Reliant as hostile until the Reliant's non-belligerency had been confirmed.
Regarding "Space Seed": Lt. Marla McGyvers (McGivers?) was a dork. Khan had a "superior intellect", but he couldn't foresee that a woman who so quickly gives up her allegiance to the Federation, her crew, and her captain just to get laid by her fantasy man come to life wouldn't just as quickly turn on him? (Well, Khan was asleep for a looooong time, guess he was thinking with that other brain, the one between his legs.). She probably got through the Academy by sleeping with her professors.
Mindy Newell Not just a dork. A weak minded, treacherous dork. Her ass should've been court martialed and hauled off to a penal colony while watching the bad boy of her dreams put back in stasis.
I also thought it was his fault for not raising the damn shields. Reliant and Enterprise are about the same size, and Reliant may be crewed by supermen, but only a few of dozen of them at most, along with an inexperienced commander.
Correction: Scotty's nephew didn't die because of Kirk. He died because Scotty carried the critically injured kid all the way from engineering to the damn bridge instead of going to sick bay. It would be like if I got hit by a car and instead of the ambulance taking me to the emergency room, they decide to make a detour to City Hall to show my mangled body to the mayor.
I realize this is an old video, but the bit with Dustin worked for me. I don't know why anyone wouldn't find that funny. This was and still-is your most hilarious Actually. Excellent work!
it would have made for a much more compelling story if someone from the Federation had ordered Genesis tested on Seti Alpha V deliberately to destroy Khan and his followers, as it opened up the moral dilemma of "do we have that right?". It may set Khan up as the protagonist initially, but there are many ways to work that around. For example, at first the Reliant refuses that order and another starship (perhaps the Enterprise herself, under different command) is sent to investigate, only being told the crew were disobeying orders. Khan, figuring all this out, not only captures the Enterprise (not Reliant) but the Genesis Device itself. NOW Kirk back on Earth must not only confront his superiors about this horrible decision, but must also now order the pursuit of his old ship... potentially to its destruction. At the same time, the implications of Khan actually controlling Genesis could be further delved into (rather than just paid lip service). Sure there would be some space battle in here, just to fulfill Paramount's demand for a more action-type story after TMP's apparent failure (though the numbers say otherwise), but in the end the conflict should be resolved in more of a battle of wits between Kirk and Khan, rather than a fist fight, phaser duel, or ship scramble. Y'know... how Picard vs. Shinzon SHOULD have ended (their talks were the best parts about that movie). If there was to be wrath from Khan, it should not have been against Kirk, it should have been against the world that created and then subsequently shunned him... and then centuries later attempted to destroy him. That would make so much more sense. AND have Kirk actually care for each of whom fall under his command (like in TOS) rather than pretty much everyone but Spock and Scotty's Nephew in Wrath treated as expendable extras. The two crewman burning alive in the torpedo room get so forgotten about that even the fire damage is gone at the end of the film. There was just so much more that could have been done with the film and its plot elements... Such a missed opportunity
@Steve Shives Yeah. Without watching your YT clip, Kirk should have checked on Khan’s progress on Ceti Alpha V. The planet was barely a Class M planet, but when nearby planet Ceti Alpha VI blew up, then Ceti Alpha V became a Class K planet, making it very uninhabitable. When you think about it, you would think that Kirk was ether ruthless (If he knew what was going to happen) or negligent (If he didn’t). That and Marla McGivers’ death turned Khan over the edge.
Jack B. Sowards, who wrote the screenplay, never wrote for Trek again, except for one episode of TNG--"Where Silence Has Lease." I just found that interesting. He's the only one listed in the imdb credits for the screenplay? Because this screenplay was one of the most brilliant things ever.
First, For Reliant to seek a test planet knowing Khan is on a planet in that system. Secondly, should have beamed out right from the living quarters, third, Being khan had Terrel and Chechov under his control, been better to have Capt Terrel speak to Kirk and invite him over or attack during "friendly talk". Fourth, Kirk should have had the shields up when protocol wasn't followed. Can always lower shields. I think the movie would've been much better. Khansequnces would be more exiting.
"Who decides?" is the single most relevant question with which humanity must grapple. That sounds like a subject for "Star Trek" to attempt tackling. If only some legitimate Star Trek still existed to broach it.
Not only should that have been noticed, but it is literally physically impossible for an exploding planet to make an inner planet shift orbit to its position.
I had this video suggested to me out of nowhere and i have to admit i was a little scared when i saw the text exchange at 5:37 its as if the youtube overlords knew there was a fallout reference and suggested it in conjunction with the tv show release.
Wrath of Khan is such an awesome piece of storytelling. First of all it is the first movie to use CG, and then you have a script with a story structure that well contained. Over the course of two hours we get to see the cast deal with the ultimate enemy, death itself.
Scott's nephew stayed at his post for the good of the ship = dead. Spock leaves his post for the good of the ship = also dead Posts are the other no-win situation 😂
How about the fact that the crew of the Reliant couldn't count? Ceti Alpha 5 was the 5th planet in the solar system. They went looking for Ceti Alpha 6, the 6th planet in the solar system. So the 5th planet is orbiting in the spot where the 6th planet used to but did noone stop and say "Hey there seems to be a planet missing in this solar system"?
It's ironic that David's scientific cheating with little or no regard for the consequences is responsible for Spock's resurrection. He, unfortunately, never got a chance to learn from his mistakes.
Would have been nice if you'd pointed out that, even ignoring the events of Space Seed, the events of Wrath of Khan wouldn't have happened without Kirk blatantly ignoring standard protocol.
Also, fwiw, does anyone blame the Sixth Coalition for the Battle of Waterloo? "Sure Napoleon tried to commandeer Europe and kill us all, but let's maroon him on Elba."
They did that just to slowly poison him out of the sight of the people. A big execution would had made many people sore but a "natural death" would be accepted by everyone.
"As you know, I have made a vow never to give you information that could potentially alter your destiny. Your path is yours to walk, and yours alone. That being said..."
Moral of the story is don't leave a potential problem to fester. Kirk should've put Khan and company back to sleep, and McGivers should've been court martialed/ sent to a penal colony. Khan was too untrustworthy to leave alone. And what's more, why wasn't Star Fleet interested in a potential future threat ? I love Wrath of Khan, but too many leaps in logic abound.
Kirk: We can hate and admire a person at the same time! Spock: You're going to be the death of me, aren't you? Kirk: That's a little harsh, Spock! -- Years later... -- Kirk: Sulu, get us out of here! Spock: Ugh... I better fix this before more people die from this irresponsible idiot's poor actions... -- A little bit later -- Kirk: Klingon bastard, you killed my son! Captain Klingon: Now, we know this is your fault, Kirk. If you killed Khan years ago like I would have done, he wouldn't have stolen the Genesis torpedo and created the planet which your son's lifeless body now rests on! Kirk: Klingon bastard! -- Still later -- McCoy: Damn it, Jim! If you had killed Khan all those years ago, we wouldn't have had to hijack that Klingon battle cruiser to escape from the Genesis planet and be sent to a Klingon prison colony! My ass is freezing off here! Kirk: Bones, shut up!
in kirks defense, the vulcans direction of film 4 allowed them to save earth by saving the whales there by appeasing the beings that came to earth in a super ship and were digging through the oceans looking for the whales, they needed that klingon battlecruiser to travel back through time and save the whales, wouldnt have looked as cool in a federation saucer shaped ship
@@aurorauplinks It might have looked a lot cooler, had the Enterprise cloaking system. But we know well, that the Federation doesn't have that tech and they needed it for this mission. Also the Enterprise wasn't capable of planet surface landing, needs to be noted. They should borrow the Voyager from the future, before Janeway embarked on her mission. At least that ship could land there in the 20th century. XD Also it was an automated probe, not actual aliens in their ship. Were they aliens, they could simply contact/be contacted by the Federation/Starfleet HQ. But as an automated probe it searched for the whales and wanted their response, not knowing they were long extinct, no contact from the Federation was possible with it
There are two things about TWOK that has always bothered me, though it doesn't affect my enjoyment of the film and/or the emotions it brings out as I watch it. 1) Khan recognizes Chekov, even though Chekov was not stationed on the Enterprise during the events of "Space Seed." (Yes, this is an old gripe discussed everywhere even before the internet. Fans have come up with somewhat plausible reasons...or excuses...such as "Chekov wasn't on the bridge, but he was on the ship in another capacity." 2) "One of Our Planets is Missing." How can a SCIENCE VESSEL crew--any crew, actually--entirely miss that a known solar system--after all, it was named and charted, hence the "Alpha Ceti 5, Alpha Ceti 6," which then indicates that the Federation knows how many planets are circling the star called Alpha Ceti--is MISSING A PLANET????
Walter Koenig suggested he was a lower level officer who had made Khan wait an inordinately long time to use the bathroom. SFDebris has a good narration with Khan twisting his legs, only for Chekov to emerge and tell him, this one appears to be clogged and he's going to have to find one on another deck xD It does make the line much more menacing, thinking that xD I agree on the Ceti Alpha thing. I feel like someone was dyslexic with their roman numerals, cuz like, if it was Ceti Alpha IV that had exploded, then naturally you might not check to assume the fourth planet was the fourth planet? It's still really sloppy but I feel like it'd be easier to handwave. Unless the Federation counts them backwards?
@@Raja1938 Good try, Raj' (I can call you that? It's okay?) Original thinking. And I mean that as a compliment. Yes, gravitational forces MIGHT cause what's left of the planet to "clump together" to form another planet, but it wouldn't happen in the (no pun intended) space of twenty years (from the time of "SPACE SEED" to the events of TWOK). It would occur over hundreds, thousands, even millions of years. More immediately and likely, the planetary debris would form an asteroid belt circling the star Alpha Ceti. And the "dust" might even form a ring--ala Saturn's rings--around one of the remaining planets. (Ceta Alpha VI?) But I still say, even given human error, that the sensors and "doodads" on the Reliant would have picked up the changes in the solar system.
@@dataportdoll7918 "Walter Koenig suggested he was a lower level officer who had made Khan wait an inordinately long time to use the bathroom. SFDebris has a good narration with Khan twisting his legs, only for Chekov to emerge and tell him, this one appears to be clogged and he's going to have to find one on another deck xD It does make the line much more menacing, thinking that xD" Love it!!!! (And thanks for the tip about SFDebris--I'm going to go check it out.)
What always bothered me is that Ceti Alpha V was apparently pushed further away from its star so that it became confused with Ceti Alpha VI. Which means that when VI exploded V had to be somewhere around the other side of the star. If the shock wave was still able to push a planet that far away, what happened to Ceti Alphas I through VI? They should've been able to tell that something was wrong long before they got to the system.
@@mindyp51a reason number 2 could be explained by starfleet's planitary database being down for maintenence at the time the Reliant entered the system. its a good argument for why you dont schedule major system updates for a monday morning :D
Kirk was never obligated toward the welfare of the villain he marooned. If anything, he only should have checked Khan's progress as a threat assessment. A dictator like Khan was impossible to reform, and marooning him would not have contained him forever. I think Kirk should have stopped this once and for all by throwing Khan and his people out the airlock. Problem solved, problem staying solved.
The problem is Federation at that moment being an utopian society, not having a death sentence, Kirk couldn't simply kill Khan (as dangerous as he was), because that would be breaking Federation rules. For a captain of the Federation flagship, highly costy consequences for riding the world of a dangerous threat like that.
Yes, but if Spock hadn't died, and the Genesis planet been created, the Earth would have been destroyed. Because if they hadn't been off-planet doing STIII stuff, they probably would have all been sitting on Kirk's porch watching him chop firewood or something when the STIV PROBE came.
Khan got what he was told to expect, a world to conquer with no guarantee of survival. Sidebar: Chekov wasn't a crewman in Season 1, so he never met Khan, but Khan recognised him.
If Kirk hadn't cheated on the Kobayashi Maru scenario, he never would have advanced as he did in his career so he never would have met Khan in the first place.
So in the movie when Chekov recognizes Khan and tells him that Captain Kirk was nice to Khan and Khan took advantage of Kirk's kindness really bothered me. Chekov wasn't even in that episode! So how does Chekov recognize Khan?
Maybe Chekov was part of the Enterprise crew but not yet assigned to the bridge. He could have seen him in passing... I know it's weak, but it's plausible LOL
The episode that I have the most problem with is " The Gamesters of Triskelion." (Yes...i know that the following characters have alien names but but my phone keeps auto-correcting.) In the episode...after freeing the Gladiators from their oppressive overlords, Kirk just leaves them there on the planet in the hopes that the overlords will willingly teach the Gladiators the concepts of free-will and democracy. Yeah...i don't think that that's gonna pan out. The overlords aren't just going to give up their gambling addiction just like that. Kirk's love interest even asked to come on the Enterprise to be taken somewhere else. Why wouldn't the crew take the Gladiators to the Federation? But instead... Kirk just leaves. All that fighting was for nothing.
The movie does take one unrealistic liberty: it assumes that Kirk never filed a report about Khan, not even any of the log entries that we heard him record in the course of the episode. There's probably some Star Fleet commodore who wanted to get home to his son's baseball game and so commandeered the ship that was scheduled to check up on Khan.
Pretty sure the Federation, or at least Section 31, would be more than willing to delete some logs and pretend the colony of super human tyrants did not exist
@@krim7 heh bringing up section 31 just gave me an idea...what if Kirk did file a report and someone in section 31 (maybe prime Admiral Marcus) considered that a colony of Augmants lead by Khan Noonien Sing was to much of a risk and cause that accident which destroyed Ceti Alpha (CA) VI. This could have been either by accident (Kirk name the wrong planet in the report and they were to lazy to check for life signs) or more likely this was on purpose as they ran models in which showed the destruction of CA VI would moved a now lifeless CA V in the perfect orbit for project Genesis. So maybe Khan's wrath should have been directed at the Marcus family ;)
Khan knew what he was signing up for when he chose Ceti Alpha V instead of a penal colony. He should have been under no illusions that his people weren't going to be left on their own to face whatever future that planet had in store for them. He made that choice out of pride, thinking that he was destined to overcome and conquer that harsh planet, not willing to settle for what would have been a safe and reasonably comfortable life confined to a colony under Federation protection. When that assumption didn't pan out, and the planet overcame him instead, he blamed Kirk instead of himself for the results of his own choice. Khan thought he was above consequences. Of course, the Federation really should have continued to monitor that planet after leaving Khan there, as a matter of caution if nothing else. Not having done that was the collective mistake of quite a few people. But that's really more of a rough edge on the writing than an expression of a major character flaw for Kirk. Without the benefit of hindsight, leaving them on that planet in and of itself wasn't an unreasonable thing to do. As other people have pointed out, any other way of handling Khan without killing him could have just as easily led to bad outcomes as well. And just killing him would have been murder. At the very least, Kirk's intent was merciful - a way to keep Khan from doing any more harm without inflicting more harm on his people than necessary. Whether the recipient deserves mercy or not, we really shouldn't fault someone for showing it. The message of a Star Trek movie shouldn't be that someone was wrong for showing mercy. So, honestly, the blame for Wrath of Khan really falls most heavily on Khan himself.
If any ship checked up on Khan, at any time (say 6 months after marooned), Khan would have taken that ship and caused issues of an all-new unknown nature. He wanted a ship and it all would have happened anyway.
You do correctly point out the main point of Space Seed and how it brought about the events of Wrath of Khan. You also indirectly point out Janeway's assessment in Voyager that Kirk and Sulu were "a bunch of cowboys". However, Kirk would have had to file a report and the Federation, not Kirk alone failed Khan. If Kirk had raised shields like he was supposed to, this wouldn't have happened. A Constitution class starship outgunned a Minerva or Soyuz or whatever class Reliant is.
9:52 I always noticed the connection between this part and the TNG episode about Troi learning to be a commander. It took her a few times to realize she had to sacrifice a friend and crewmen to save the ship, something Kirk never was able to assimilate.
What always spoiled the plot premise for me was that Checkov got the planets mixed up. OK the planets had moved or something, but the Science officer on the ship would have known this. I'm sure star fleet don't land on the wrong planet very often.
Thanks, Steve, for the great video. It created a lot of good discussion with various opinions. I have to fall on the side that says what Khan did was Khan's fault. When I saw the film for the first time I wondered why Khan was pissed off at Kirk. It seemed so irrational. It was not Kirk's job or even moral obligation to check up on Khan's band. Kirk owed him nothing. Regarding Kirk's offer to dispense with the court martial, it is plausible that in Kirk's time the rules were looser than for Picard. Being on the frontier of space. Bureaucracy grows with time. It also makes sense that Kirk didn't want to babysit Khan's sizable crew on the Enterprise which I can only imagine was built to use space efficiently. The brig could not have been large enough. Dropping them off on the planet was an imaginative solution to avoid another take over attempt. A solution that Khan accepted with out hesitation. It would not be the only time that Star Fleet has lost track of colonists. That said, Kirk's not raising shields was a boneheaded mistake and a court martial offense. Kirk didn't suffer any consequences there.
Did you mean to say Kirk’s actions had Khansequences?
you win the internet.
Siddown! 😂
This made my day. :D
*rimshot*
Boo! 😎
In Kirk's defense, he lived in a time where basically nothing that happens matters later.
Continuity was discovered in the Delta Quadrant and was quickly distributed in the Federation.
Actually... the Delta Quadrant didn't have much continuity either. Honestly, it was the Gamma Quadrant that introduced any measure of continuity
You're pretty.
Much right, but don't forget they do refer to the organian peace treaty in later episodes
@@luvmenow33 season one makes a lot more sense if you watch it in production order not broadcast. That one midseason episode that opens where spock is very robotic and emphasis on the procedural part of the ships activities is way out of place.
@@k1productions87 Babylon 5 introduced continuity.
"Wrath of Khan" was a chess match, with Kirk and Khan making move after calculating move. And Spock was the sacrificed Queen who won Kirk the game.
Kirk did have an edge. Khan was still operating in a two dimensional, twentieth century mindset. Kirk on the other hand was well versed in twenty-third century, three dimensional tactics. If Khan had thought of their battle more as an aerial dogfight, and not as a surface ship engagement, he might have won. It strikes me as incongruent that a mind as advanced, and quick to adapt as Khans, didn’t grasp this paradigm more rapidly.🤔
@@MrAndyBearJr So Khan was playing chess and Kirk was playing 3D Chess.
Had Khan heeded the advice of Jaquin they'd both be alive. They escaped from Ceti Alpha V, and had a star ship at their disposal. His revenge vendetta backfired.
Khan in my opinion, made some of Kirk's Klingon enemies look a bit weak.
Khan, Kruge, and Chang. Fortunately Kirk out lives them all.
My favorite part of Wrath of Khan is right after the first battle when Sulu says" you did it sir" and Kirk immediately snaps " I DID NOTHING! Except get caught with my britches down! I use be going senile."
RIP Ricardo Montalban, you were awesome as Khan.
KHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN!
As old as that Movie is I can watch it now and it is still as good as new. We don't need fancy special effects and models. Just good plots and acting.
Ricardo Montalban was just simply awesome, period, and sexy as heck.
Best Trek Villain Ever
He was so great, i found him scary as a kid, possibly because id saw this alien character with a similar hair cut in the He-Man movie and er cause of those, pecks. But mostly because he had very real presence and was quite imposing.
All he had to do was raise the fucking shields like Saavik said.
Having grown up with Original Trek (in my fifties now), I've seen this movie probably fifteen or so times. The latest was last summer. And I'm not ashamed to say I cry every damned time at Spock's death scene. Shatner went between extremes in his acting, from complete ham to knock it out of the park, but the last few minutes of Wrath is without doubt his best work, at least in emotional terms.
I agree. You can tell that Kirk really does think of Spock like a brother.
Having grown up with the JJ films, and still enjoying them to this day, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Kahn is peak trek, and Spock always grabs a tear.
The initial fight between the enterprise and the reliant is ten of the best minutes in cinema history
You're right and wrong at the same time. It is Kirk's fault but not for the reasons you say. Khan's is at fault for all of Khan's actions. When Kirk offers him Ceti Alpha V it is known as a harsh planet that, as Khan points out, they will "struggle to find food" even before CA VI goes the way of Krypton. Khan's hatred of Kirk is stupid because there is no way he would have wanted Kirk to come check up on him even if Kirk offered. Khan is suffering from buyers remorse and irrationally blaming for his own actions. No, its Kirk's fault because he ignored Star Fleet regulation and didn't raise his shields when the regs and common sense told him he should have. (I'm amazed he didn't get court-martialed for this.) If he had raised them when he should Khan wouldn't have gotten those cheap shots off disabling the Enterprise. The Constitution class heavy cruiser would have easily outgunned the Miranda class light cruiser in relatively short order. Very quickly if they did the prefix code trick at the same time. Its sad the first Enterprise ended its life facing off against two ships it could easily out class. That was almost as bad as the Enterprise D!
Agree completely... Spock should have doubled down on Kirk after saving his face with Saavik... quietly Jim we should raise shields... remember Spock is officially the ship's Captain now... very selfish of him to assume command. He should have refused Spock's offer out of hand. You're Head of Starfleet Operations for Christ's sake... act like it. Don't get me started on the D... it was worse than watching Battlestar Galactica ...either show and watch a Battlestar get taken out with one to two or three hits. Yesterday's Enterprise is painful to watch.
Jeremy Perron It doesn’t matter what Kahn’s take on the matter is, Kahn wasn’t the captain. He didn’t have a say in the matter and all the responsibility for what happens after taking the ship back lays with the captain.
Not that what he did was particularly wrong, if he sent a ship to check on them and that ship got hijacked that would also be Kirks fault.
It was Kirk's fault: He let him go!
( in the original series.)
Like letting Hitler or Bin Laden go. ILLOGICAL!
The President of the Federation should have overridden Kirk's bad decision and arrested Khan and his crew and put them in a special prison or cryogenic prison.
''When Kirk offers him Ceti Alpha V it is known as a harsh planet that, as Khan points out, they will "struggle to find food" even before CA VI goes the way of Krypton. Khan's hatred of Kirk is stupid because there is no way he would have wanted Kirk to come check up on him even if Kirk offered. Khan is suffering from buyers remorse and irrationally blaming for his own actions.'' Exactly. Khan bought CA V as is.
@@DrewLSsix Nope Khan's fault. Khan is grown and responsible for his own actions. Kirk ceases to be his captain when leaves the Enterprise. At this point he is on his and responsible for his destiny. It's Khan's fault it he does something bad and his credit if he does something good. Not Kirk's.
The Federation also has some blame in all of this. When they went to the Ceti-Alpha system to scan for a suitable planet for testing the planet scale Genesis device, they never bothered to check their records on this system to see what information there was on it, such as Kirk's logs about Khan and him being exiled to this system. They also never bothered to look at their maps of this system otherwise they would have known an entire planet was missing with nothing but debris where it was and that the orbits of nearby planets got fucked up. Keep in mind that the tests were very thorough to the point where there couldn't be as much as one microbe on the planet or it was being called off. If anything, trying to test in such an unstable system would not be ideal and they would have moved on to one of the bajillion uninhabited systems with planets in life sustaining conditions and where no nearby planets are due to explode. This is more of a case of making the Feds stupid to move the story along, but I think it could have been handled better without the need of making the Feds stupid. Chekhov for one wasn't there in Space Seed, so they could have played up his ignorance rather than retcon him being there to be an exposition dump to the other captain and we the audience when Khan reveals himself. They could have brought up a computer glitch in their system preventing data from the system to show up to again given them a reason for their ignorance of what had happened in this system.
oh, and the federation tells Kirk, the Enterprise is the only ship in the quadrant when they know Reliant was sent to Regula 1. And maybe warn Enterprise that Reliant is there but not responding...
Not to mention the XO of the Reliant decides to wait rather than rush in with a rescue when Captain Terrell fails to check in.
Not to mention that Captain Terrell and Chekov beamed down to an unexplored planet with no security (red shirts) force. Another violation of Star Fleet regulations.
Although Chekhov wasn't aboard Enterprise during that mission. I am sure mandatory that Bridge crew keep updated on Captain's mission logs. The Federation has monitored thousands of planetary systems since Botany Bay incident, a minor oversight during first survey of Ceti Alpha system in more 25 years not impossible.
The screw up was that Star fleet thought Khan was on the planet that exploded. Thats why they never sent a welfare check for Khan and why they thought the planet was to totally uninhabited.
It's wrong to say that Kirk never faced the "no-win" scenario. Spock says that Kirk took the test _three times._ Kirk faced it; he just didn't think of it as a no-win, but as an opportunity to adjust his thinking and methods. In other words, as a *learning opportunity.* They make a similar mistake in the next movie when they say that Kirk has never had to deal with the death of a loved one. They completely forget that Kirk's brother was killed in "Operation Annihilate" and that his parents were executed right before his eyes by Kodos the Executioner when he was a kid.
Didn't Spock say that Kirks dad lived to proudly see Kirk become captain of the Enterprise in Star Trek 2009?
@@edgardox.feliciano3127yes. In the original timeline Kirk’s father did not die.
Nicholas Meyer's contribution to the franchise is hard to overstate. He was one of the first people on the creative team to introduce a sense of realism to the franchise, which we see in Star Trek II and also in Star Trek VI (the only one that rivals it in terms of merit among the original series feature films).
I liked the video, but the breaks for texting broke the flow a bit too much for me.
Blame Dustin!
Wasn't funny, and I was genuinely interested in the relevant commentary.
Agreed. The texting bits were irrelevant & not humorous AT ALL. They just ended up disrupting the value of the presentation. If you want to send a message about annoying texts - DON'T ACKNOWLEDGE THEM and especially - DON'T ANSWER THEM!
I think it was a joke...
@@crazy9932 yes a joke that falls on deaf ears
A really great episode. I do agree that Wrath of Khan was Kirk's fault, as the episode "Space Seed" from the original series showed Kirk giving Khan all the knowledge he would need to takeover a starship. Then, when Khan is defeated in that episode his crew is captured, Kirk sends them all to exile on a planet which is near another unstable planetary body. This meant that Kirk either intentionally wanted to wipe out Khan and his crew without having to get his hands dirty, or that it was unintentional. And, instead of letting the knowledge of Khan be sent throughout the starships of the Federation of Planets as well as neglecting to keep an eye on Khan or sending someone else to do the job, Kirk forgets the whole thing. As such, Khan and his crew are left on a planet which becomes very harsh, loses half their number due to space parasites and a war between the crew, and the death of Khan's wife drives him mad. Thus, when the USS Reliant sends people to Khan's new home, without knowledge of the dangers of this system, Khan takes over the ship and uses it on a mission of revenge which costs many lives.
Luteniant savick was completely right tho Enterprise should have raised her shields when communications could not be achieved with reliant poor engineering personal like Peter Preston were slaughted when the reliant phasers penetrated the engine room ruptured the warp core realising massive amounts of radiation only option was to shut off the power a catastrophic amount of errors leading to the death of spock who had to sacrifice himself to just reactivate the warp engine temporarily so enterprise could get away from the genesis explosion wave...... you should have raised those damm shields kirk
I must say this is one spin I haven't seen anyone tackle on the movie yet, that of Spock's deus ex vulcana being an intentional plot point here. Well done, Steve! Just when you think there isn't any more to KHAAAAN out of the film, someone always finds an angle.
The nephew bit is hysterical! 😆 Well done.
The point of this video crashes down on Kirk toward the end of TWoK, and he himself acknowledges it: _I haven't faced death. I've cheated death. I've tricked my way out of death and patted myself on the back for my ingenuity._
Here's a thought, though: what does Kirk do if he DOESN'T plant Khan & Co. on Ceti Alpha V? Return them to Earth for trial and judgment? Wouldn't THAT have been a party? What if, in that whole process, there is "Marcus" or his equivalent from *Star Trek: Into Darkness* who manages to take control of and exploit Khan for his own purposes in THIS universe? I wonder if there is ANY scenario that comes out well from the introduction of Khan Noonien Singh?
Of course, as C. S. Lewis says in his Narnia tales, no one is ever told what _would_ have happened.
They could have just shot him. Not pretty but would have saved a lot of lives. Too bad they don't have a fortune teller who can predict the future.
I've gotta say, bringing Khan back to Earth, and bringing him in as an asset could endanger the entire Federation.
@@MuttFitness Yeah, they COULD have just shot him ... but that wouldn't have been very high-minded Federation-y, would it?
Daniel Appleton . They would likely still revive them, possibly not knowing the dangers. Kahn probably would have tried taking over the Federation once freed.
Also, if you keep them in cryo, how is that any better than sentencing them to death. Sure they could be revived one day, but it seems no one wants to take that risk.
Judging from what we know of Harry Mudd, the security of the Federation's prison system is a joke, so dropping someone on a deserted planet may well be the best way to deal with them without simply executing them. Kirk seems to like that approach and uses it on a few occasions. What Kirk apparently did wrong was not put a satellite network around the planet to instruct people to stay away from it. That said, even if he'd done that, whether others would have obeyed that instruction is another matter entirely.
Actually, Khan himself said that right at the start: "'Admiral' Kirk...never bothered to check on our progress." :) What *should* have been done was for the Federation to have sent someone to check up on them at least once a year. Then they would have seen what was going on, and caught Khan off-guard before he was used to the climate change. Chances are Khan would have tried something back then, and the Federation would have just zapped them for being murderous troublemakers. End of story, no need for The Wrath of Khan. :)
Sorry, but Khan comes off as a whiny little bitch with that line, by comparison with his attitude at the end of "Space Seed," where he's all ready to tackle an entire planet. His words _then_ were, "... a world to win, an empire to build."
He failed to take Murphy's Law into account ... or the simple fact that shit happens.
Here's something to think about. This whole incident would generate a pretty big heap of paperwork, including a lost crew member report.
What if the paperwork was "lost" at Star Fleet Command via the auspices of Section 31? We know that in the Kelvin timeline, the Botany Bay was intercepted by another ship and Khan got the ULTIMATE makeover and brainwashing(which later failed) and was essentially "weaponized" compliments of Section 31. What if Section 31 decided that it might be a good idea to have a secret planet of "supermen" in the event of doomsday scenario that might require the services of a race of Khans? One little digital "tapeworm" like they used on the Borg incident in Enterprise and the general populace is none the wiser.
It was Kirk's fault: He let him go!
( in the original series.)
Like letting Hitler or Bin Laden go. ILLOGICAL!
Though not explicitly stated in Space Seed, Kirk often sent logs/reports/status to Star Fleet. So the Federation knew Khan was there and shoulda/woulda followed-up the situation by either accepting Kirk's judgment and doing regular check-up visits, or retrieving Khan and exacting their own punishment.
Or did Kirk keep it out of the Federation logs where Khan was.
When I first viewed Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan I was six years old. I understood Khan. His character was very straight forward. He hated Kirk and wanted revenge. You didn't even need to watch Space Seed to understand that. But it took me a long time to understand Kirk. When I was young I didn't understand why Kirk was so miserable in the first forty minutes of the film. He looked young enough to me. But later as middle age began to settle itself opon me I understood Kirk perfectly. And I also realized the film's conflict reinvigorated his spirit and reminded him he was still vital enough to outsmart an old rival. But that hubris cost him his best friend in the end making Kirk realize that the best age to be is the age you are. Great video as always Steve.
Six
Kirk never seems to learn. Much as he spends the episode ignoring Spock's warnings, he spends half the movie ignore Saavik's advice on Starfleet's rules. Rules which were, it turns out, written for a reason.
When I first saw the title, I assumed Steve was talking about ignoring Saavik and Starfleet General Order 12 which, you know, may have also prevented the rest of the movie: Sir, may I quote General Order Twelve, "On the approach of any vessel, when communications have not been established..."
He had learned his lesson in Star Trek 3, targeting the distortion rather than waiting until it made a move. And he was able to get the jump on the Klingons
OTOH, at the beginning, during the KM test, Sulu reminds Saavik about SF's reg about not entering the NZone, which SHE ignores.
What about the fact that Lt.Savik quoted regulation that could have prevented the Reliant from wreaking havoc on the Enterprise when first encountered.
That is the most important fact!
Fun little fact: The tool Kirk uses in Space Seed to overcome Khan is not an oversized switch, it´s meant to resemble a tool used on old sailing ships, can´t remember the name but I saw an interview with Nicolas Meyer where he mentions this small detail that impressed him.
@@rojh9351 Yes,that was it. Seems in the old days they were also used as weapons if no blade or something was around,so there´s that.
Everyone knew what exactly what The Cage was, and everyone saw 99% of it as part of The Menagerie in 1966, not 25 years later
Heh, A friend of mine once ran a Star Trek RPG campaign that revolved around a Federation crew that followed in Kirk's wake, fixing the various problems that he'd caused, settling paternity suits etc, etc.
Spock was, and ever will be, our friend!
I love this movie. I was in Jr High when it came out, TOS was the only Star Trek then, I mowed lawns to get money to go watch this movie and I did so once a week for 4 months(at the dollar movie house) Also purchased the sound track at the record store. RIP James Horner. Guess I'll get to the point, good analysis, You are spot on. Never looked at this way but Kirk brought this on himself and more importantly others.....
DUUUUSSSSSTTTIIIINNNNNNNNN!!!!
This is all summarized by the first battle between Khan and Kirk: Kirk ignores the good advice from regulations and Saavik (more Kirk ignoring Vulcan logic there), fails to properly protect the Enterprise, and thus gets somebody else killed and a few others seriously injured. Had he raised his shields when specifically told to do so, he could have pulled the exact same hacking maneuver that he uses to get out of that mess and blown the Reliant out of the water.
There was a prequel novel detailing Khan leading his people and explained the death of Khan's wife...the title escapes me, but it was very good.
If the events of TWOK never took place Admiral Kirk would have been on Earth drinking Romulan Ale while the Whale probe destroys Earth with no one to stop it.
Steven Reynolds Incidental, it doesn’t absolve one of their responsibility.
@@DrewLSsix Only reason Kirk HAD an excuse to get command of the Enterprise again was the incident at Regula 1, which was caused by Khan. Had this single event not happened the Federation, based out of Earth would cease to exist. Then in the near future both the Alpha and Beta quadrants would be occupied by the Borg... Sometimes breaking the rules and doing things Kirk's way saves more lives than were lost in the long run.
@@Dave102693 the Borg are vastly superior to the Dominion. Every attack on Borg ships even if it successfully destroyed the ship caused a query by the collective. Borg queries look for ways of improving their ships against known weaknesses. The Dominion however had weaknesses that once discovered were never corrected. In theory, if Janeway had not stopped the Borg with her virus, they would have overwhelmed the Dominion with numbers. Assimilating their technology would have made the Borg a real nightmare.
The Borg by the way are still active, but in what sense is unknown. Are they free of the collective? Destroyed? Unplugged from their nanites? Adapting to the virus? Officially, Picard's new show may finally answer that question.
Bit of a jump. If TWOK didn't happen then kirk would've probably had to deal with some other aliens hell bent on a failed genesis project. Probably the klingons. In which case the probe would've still come to earth and very likely destroyed it before Kirk got back with the enterprise.
@@richardsmall2855 You could argue the Borg are more powerful than the Dominion from the perspective of the Alpha quadrant powers, and the strengths and weaknesses of said powers. But I'd argue in a head to head match between the two, the Dominion has the edge. The founders could pose as drones to sabotage ships without risking their lives since they would be incompatible with assimilation, and even if they weren't, their strengths would be squandered by the collective. The Jem Hadar are reliant on Ketracel White on a genetic level, which ensures that any drones made out of Jem Hadar would suffer withdrawal and die. Not to mention, with the Dominion's genetic mastery, I'm sure they could make the Vorta and Jem Hadar resistant to the Borg nanites. The Dominion has weaknesses, sure, but they could seriously cripple the Borg before they even registered them as a threat.
"I know you have a phone." Plus the Mike Stoklasa "Ohhh." Man, you're on point in this one.
Had an interesting dream last night that gave me an idea for an alternate way the movie could have ended. Usually these things are full of holes, and this one would require a few edits to the movie, and probably has some other issues, but the premise is interesting enough I wanted to share it. Anyway, at the end of the movie, Khan is the only living person left on the Reliant. In the movie, he is near death, however with a little editing you could leave things a bit more ambiguous after he activates the Genesis device. Suppose in that time he managed to get down to one of Reliant’s shuttlebays and use a warp-capable shuttlecraft (I think these exist in the TOS movie era) to escape the nebula just before the device detonates and somehow isn’t detected due to nebula interference and whatnot, and he obviously decides not to engage the Enterprise (we’ll assume they don’t have enough shuttlecraft to do something similar on the Enterprise or the bay doors aren’t working at this point in the movie, or whatever) with a lone shuttle. As such, he decides to lay low for a while and wait for another opportunity. Speaking of opportunities, maybe I’m just looking for a way to replace Star Trek V. Do I get a commendation for original thinking? 😉 I suppose it’s kind of like the blink-and-you’ll-miss-it “save the animals” ending variant in Super Metroid.
The text battle literally made me laugh out loud. 😂
Great video as per usual :). Two things I'd like to say:
1) To give another perspective: The way I always thought of this, and do in the case of any and all crimes comitted by anyone, the victim can never be at fault. They can be held responsible for putting others in danger through neglegence, but ultimately Khan is always the one at fault. If you leave your car unlocked, you can be called stupid if it's stolen, but the burden of responsibility and blame should ALWAYS be on the person who stole it.
The underlying message of Star Trek in general, with no capital punishment, good and fair treatment for all under any circumstances, I always took to mean that any individual, no matter their history or crime, can be granted the right to make amends, learn, and change, and should be given the chance to do so. Sure, they're likely to break the rules, but let THEM be the ones to prove that, don't assume that they will. Here, Kirk's only responsibility would be to minimise the likelihood that Khan and his followers can cause harm to others in the future. Leaving them on an abandoned planet out of reach of anyone without the technology required to leave would seem to be a good start. Now, an orbiting beacon would have been handy, proper reporting to the federation that to stay away from the planet or system would be wise, but it's understandable that with the destruction of Ceti Alpha 6, and the complete transformation of Ceti Alpha 5, the Reliant was unable to identify the planet in question as the one the Enterprise had left Khan on previously.
Following on this, after their escape to the Reliant, one of Khan's crew tries to convince him to just leave Kirk and the Enterprise, now they have a ship, to persue a new life for themselves with their new found freedom. It was Khans decision to exact revenge upon Kirk, thus cementing it as him being the enemy and the one determined to attack Kirk and the Enterprise no matter the risk or cost. Kirk understandably then had to bear the burden and feeling of responsibility for the deaths, injuries and heartbreak that followed, due to not better confining Khan, and he may well feel at fault, but I would argue that the fault was never his. He should, however, have raised his shields, good shout Mr Saavik!
2) Please... don't do the texting thing again, I was genuinely interested in the conversation and this interupted the flow as others have said.
Khan was clearly competent and dangerous man and Star Trek is really hyper-optimistic and naive world where nobody could even think that John Headeater von Bodymangler would be worth of that name even when he is sharpening his knives. Actually Kirk's decision to dump Khan on Ceti Alpha V was smart as it gave that superhuman something to do. Then harsh life became struggle by planetary disaster. Apparently Captains of Starfleet have huge authority to work on their own and they even don't have to report of their specific doings. Thus nobody knew or cared that Ceti Alpha V was recently colonized by temperamental superhumans or that its neighboring planet has caused severe changes to its climate by blowing up.
Great video! I remember thinking even as a 10-yr-old in the 70s what a bad idea it seemed to give Khan access to the Enterprise computer files. But as a bit of tangent, another interesting aspect of "Space Seed" is the behavior of Marla McGivers. The original series was most definitely sexist by today's standards, though they didn't think of it that way in those days. The absolute ease with which McGivers was convinced to commit treason and mutiny was most directly because she was literally turned on by Khan AND his physical and psychologically abusive behavior towards her. She swore allegiance to him AS he was crushing her hand! Khan wouldn't even giver her a token promise that he wouldn't harm anyone when she asked, he just rebuked her for even questioning him, and she went along with it! I think it's safe to say that this was the prevailing attitude at the time about how women would behave if serving in the military. So perhaps the blame could be spread between Kirk and McGivers. After crushing McGivers hand, if she had just alerted Kirk to the danger, crisis could still have been avoided, even with Khan's access to the computer!
Putting them back into hibernation would have been a more sensible option. The hibernation pods from Khan's ship could have been transported to the Enterprise or perhaps they would have built new ones or modified the old ones with 23rd century technology. Fewer resources would be wasted keeping them alive until they reached a starbase or a Federation planet.
The nephew texting is golden. That's such a great little device for nipping the shallow criticisms in the bud.
I would agree, but throwing politics into the bit after it was already overused made it a bit stale, and made it obvious that he was also prone to shallow criticisms. Example, implying that a lawfully elected leader who has respect for the system is a tyrant.
I've heard that in Ancient Greek tragedy, from which "I know nothing" comes from, most stories ended with the protagonist learning that he's not the hero he thought himself to be ... making Kirk's appropriation of the phrase that more ... appropriate.
If any of you are interested, about 6.5 minutes into Space Seed it is mentioned that suspended animation was necessary for long-term space travel until the year 2018.
@knarr: Yeah, I just "Space Seed" again on the Heroes & Icon network, and I picked up on that line. Pretty funny.
Great job! Love the nephee bit. You have found a way to let me enjoy star trek in a new and different way. Keep up the good work! 😁
I think that Kirk just kicked it up to Starfleet. He reported what happened and after that, it should have been up to them to go and check on Khan.
I agree with the points in the video. At the same time, how did Starfleet not know Ceti Aplha VI was missing when the Reliant entered the system?
One reason for Kirk dropping Khan on the planet: They were on a five year exploratory mission, so they supposedly were outside the bounds of Federation space or at the very edges. Their ships weren't that fast, and the decision was either to incarcerate Khan and his people for months or years on the Enterprise, or mete out justice then and there. Since there's no death penalty in the Federation (except for one specific case), that was the choice he had to make.
Shoud've marched all 72 of them onto the hangar deck, locked them in, then opened the bay doors!
@@stanleyjedrzejczyk2966 That's basically a death sentence, which was practically nonexistent in the Federation. Remember Trek is an utopian image of our future. You know, what utopian means, right? Khan was dangerous, but still had his rights. Killing him off was not an option unless in self defence.
One of the best TAs you've ever done. Love it.
And just think how the events of TWOK would have been altered if Kirk had followed procedure and treated the initial encounter with the Reliant as hostile until the Reliant's non-belligerency had been confirmed.
Regarding "Space Seed": Lt. Marla McGyvers (McGivers?) was a dork. Khan had a "superior intellect", but he couldn't foresee that a woman who so quickly gives up her allegiance to the Federation, her crew, and her captain just to get laid by her fantasy man come to life wouldn't just as quickly turn on him? (Well, Khan was asleep for a looooong time, guess he was thinking with that other brain, the one between his legs.).
She probably got through the Academy by sleeping with her professors.
Mindy Newell Not just a dork. A weak minded, treacherous dork. Her ass should've been court martialed and hauled off to a penal colony while watching the bad boy of her dreams put back in stasis.
I also thought it was his fault for not raising the damn shields. Reliant and Enterprise are about the same size, and Reliant may be crewed by supermen, but only a few of dozen of them at most, along with an inexperienced commander.
You're one of my favorite content creators. Thanks!
Correction: Scotty's nephew didn't die because of Kirk. He died because Scotty carried the critically injured kid all the way from engineering to the damn bridge instead of going to sick bay. It would be like if I got hit by a car and instead of the ambulance taking me to the emergency room, they decide to make a detour to City Hall to show my mangled body to the mayor.
I realize this is an old video, but the bit with Dustin worked for me. I don't know why anyone wouldn't find that funny. This was and still-is your most hilarious Actually. Excellent work!
Before even watching the video essay I will throw out this observation..........DID ANYONE THINK THAT KIRK WASN'T RESPONSIBLE lol
Theory: Section 31 destroyed Ceti Alpha VI in an effort to eliminate Khan.
it would have made for a much more compelling story if someone from the Federation had ordered Genesis tested on Seti Alpha V deliberately to destroy Khan and his followers, as it opened up the moral dilemma of "do we have that right?". It may set Khan up as the protagonist initially, but there are many ways to work that around. For example, at first the Reliant refuses that order and another starship (perhaps the Enterprise herself, under different command) is sent to investigate, only being told the crew were disobeying orders. Khan, figuring all this out, not only captures the Enterprise (not Reliant) but the Genesis Device itself. NOW Kirk back on Earth must not only confront his superiors about this horrible decision, but must also now order the pursuit of his old ship... potentially to its destruction. At the same time, the implications of Khan actually controlling Genesis could be further delved into (rather than just paid lip service). Sure there would be some space battle in here, just to fulfill Paramount's demand for a more action-type story after TMP's apparent failure (though the numbers say otherwise), but in the end the conflict should be resolved in more of a battle of wits between Kirk and Khan, rather than a fist fight, phaser duel, or ship scramble. Y'know... how Picard vs. Shinzon SHOULD have ended (their talks were the best parts about that movie).
If there was to be wrath from Khan, it should not have been against Kirk, it should have been against the world that created and then subsequently shunned him... and then centuries later attempted to destroy him. That would make so much more sense. AND have Kirk actually care for each of whom fall under his command (like in TOS) rather than pretty much everyone but Spock and Scotty's Nephew in Wrath treated as expendable extras. The two crewman burning alive in the torpedo room get so forgotten about that even the fire damage is gone at the end of the film.
There was just so much more that could have been done with the film and its plot elements... Such a missed opportunity
@Steve Shives Yeah. Without watching your YT clip, Kirk should have checked on Khan’s progress on Ceti Alpha V. The planet was barely a Class M planet, but when nearby planet Ceti Alpha VI blew up, then Ceti Alpha V became a Class K planet, making it very uninhabitable. When you think about it, you would think that Kirk was ether ruthless (If he knew what was going to happen) or negligent (If he didn’t). That and Marla McGivers’ death turned Khan over the edge.
Jack B. Sowards, who wrote the screenplay, never wrote for Trek again, except for one episode of TNG--"Where Silence Has Lease." I just found that interesting. He's the only one listed in the imdb credits for the screenplay?
Because this screenplay was one of the most brilliant things ever.
right? think of all the angles that he tackled so well.
First, For Reliant to seek a test planet knowing Khan is on a planet in that system. Secondly, should have beamed out right from the living quarters, third, Being khan had Terrel and Chechov under his control, been better to have Capt Terrel speak to Kirk and invite him over or attack during "friendly talk". Fourth, Kirk should have had the shields up when protocol wasn't followed. Can always lower shields. I think the movie would've been much better. Khansequnces would be more exiting.
"Who decides?" is the single most relevant question with which humanity must grapple.
That sounds like a subject for "Star Trek" to attempt tackling. If only some legitimate Star Trek still existed to broach it.
Umm, shouldn't Checkov's captain and crew noticed that the Ceti Alpha system was missing a planet? I say it's all their fault, #KirkIsPerf lolol
Starfleet is not known for comptence
Not only should that have been noticed, but it is literally physically impossible for an exploding planet to make an inner planet shift orbit to its position.
Wow. I hadn't noticed your subs growing by almost 50%!
"The Wrath Of Nephew",
the movie!
That was not "an oversized switch" with which Kirk clubbed Kahn. That was a Dunsel. Don't you know anything about star ships?
I always called it a plastic crowbar.
lol
Jeez Steve you seem to never get along with your houseguests. You just got rid of Geoffrey and here you are dealing with Dustin. Sorry bud!
Carlisle the Cinephile that being said, I feel like the B plot with his nephew broke up the video’s pace too much.
I had this video suggested to me out of nowhere and i have to admit i was a little scared when i saw the text exchange at 5:37 its as if the youtube overlords knew there was a fallout reference and suggested it in conjunction with the tv show release.
I love your content Brother... you're amazing and hilarious! Please keep up the great work!!!
Wrath of Khan is such an awesome piece of storytelling. First of all it is the first movie to use CG, and then you have a script with a story structure that well contained. Over the course of two hours we get to see the cast deal with the ultimate enemy, death itself.
Scott's nephew stayed at his post for the good of the ship = dead.
Spock leaves his post for the good of the ship = also dead
Posts are the other no-win situation 😂
Plot twist: there are no house guests, only Steve's own spin on the video essay format.
😱 Really?
"I know you have a phone". That was either a very subtle reference, or I'm reading into things ,haha
Of all the video you have made on this channel,,. This was the most.......... Funny😂.
I cried when I first saw the funeral scene, even now at 42 that scene gets me. On an alternate note, the Kelvin Timeline has Kirk do what Spock did.
How about the fact that the crew of the Reliant couldn't count? Ceti Alpha 5 was the 5th planet in the solar system. They went looking for Ceti Alpha 6, the 6th planet in the solar system. So the 5th planet is orbiting in the spot where the 6th planet used to but did noone stop and say "Hey there seems to be a planet missing in this solar system"?
That "switch" in Space Seed was likely a form of tool or fire extinguisher.
It's ironic that David's scientific cheating with little or no regard for the consequences is responsible for Spock's resurrection. He, unfortunately, never got a chance to learn from his mistakes.
Would have been nice if you'd pointed out that, even ignoring the events of Space Seed, the events of Wrath of Khan wouldn't have happened without Kirk blatantly ignoring standard protocol.
Also, fwiw, does anyone blame the Sixth Coalition for the Battle of Waterloo? "Sure Napoleon tried to commandeer Europe and kill us all, but let's maroon him on Elba."
They did that just to slowly poison him out of the sight of the people. A big execution would had made many people sore but a "natural death" would be accepted by everyone.
"As you know, I have made a vow never to give you information that could potentially alter your destiny. Your path is yours to walk, and yours alone. That being said..."
Moral of the story is don't leave a potential problem to fester. Kirk should've put Khan and company back to sleep, and McGivers should've been court martialed/ sent to a penal colony. Khan was too untrustworthy to leave alone. And what's more, why wasn't Star Fleet interested in a potential future threat ? I love Wrath of Khan, but too many leaps in logic abound.
Kirk: We can hate and admire a person at the same time!
Spock: You're going to be the death of me, aren't you?
Kirk: That's a little harsh, Spock!
-- Years later... --
Kirk: Sulu, get us out of here!
Spock: Ugh... I better fix this before more people die from this irresponsible idiot's poor actions...
-- A little bit later --
Kirk: Klingon bastard, you killed my son!
Captain Klingon: Now, we know this is your fault, Kirk. If you killed Khan years ago like I would have done, he wouldn't have stolen the Genesis torpedo and created the planet which your son's lifeless body now rests on!
Kirk: Klingon bastard!
-- Still later --
McCoy: Damn it, Jim! If you had killed Khan all those years ago, we wouldn't have had to hijack that Klingon battle cruiser to escape from the Genesis planet and be sent to a Klingon prison colony! My ass is freezing off here!
Kirk: Bones, shut up!
LOL! But basically all those movies are the fallout from Space Seed!
in kirks defense, the vulcans direction of film 4 allowed them to save earth by saving the whales there by appeasing the beings that came to earth in a super ship and were digging through the oceans looking for the whales, they needed that klingon battlecruiser to travel back through time and save the whales, wouldnt have looked as cool in a federation saucer shaped ship
@@aurorauplinks It might have looked a lot cooler, had the Enterprise cloaking system. But we know well, that the Federation doesn't have that tech and they needed it for this mission. Also the Enterprise wasn't capable of planet surface landing, needs to be noted. They should borrow the Voyager from the future, before Janeway embarked on her mission. At least that ship could land there in the 20th century. XD
Also it was an automated probe, not actual aliens in their ship. Were they aliens, they could simply contact/be contacted by the Federation/Starfleet HQ. But as an automated probe it searched for the whales and wanted their response, not knowing they were long extinct, no contact from the Federation was possible with it
There are two things about TWOK that has always bothered me, though it doesn't affect my enjoyment of the film and/or the emotions it brings out as I watch it.
1) Khan recognizes Chekov, even though Chekov was not stationed on the Enterprise during the events of "Space Seed." (Yes, this is an old gripe discussed everywhere even before the internet. Fans have come up with somewhat plausible reasons...or excuses...such as "Chekov wasn't on the bridge, but he was on the ship in another capacity."
2) "One of Our Planets is Missing." How can a SCIENCE VESSEL crew--any crew, actually--entirely miss that a known solar system--after all, it was named and charted, hence the "Alpha Ceti 5, Alpha Ceti 6," which then indicates that the Federation knows how many planets are circling the star called Alpha Ceti--is MISSING A PLANET????
Walter Koenig suggested he was a lower level officer who had made Khan wait an inordinately long time to use the bathroom. SFDebris has a good narration with Khan twisting his legs, only for Chekov to emerge and tell him, this one appears to be clogged and he's going to have to find one on another deck xD It does make the line much more menacing, thinking that xD
I agree on the Ceti Alpha thing. I feel like someone was dyslexic with their roman numerals, cuz like, if it was Ceti Alpha IV that had exploded, then naturally you might not check to assume the fourth planet was the fourth planet? It's still really sloppy but I feel like it'd be easier to handwave. Unless the Federation counts them backwards?
@@Raja1938 Good try, Raj' (I can call you that? It's okay?) Original thinking. And I mean that as a compliment.
Yes, gravitational forces MIGHT cause what's left of the planet to "clump together" to form another planet, but it wouldn't happen in the (no pun intended) space of twenty years (from the time of "SPACE SEED" to the events of TWOK). It would occur over hundreds, thousands, even millions of years. More immediately and likely, the planetary debris would form an asteroid belt circling the star Alpha Ceti. And the "dust" might even form a ring--ala Saturn's rings--around one of the remaining planets. (Ceta Alpha VI?)
But I still say, even given human error, that the sensors and "doodads" on the Reliant would have picked up the changes in the solar system.
@@dataportdoll7918 "Walter Koenig suggested he was a lower level officer who had made Khan wait an inordinately long time to use the bathroom. SFDebris has a good narration with Khan twisting his legs, only for Chekov to emerge and tell him, this one appears to be clogged and he's going to have to find one on another deck xD It does make the line much more menacing, thinking that xD"
Love it!!!!
(And thanks for the tip about SFDebris--I'm going to go check it out.)
What always bothered me is that Ceti Alpha V was apparently pushed further away from its star so that it became confused with Ceti Alpha VI. Which means that when VI exploded V had to be somewhere around the other side of the star. If the shock wave was still able to push a planet that far away, what happened to Ceti Alphas I through VI? They should've been able to tell that something was wrong long before they got to the system.
@@mindyp51a reason number 2 could be explained by starfleet's planitary database being down for maintenence at the time the Reliant entered the system. its a good argument for why you dont schedule major system updates for a monday morning :D
Regarding callback to earlier episodes: in "Deadly Years," Kirk called back to the "Corbomite Maneuver" to escape the Romulans...
He didn't use the Corbomite Maneuver to escape Romulans. That was from his encounter w/Balok.
Kirk was never obligated toward the welfare of the villain he marooned. If anything, he only should have checked Khan's progress as a threat assessment. A dictator like Khan was impossible to reform, and marooning him would not have contained him forever. I think Kirk should have stopped this once and for all by throwing Khan and his people out the airlock. Problem solved, problem staying solved.
The problem is Federation at that moment being an utopian society, not having a death sentence, Kirk couldn't simply kill Khan (as dangerous as he was), because that would be breaking Federation rules. For a captain of the Federation flagship, highly costy consequences for riding the world of a dangerous threat like that.
Yes, but if Spock hadn't died, and the Genesis planet been created, the Earth would have been destroyed. Because if they hadn't been off-planet doing STIII stuff, they probably would have all been sitting on Kirk's porch watching him chop firewood or something when the STIV PROBE came.
By the way, Steve, loved this!
This is my first time seeing this. Very original. I look fore ward to seeing more of your work. Carry on!
Liked and subscribed!
Khan got what he was told to expect, a world to conquer with no guarantee of survival.
Sidebar: Chekov wasn't a crewman in Season 1, so he never met Khan, but Khan recognised him.
Wrath of Khan totally works because it contrasts Kirk's heroics with the consequences.
It's textbook contract and infinity.
This notion was always in the back of my head but I never thought about it that way. Pretty solid analysis.
If Kirk hadn't cheated on the Kobayashi Maru scenario, he never would have advanced as he did in his career so he never would have met Khan in the first place.
So in the movie when Chekov recognizes Khan and tells him that Captain Kirk was nice to Khan and Khan took advantage of Kirk's kindness really bothered me. Chekov wasn't even in that episode! So how does Chekov recognize Khan?
Maybe Chekov was part of the Enterprise crew but not yet assigned to the bridge. He could have seen him in passing... I know it's weak, but it's plausible LOL
The episode that I have the most problem with is " The Gamesters of Triskelion." (Yes...i know that the following characters have alien names but but my phone keeps auto-correcting.) In the episode...after freeing the Gladiators from their oppressive overlords, Kirk just leaves them there on the planet in the hopes that the overlords will willingly teach the Gladiators the concepts of free-will and democracy. Yeah...i don't think that that's gonna pan out. The overlords aren't just going to give up their gambling addiction just like that. Kirk's love interest even asked to come on the Enterprise to be taken somewhere else. Why wouldn't the crew take the Gladiators to the Federation? But instead... Kirk just leaves. All that fighting was for nothing.
Wow, what a fantastic essay on The Wrath of Khan. This video actually made me want to go back and re-watch TOS and the movies.
"I HURT YOU...
AND I'M GOING TO KEEP HURTING YOU..."
KHAN...
Now....thats dedication ...
The movie does take one unrealistic liberty: it assumes that Kirk never filed a report about Khan, not even any of the log entries that we heard him record in the course of the episode. There's probably some Star Fleet commodore who wanted to get home to his son's baseball game and so commandeered the ship that was scheduled to check up on Khan.
Pretty sure the Federation, or at least Section 31, would be more than willing to delete some logs and pretend the colony of super human tyrants did not exist
@@PungiFungi That's exactly what Donnie--the one sitting in the Oval Office--said about the deficit.
They could have classified the whole thing and people forgot about it as they got promoted / retired.
@@krim7
heh bringing up section 31 just gave me an idea...what if Kirk did file a report and someone in section 31 (maybe prime Admiral Marcus) considered that a colony of Augmants lead by Khan Noonien Sing was to much of a risk and cause that accident which destroyed Ceti Alpha (CA) VI.
This could have been either by accident (Kirk name the wrong planet in the report and they were to lazy to check for life signs) or more likely this was on purpose as they ran models in which showed the destruction of CA VI would moved a now lifeless CA V in the perfect orbit for project Genesis.
So maybe Khan's wrath should have been directed at the Marcus family ;)
@@amazedsatsuma Liking it.
Khan knew what he was signing up for when he chose Ceti Alpha V instead of a penal colony. He should have been under no illusions that his people weren't going to be left on their own to face whatever future that planet had in store for them. He made that choice out of pride, thinking that he was destined to overcome and conquer that harsh planet, not willing to settle for what would have been a safe and reasonably comfortable life confined to a colony under Federation protection. When that assumption didn't pan out, and the planet overcame him instead, he blamed Kirk instead of himself for the results of his own choice. Khan thought he was above consequences.
Of course, the Federation really should have continued to monitor that planet after leaving Khan there, as a matter of caution if nothing else. Not having done that was the collective mistake of quite a few people. But that's really more of a rough edge on the writing than an expression of a major character flaw for Kirk.
Without the benefit of hindsight, leaving them on that planet in and of itself wasn't an unreasonable thing to do. As other people have pointed out, any other way of handling Khan without killing him could have just as easily led to bad outcomes as well. And just killing him would have been murder. At the very least, Kirk's intent was merciful - a way to keep Khan from doing any more harm without inflicting more harm on his people than necessary. Whether the recipient deserves mercy or not, we really shouldn't fault someone for showing it. The message of a Star Trek movie shouldn't be that someone was wrong for showing mercy.
So, honestly, the blame for Wrath of Khan really falls most heavily on Khan himself.
If any ship checked up on Khan, at any time (say 6 months after marooned), Khan would have taken that ship and caused issues of an all-new unknown nature. He wanted a ship and it all would have happened anyway.
You do correctly point out the main point of Space Seed and how it brought about the events of Wrath of Khan. You also indirectly point out Janeway's assessment in Voyager that Kirk and Sulu were "a bunch of cowboys". However, Kirk would have had to file a report and the Federation, not Kirk alone failed Khan. If Kirk had raised shields like he was supposed to, this wouldn't have happened. A Constitution class starship outgunned a Minerva or Soyuz or whatever class Reliant is.
" Spock ...These cadets of yours...How will they respond to real pressure?"
As with all things each according to their gift.
9:52 I always noticed the connection between this part and the TNG episode about Troi learning to be a commander. It took her a few times to realize she had to sacrifice a friend and crewmen to save the ship, something Kirk never was able to assimilate.
Speaking of how TOS doesn't revisit plots often, could you maybe make an episode about Mudd's appearances?
What always spoiled the plot premise for me was that Checkov got the planets mixed up. OK the planets had moved or something, but the Science officer on the ship would have known this. I'm sure star fleet don't land on the wrong planet very often.
Thanks, Steve, for the great video. It created a lot of good discussion with various opinions. I have to fall on the side that says what Khan did was Khan's fault. When I saw the film for the first time I wondered why Khan was pissed off at Kirk. It seemed so irrational. It was not Kirk's job or even moral obligation to check up on Khan's band. Kirk owed him nothing. Regarding Kirk's offer to dispense with the court martial, it is plausible that in Kirk's time the rules were looser than for Picard. Being on the frontier of space. Bureaucracy grows with time. It also makes sense that Kirk didn't want to babysit Khan's sizable crew on the Enterprise which I can only imagine was built to use space efficiently. The brig could not have been large enough. Dropping them off on the planet was an imaginative solution to avoid another take over attempt. A solution that Khan accepted with out hesitation. It would not be the only time that Star Fleet has lost track of colonists. That said, Kirk's not raising shields was a boneheaded mistake and a court martial offense. Kirk didn't suffer any consequences there.
Dustin is Trek, Actually's greatest guest