Khan Noonien SIngh
Development
Initial development
Writer Carey Wilber pitched "Space Seed" to Star Trek producers Roddenberry, Gene Coon, and Robert Justman with a 18-page outline dated August 29, 1966. In the outline, Wilber envisioned the crew of Botany Bay as criminals sent on a 1500-year journey to make room on Earth for others. Khan was represented as a Nordic criminal with a "magnificent" body, Harald Ericsson[11][12] The producers suggested changes to the outline in a series of memos; in memos dated September 7 and 9, Coon suggested significant changes to Ericsson. "I want to rather do more with him than you have indicated in the story outline,” he wrote. Believing that Ericsson (misspelled as Erickson in the memo) could be a worthy adversary for Kirk, Coon suggested that the character be “in fact very similar to James Kirk, our captain, except that our captain has made an adjustment to this world and this culture [...] In other words, Carey, build us a giant of a man."[13]
The first draft of the script introduced the character as John Ericssen—who is revealed to be a man involved in "the First World Tyranny", named Ragnar Thorwald. The character of Thorwald was more brutal than Khan in the final version, killing guards using a phaser.[12] In the original script, Kirk forgives Ericssen and offers him and his people a chance at a fresh start—something that remained in the final episode—but the character committing murder would have precluded such an ending, as NBC censors would have necessitated the "bad guy" be punished for his actions.[14]
By the final draft, Khan is Indian; a character guesses that Khan is from Northern India, and "probably a Sikh".[15] Khan's full name was based on that of Kim Noonien Singh, a pilot Gene Roddenbery served with during the Second World War. Roddenbery lost touch with his friend and had hoped that Khan's similar name might attract his attention and renew his old acquaintance.[16]
In "Space Seed", Khan is presented as having several positive characteristics: he is gracious, smiling, fearless, and generous. He is not threatened by the success of others, and encourages their self-esteem. He is also ambitious, desiring a challenge commensurate with his abilities, but this ambition is not tempered by any consideration of the rights of others. Author Paul Cantor asserts that Khan is a mirror image of Kirk, sharing his aggressiveness, ambition, and even his womanizing tendencies, but possessing them in far greater degree.[17] During the episode, several of the characters express their admiration for the man even as they oppose him, with Kirk referring to him as "the best of the tyrants, and the most dangerous".[17] The character's Latino accent and superhuman appearance strongly differentiate him from most Star Trek characters.[18]
The Wrath of Khan
After the disappointing response to the first Star Trek feature film, The Motion Picture, Paramount executives appointed Harve Bennett, a television producer who had never watched Star Trek, to be executive producer for the sequel.[19] Bennett watched all the original series episodes and chose Khan from "Space Seed" as a possible villain for the film.[20] Early drafts of the script had Khan as a shadowy tyrant leading a planet in revolt; later drafts added the "Genesis device" which Khan would steal.[20]
Costume designer Robert Fletcher wanted to emphasize the effects of their harsh environment on Khan and his followers. "My intention with Khan was to express the fact that they had been marooned on that planet with no technical infrastructure, so they had to cannibalize from the spaceship whatever they used or wore. Therefore, I tried to make it look as if they had dressed themselves out of pieces of upholstery and electrical equipment that composed the ship," he said.[21] Director Nicholas Meyer told Montalbán to keep Khan's right glove on at all times, in order to give viewers a puzzle they could form their own opinions about and add mystery to the character.[22] Meyer has been repeatedly asked if Montalbán wore a prosthetic chest for his scenes, as his uniform was purposefully designed with an open front. Meyer replied in audio commentary for the film that Montalbán (who was 61 during filming)[3] is "one strong cookie", and that no prosthetics were applied to the actor's sizeable frame.[22]
At no point during The Wrath of Khan are Khan and Kirk in the same location; they speak to each other only over communication links such as view screens. This was due in part to the fact that the set of the Reliant was a redress of the Enterprise bridge, and the two actors' scenes were filmed four months apart.[23] Montalbán recited his lines with a script girl instead of to William Shatner.[24]
Montalbán said in promotional interviews for the film he realized early on in his career that a good villain does not see himself as villainous.[24] The villain may do villainous things, but he feels that he is doing them for righteous reasons. Montalbán further stated he always tried to find a flaw in the character, as no one is completely good or completely evil; while Khan had a rather distorted view of reality and therefore performed acts of evil, he still felt that his vengeance was a noble cause because of the death of his wife.[24] Khan quotes the character of Ahab from Moby-Dick throughout the film, driving home his lust to make Kirk pay for the wrongs he has inflicted upon him.[22]
Star Trek Into Darkness
Following the box office success of J. J. Abrams' Star Trek reboot and the announcement that actors Chris Pine and Zachary Quinto had tentatively agreed to appear in two sequels, Internet rumors began circulating about the plot of the second film. Abrams hinted that because of the alternate timeline created in the first film, reintroducing Khan into Star Trek lore remained a possibility. Abrams told MTV, "[Khan and Kirk] exist—and while their history may not be exactly as people are familiar with, I would argue that a person's character is what it is," Abrams said of the notion that his Khan could be just as evil, even if Kirk never stranded him on Ceti Alpha V. "Certain people are destined to cross paths and come together, and Khan is out there... even if he doesn't have the same issues."[25] Writer Damon Lindelof declared that Khan's "intense gravity", particularly regarding the character's delivery of monologues, made him an obligatory character to use, even if its iconic status made the crew afraid of the fan reaction. Lindelof jokingly stated that "it was never really a 'Should we or shouldn't we?' as much as it was 'We really have to do this but if we don't get it right people are going to kill us.'"[26]
As part of the secrecy campaign, Benedict Cumberbatch denied that he was playing Khan during interviews, describing Harrison as simply a terrorist with his own purposes,[27] as well as "someone that's activated and manufactured in a way by Starfleet, and it's a scene that has come back to haunt him". He discussed the character's moral ambiguity saying it fit the adage "one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter", adding parallels to the current world order "whether it's U.S. foreign policy or the actions of some terrorists".[28] Into Darkness writers Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman added that they used the character of Khan not just for his popularity with the fandom—“It’s so easy to fall into the trap of doing something because you think people are going to love it. You must come up with what the movie can be on its own and then, if it turns out the villain maybe can be Khan, then you can do it. But you can’t start there.” - but for fitting the sequel's theme of "how far will we go to exact vengeance and justice on an enemy that scares us."[29]
All credits go to Wikipedia.
Development
Initial development
Writer Carey Wilber pitched "Space Seed" to Star Trek producers Roddenberry, Gene Coon, and Robert Justman with a 18-page outline dated August 29, 1966. In the outline, Wilber envisioned the crew of Botany Bay as criminals sent on a 1500-year journey to make room on Earth for others. Khan was represented as a Nordic criminal with a "magnificent" body, Harald Ericsson[11][12] The producers suggested changes to the outline in a series of memos; in memos dated September 7 and 9, Coon suggested significant changes to Ericsson. "I want to rather do more with him than you have indicated in the story outline,” he wrote. Believing that Ericsson (misspelled as Erickson in the memo) could be a worthy adversary for Kirk, Coon suggested that the character be “in fact very similar to James Kirk, our captain, except that our captain has made an adjustment to this world and this culture [...] In other words, Carey, build us a giant of a man."[13]
The first draft of the script introduced the character as John Ericssen—who is revealed to be a man involved in "the First World Tyranny", named Ragnar Thorwald. The character of Thorwald was more brutal than Khan in the final version, killing guards using a phaser.[12] In the original script, Kirk forgives Ericssen and offers him and his people a chance at a fresh start—something that remained in the final episode—but the character committing murder would have precluded such an ending, as NBC censors would have necessitated the "bad guy" be punished for his actions.[14]
By the final draft, Khan is Indian; a character guesses that Khan is from Northern India, and "probably a Sikh".[15] Khan's full name was based on that of Kim Noonien Singh, a pilot Gene Roddenbery served with during the Second World War. Roddenbery lost touch with his friend and had hoped that Khan's similar name might attract his attention and renew his old acquaintance.[16]
In "Space Seed", Khan is presented as having several positive characteristics: he is gracious, smiling, fearless, and generous. He is not threatened by the success of others, and encourages their self-esteem. He is also ambitious, desiring a challenge commensurate with his abilities, but this ambition is not tempered by any consideration of the rights of others. Author Paul Cantor asserts that Khan is a mirror image of Kirk, sharing his aggressiveness, ambition, and even his womanizing tendencies, but possessing them in far greater degree.[17] During the episode, several of the characters express their admiration for the man even as they oppose him, with Kirk referring to him as "the best of the tyrants, and the most dangerous".[17] The character's Latino accent and superhuman appearance strongly differentiate him from most Star Trek characters.[18]
The Wrath of Khan
After the disappointing response to the first Star Trek feature film, The Motion Picture, Paramount executives appointed Harve Bennett, a television producer who had never watched Star Trek, to be executive producer for the sequel.[19] Bennett watched all the original series episodes and chose Khan from "Space Seed" as a possible villain for the film.[20] Early drafts of the script had Khan as a shadowy tyrant leading a planet in revolt; later drafts added the "Genesis device" which Khan would steal.[20]
Costume designer Robert Fletcher wanted to emphasize the effects of their harsh environment on Khan and his followers. "My intention with Khan was to express the fact that they had been marooned on that planet with no technical infrastructure, so they had to cannibalize from the spaceship whatever they used or wore. Therefore, I tried to make it look as if they had dressed themselves out of pieces of upholstery and electrical equipment that composed the ship," he said.[21] Director Nicholas Meyer told Montalbán to keep Khan's right glove on at all times, in order to give viewers a puzzle they could form their own opinions about and add mystery to the character.[22] Meyer has been repeatedly asked if Montalbán wore a prosthetic chest for his scenes, as his uniform was purposefully designed with an open front. Meyer replied in audio commentary for the film that Montalbán (who was 61 during filming)[3] is "one strong cookie", and that no prosthetics were applied to the actor's sizeable frame.[22]
At no point during The Wrath of Khan are Khan and Kirk in the same location; they speak to each other only over communication links such as view screens. This was due in part to the fact that the set of the Reliant was a redress of the Enterprise bridge, and the two actors' scenes were filmed four months apart.[23] Montalbán recited his lines with a script girl instead of to William Shatner.[24]
Montalbán said in promotional interviews for the film he realized early on in his career that a good villain does not see himself as villainous.[24] The villain may do villainous things, but he feels that he is doing them for righteous reasons. Montalbán further stated he always tried to find a flaw in the character, as no one is completely good or completely evil; while Khan had a rather distorted view of reality and therefore performed acts of evil, he still felt that his vengeance was a noble cause because of the death of his wife.[24] Khan quotes the character of Ahab from Moby-Dick throughout the film, driving home his lust to make Kirk pay for the wrongs he has inflicted upon him.[22]
Star Trek Into Darkness
Following the box office success of J. J. Abrams' Star Trek reboot and the announcement that actors Chris Pine and Zachary Quinto had tentatively agreed to appear in two sequels, Internet rumors began circulating about the plot of the second film. Abrams hinted that because of the alternate timeline created in the first film, reintroducing Khan into Star Trek lore remained a possibility. Abrams told MTV, "[Khan and Kirk] exist—and while their history may not be exactly as people are familiar with, I would argue that a person's character is what it is," Abrams said of the notion that his Khan could be just as evil, even if Kirk never stranded him on Ceti Alpha V. "Certain people are destined to cross paths and come together, and Khan is out there... even if he doesn't have the same issues."[25] Writer Damon Lindelof declared that Khan's "intense gravity", particularly regarding the character's delivery of monologues, made him an obligatory character to use, even if its iconic status made the crew afraid of the fan reaction. Lindelof jokingly stated that "it was never really a 'Should we or shouldn't we?' as much as it was 'We really have to do this but if we don't get it right people are going to kill us.'"[26]
As part of the secrecy campaign, Benedict Cumberbatch denied that he was playing Khan during interviews, describing Harrison as simply a terrorist with his own purposes,[27] as well as "someone that's activated and manufactured in a way by Starfleet, and it's a scene that has come back to haunt him". He discussed the character's moral ambiguity saying it fit the adage "one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter", adding parallels to the current world order "whether it's U.S. foreign policy or the actions of some terrorists".[28] Into Darkness writers Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman added that they used the character of Khan not just for his popularity with the fandom—“It’s so easy to fall into the trap of doing something because you think people are going to love it. You must come up with what the movie can be on its own and then, if it turns out the villain maybe can be Khan, then you can do it. But you can’t start there.” - but for fitting the sequel's theme of "how far will we go to exact vengeance and justice on an enemy that scares us."[29]
All credits go to Wikipedia.