Star Trek 2: The Wrath of Khan (4 Stars)

Very often after watching a film, especially old films, I read the thoughts of other fans and critics before starting my review. I don't want to copy them, but I'm looking for inspiration and possibly trivia about the making of the film that I didn't already know. In the case of "Star Trek 2", released 35 years ago in 1982, there are literally hundreds of online reviews. I checked a few of them, but I'll only pick up on one statement. One writer wrote that "all Star Trek fans agree that Star Trek 2 is the best Star Trek movie". He should change that to "almost all". Admittedly, it's a long time since I watched the films, but as I remember I enjoyed the fourth film the most. I'll get round to reviewing it soon.

Having said that, I need to praise one thing about the film. The scene in which the two star ships manoeuvre around one another in the Nebula is more like a Star Trek episode than anything else in the film series. It's a classic battle of wits, Jim Kirk as he was before his promotion to Admiral. Maybe this is why so many Star Trek fans call it the best film?

This is a sequel to "Space Seed" an episode in the first season of "Star Trek". It features the return of Khan, a genetically engineered human being from the 20th Century, who was exiled at the end of the television episode. Khan says that it's been 17 years since his exile, but this is possibly incorrect. It's 17 years in our time, because the episode was aired in 1967 and the film was made in 1982. The first Star Trek film takes place two and a half years after the end of the Enterprise's five-year journey, of which the first three years were shown (out of order) in the TV series. Assuming that the adventure with Khan took place in the first year that would mean the first film took place about seven years after Khan's banishment. It's not clear how much time has passed between the first two Star Trek films, but it's obviously less than 10 years.

Stardates can be used as clues, but they don't help much, despite the attempts of Star Trek apologists to correlate them to our time. The whole point of using stardates in the original series was to prevent viewers being able to pinpoint the real dates of the episodes. As stated in the writer's guide for the original series:

We invented "Stardate" to avoid continually mentioning Star Trek's century (actually, about two hundred years from now), and getting into arguments about whether this or that would have developed by then. Pick any combination of four numbers plus a percentage point, use it as your story's stardate. For example, 1313.5 is twelve o'clock noon of one day and 1314.5 would be noon of the next day. Each percentage point is roughly equivalent to one-tenth of one day. The progression of stardates in your script should remain constant but don't worry about whether or not there is a progression from other scripts. Stardates are a mathematical formula which varies depending on location in the galaxy, velocity of travel, and other factors, can vary widely from episode to episode.

The stardate for any episode is random, according to the writer's guide, but it's a number of days. If we wanted to be pedantic in our analysis we would get into contradictions. The earliest episode is "Where no man has gone before" (Stardate 1312.4), and the last episode is "All our yesterdays" (Stardate 5943.7). That means the last adventure takes place 4630 days after the first, which is more than 12 years. So much for the "five year journey". The first adventure of "Star Trek: The Next Generation" takes place in Stardate 41153.7, which would be 96 years after "All our yesterdays". That sounds roughly right, but I think it's more by chance than deliberate. Each Star Trek series has aligned its stardates differently, making an exact analysis impossible.

One big improvement in the second film is that the costumes have been improved. The Star Fleet insignia are now metal badges. In the first film they looked like patches sewn onto sweatshirts.

There's something curious in this film. There's a new Vulcan officer, Lieutenant Saavik. Jim Kirk repeatedly addresses her as "Mr. Saavik". Is this supposed to imply that in future generations gender-specific titles will be abolished? Or does it mean that Kirk is getting old and can't tell the difference any more?

It's also significant that at Spock's funeral Saavik is the only person crying. Even pure-blooded Vulcans have difficulty keeping their emotions under control.

I just mentioned that Spock dies in this film. I hope that's not a spoiler for the 0.2% of the world's population who haven't seen this film yet. Yes, he dies, but he comes back to life in the third film, which I intend to watch tomorrow. That's just like in Marvel comics: "Nobody remains dead except for Bucky Barnes and Ben Parker". (Except that Bucky Barnes didn't remain dead, and Ben Parker has to die again every time the Spider-Man film franchise is rebooted). What I'm curious about is whether Spock was intended to remain dead when "Star Trek 2" was made. I haven't managed to find a clear answer online. Indirectly the answer is Yes, because William Shatner says he expected it to be the last Star Trek film. Luckily for us fans he was wrong.

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