Khan Noonien Singh , or simply Khan, is a villain from the Star Trek sci-fi universe. The character first appeared in the Cosmic Seed episode of the original Star Trek series and was played by Ricardo Montalban , who repeated this role in Star Trek 2: The Wrath of Khan in 1982. In 2013, in the movie Star Trek: Retribution , Benedict Cumberbatch played the role of Khan.
| Han Nunyen Singh | |
|---|---|
| Khan noonien singh | |
 Ricardo Montalban as Han Nunyen Singh in the Cosmic Seed episode | |
| Universe | Star way |
| Execution | Ricardo Montalban (1967, 1982), Benedict Cumberbatch (2013) |
| Information | |
| Type of | genetically advanced person |
| Floor | |
Once Khan managed to seize control of more than a quarter of the Earth during the Eugenic Wars of the 1990s [1] . After exiting suspended animation in 2267, Khan attempted to capture the USS Enterprise NCC-1701 , but his plans were frustrated by Captain James T. Kirk , who sent Han and his men to the planet Alpha Kita-V to create a new society. In Star Trek 2: The Wrath of Khan , the action takes place 15 years after the events of the Cosmic Seed episode. Khan returns from exile and tries to take revenge on Kirk.
Star Trek 2 executive producer Harvey Bennett has chosen Han as the villain for the film. In order to reflect the time spent on an inhospitable planet, the creators changed the costume of Khan, which now consisted of many heterogeneous elements and showed the muscles of the antagonist. Montalban’s game was praised by critics and fans alike. Khan entered the top ten villains according to the Online Film Critics Society.
In an alternate temporary universe, featured in Star Trek: Retribution , Khan was woken up ten years before the events of the Cosmic Seed episode. He was hiding under the name of John Harrison and, under the pressure of a corrupt admiral Marcus, created weapons for the Starfleet in exchange for the lives of his team members. Ultimately, he rebelled and came into conflict with the Enterprise team .
Content
Biography
Cosmic Seed Episode
Khan first appears in an episode of the original series Cosmic Seed , first shown on February 16, 1967 . According to the episode's backstory, Khan was one of the genetically enhanced superhumans created free from ordinary human mental and physical limitations and removed from power after the Eugenic Wars in the 1990s. Khan was the most successful conqueror who controlled a quarter of the Earth’s surface from Asia to the Middle East from 1992 to 1996 until his overthrow. Although most superhumans were killed or executed, Khan with 84 (12 died, 72 survived) superhumans fled the Earth in the SS Botany Bay spacecraft. In 2267, they got out of a state of suspended animation when the Enterprise team found them.
Due to the malfunction of Khan's suspended cabin, he is transported to the Enterprise, where he wakes up and realizes that he is in the XXIII century. While SS Botany Bay is towing to the Starfleet base , Khan captivates the ship's historian Marla McGivers and, using access to the ship's technical documentation, learns how to take control of the starship. McGivers agrees to help Khan free the remaining superhumans, allowing him to organize a rebellion. Khan puts Captain Kirk in a decompression chamber and threatens to kill him if the Enterprise team refuses to comply. McGivers feels guilty and frees his captain. Khan's people are lulled by nerve gas, Khan himself manages to escape, and he tries to destroy the Enterprise, but Kirk manages to neutralize him. After that, the captain of the Enterprise sends Khan and his henchmen to the still non-colonized planet Alpha Kita-V . McGivers also follows Khan. [2]
Star Trek 2: The Wrath of Khan
Khan returns in the 1982 film Star Trek 2: Khan's Wrath . Clark Terril and Pavel Chekhov , the commander and first officer of the USS Reliant ship, descend to the planet Alpha Kita-V , which looks suitable for testing the Genesis terraforming device. Khan's followers catch Terril and Chekhov, after which Khan explains to them that after landing on the planet, she turned into a desert, and many survivors, including Khan's wife, were killed by the only animal remaining on the planet - Centauri eel. By the time USS Reliant arrived at Alpha Kit-V, only 20 Khan's minions remained alive. Vowing to take revenge on Kirk, Khan controls Chekhov and Terryl with the help of eels implanted in his brain, after which he gains control of Reliant, intending to capture Genesis and avenge Kirk for his exile.
Having been drawn by Khan to the Regula I space station, the Enterprise is the victim of his sudden attack and becomes inoperative. Kirk, using a special code, remotely disables Reliant shields and causes serious damage to the ship. Khan has to retreat and do repairs. Using the still controlled Terril and Chekhov, Khan steals Genesis and lands Kirk on Regula I. Spock tricks Khan into believing that the Enterprise is damaged. At this point, Kirk returns to the Enterprise and hides the ship in the Mutara Nebula. In an attempt to catch Kirk, Khan directs Reliant into the nebula , where the shields are inoperative. Due to Khan's inexperience in fighting in a three-dimensional space, the Enterprise successfully attacks Reliant, which leads to a serious wound to Khan. Refusing to accept defeat, he activates Genesis, intending to kill himself and his enemy. Khan quotes Ahab's words from Moby Dick when he sees the Enterprise trying to fly away before Genesis destroys it. However, Spock commits an act of self-sacrifice and saves the Enterprise by repairing his warp engine and receiving a lethal dose of radiation . [3]
Star Trek: Retribution
Khan appears in the movie Star Trek: Retribution , released in 2013 . Since the action takes place in an alternative temporary universe, Khan was found on SS Botany Bay not by Kirk, but by Star Fleet Admiral Alexander Markus. The latter feels that a war is coming with the Klingons , so he forces Khan, under the name of John Harrison, to create weapons for the Starfleet, threatening to kill his crew. Khan raises a riot and detonates a secret Starfleet facility in London . Then, during an emergency meeting of Starfleet Command, Khan attacks the headquarters in San Francisco , killing many officers and Admiral Christopher Pike . After Kirk destroys the Khan shuttle, the latter teleports to Kronos, the home planet of the Klingons.
Admiral Marcus equips the Enterprise with 72 torpedoes and sends a starship under the command of Kirk in pursuit of Khan. Kirk tries to grab him alive, but Spock and Uhura are attacked by the Klingons and cannot help him. At the same time, Hikaru Sulu , temporarily being the commander of the Enterprise, offers Khan to surrender, otherwise he will be torpedoed. Khan knows that his crew are in torpedoes, plunged in suspended animation, after which he deals with the Klingons and surrenders to Kirk, revealing his real name, as well as the plans of Marcus.
Then Marcus arrives on the USS Vengeance and demands that he be given Khan. After Khan appears on Retribution, he kills Marcus, breaks his daughter’s leg, and orders Spock to send capsules with his crew to the hijacked ship in exchange for Kirk. At the conclusion of the exchange, Khan planned to destroy the Enterprise, but Spock activated torpedoes and damaged Retribution. At the same time, Khan's crew members were not injured - Spock had previously ordered them to be transferred to the medical compartment.
The Enterprise damaged during the battle is unable to remain in orbit and begins to fall to the Earth. By analogy with the movie Star Trek 2: The Wrath of the Khan, Kirk is already restoring the Enterprise's warp engine at the cost of his life. Spock is with his friend until the last seconds of his life and blames Khan for the death of his captain.
Khan directs Retribution at San Francisco and escapes death due to the wreck of his ship. After a long chase, Spock catches up with Khan and prepares to kill him when Niyota Uhura appears and stops him, saying that Khan's blood can revive Kirk. After the successful “resurrection” of James Kirk, Khan himself is placed in a cryogenic sleep in the secret fleet of the Starfleet along with his team.
Analysis
Khan is often compared with the Superman ( German Übermensch ) from the work of Friedrich Nietzsche " So said Zarathustra ." Khan is superior in both mental and physical development to any ordinary person. In the Borderland episode of Star Trek: Enterprise , Malik, the leader of a group of genetically advanced people like Khan, quotes Nietzsche verbatim, saying to Archer : “Man is something that must be transcended” [4] (original: “Mankind is something to be surpassed " ) [5] . However, Professor William J. Delvin and his co-author Shai Biederman, having made a detailed comparison of the character with the Superman, found that Khan’s attempts to take revenge run counter to Nietzsche’s ideals and his ideas about the transcendence and independent creation of meaningful life. At the same time, the authors propose to consider Spock's self-sacrifice in the movie Star Trek 2: The Wrath of Khan as the best example of the behavior of the Superman [6] .
Reviews
Khan performed by Ricardo Montalban was favorably received by critics. Discussing films of the Star Trek universe, the Associated Press noted that they can be judged by how threatening the main villain was, and according to the agency, Khan was recognized as such [7] . In 2002, Khan was awarded the title of greatest villain of all Star Trek films [8] . Khan 's Anger reviewers, such as Roger Ebert , have pointed out Khan's antagonist as the most powerful aspect of the film [9] [10] .
Khan was recognized as an outstanding villain beyond Star Trek. The Associated Press called the character "one of the greatest villains in science fiction ." In 2002, 132 members of the Online Film Critics Society ranked Khan as one of the ten most outstanding villains featured on screen in the history of cinema. At the same time, Khan was the only character from the Star Trek universe who was on this list [11] . In 2006, Khan won the TV's Most Out-of-This-World Character nomination, ahead of such popular sci-fi characters as Doctor Who and Adam's commander from the series Star Cruiser Galaxy . Khan is also popular outside the Star Trek fan movement; an episode from Star Trek 2: The Wrath of Khan movie, where Kirk shouts “Khaaan!” was so popular that it made YTMND more famous. .
In 2004, Khan’s backstory was continued in the form of three episodes in the series “ Star Trek: Enterprise ”, during which a scientist of the XXII century finds embryos of genetically improved people from the time of Khan and brings them back to life in the episode “Augments” [12] . The producer of the series Manny Koto described them as “mini-versions of Han Nunyen Singh” [13] .
The play of Benedict Cumberbatch in the movie Star Trek: Retribution was praised by critics. For example, Peter Travis from Rolling Stone magazine called his character “the one to be reckoned with,” and described him as “a villain for ages.” [14] Jonathan Romney of The Independent newspaper emphasized Cumberbatch’s voice, stating that “his speech is so resonant that it could be synthesized from the timbre of Ian McKellen , Patrick Stewart and Alan Rickman ” [15] .
Notes
- ↑ Cartmell, Deborah; Whelehan, Imelda. Adaptations: From Text to Screen, Screen to Text. - Routledge Publishing, 1999 .-- P. 179. - ISBN 0-415-16738-8 .
- ↑ Space Seed " (script)
- ↑ Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan " (script)
- ↑ Friedrich Nietzsche So said Zarathustra / Translation: Yu. M. Antonovsky
- ↑ Star Trek: Enterprise - Borderland " (script)
- ↑ Biderman, Shai; Devlin, William J. The Wrath of Nietzsche // Star Trek and Philosophy: The Wrath of Kant / Kevin Decker and Jason Eberl. - Trade Paperback. - Chicago, Illinois: Open Court, 2008. - P. 47-59. - ISBN 978-0-8126-9649-3 .
- ↑ Associated Press . Patrick Stewart envious of villain roles , CTV.ca (December 2, 2002). Date of treatment December 4, 2007.
- ↑ Germain, David . Best of the baddies: No Star Trek evil one was nastier than lunatic Khan, The Gazette (December 13, 2002), S. D13.
- ↑ Ebert, Roger. Review: Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan . Chicago Sun-Times (January 1, 1982). Date of appeal September 13, 2008.
- ↑ Zacharek, Stephanie . 'Star Trek II' DVD Review, Salon (August 22, 2000).
- ↑ Melloy, Neil . Vader our most wanted villain, Courier Mail (October 8, 2002), p. 18.
- ↑ Production Report: Brent Spiner Begins Trilogy with "Borderland" . StarTrek.com . CBS Paramount Television (August 27, 2004). Date of treatment October 14, 2008.
- ↑ Enterprise Raises Khan , Sci Fi Wire , Sci Fi Channel (October 8, 2004). Archived on May 25, 2005. Date of treatment March 15, 2010.
- ↑ Travers, Peter Star Trek Into Darkness review . Rolling Stone (MAY 16, 2013). Date of treatment May 27, 2013.
- ↑ Romney, Jonathan . Jonathan Romney on Star Trek Into Darkness: Benedict Cumberbatch, a supervillain worlds apart (May 11, 2013). Date of treatment May 27, 2013.