Why do so many people think Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan was good?

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I will always remember it as the film that started one AMAZING HELL OF A SUMMER for movies.

So, so, SO many of what we call classic Movies came out that summer
 
Why is Saavik already an ensign if she hasn’t graduated yet?

Wasn't Saavik a Lieutenant?

Why didn’t Spock understand that Ceti Alpha Six was unstable enough to explode in a mere six months in Space Seed?

Hmmm, maybe because He didn't SCAN Ceti Alpha Six? I always assumed that the Ceti star system had been previously charted and he was quoting from memory, since he knew the fifth planet could sustain life he had no reason to re-scan the system.

What’s wrong with the Reliant’s sensors? The USS Grissom was able to detect ONE photon tube and pin point its exact location on Genesis. However the Reliant only has a “minor energy flux reading on one dynoscanner”, when in fact it is missing approximately FIFTY adult human beings! Despite the inhospitable environment, I doubt 50 people should only produce a minor reading (which is mistaken for “particles of
pre-animate matter”).

maybe because of the different planetary conditions? All that junk in the atmosphere could've clouded the sensors.

Chekov recognizes the Botany Bay belt buckle and realizes where they actually are. Why didn’t he just call for an emergency beam out? (I won’t go into the whole “why does Chekov know who Khan is, why does Khan remember Chekov’s face thing. No Sir I won’t.)

I always figured he panicked.

Khan’s men were more or less the same age as him in Space Seed, however everyone seems much younger than Khan now. Shouldn’t they all at least look the same age as Khan? At least a “little” older than they do in the film?

According to the Star Trek novel "To Rein in Hell" the younger members of Kahn's group are the children of his followers. What happened to the originals? They all died from one thing or another.

So in The Motion Picture, Kirk was pretty irritated that he had to take a shuttle over to the Enterprise when the transporters were not working. Yet this time they take him over in a shuttle again. Are the transporters still not working? Why is Kirk okay with it now?

In ST:TMP There was a Big emergency while in the first half of WOK there was none so he could take his time going over. Plus in order to save on the budget they re-used footage from TMP.


The shuttle is told to approach and dock with the port side torpedo bay. So why does it dock with the engineering section?

editing mistake.


Well the uniforms certainly look much more militaristic now don’t they? But hold on, I thought Starfleet “wasn’t” the military. Oh wait, David Marcus says that scientists were always “pawns of the military” when referring to the approaching Reliant. So I guess they “are” the military now... Even though I thought they were primarily explorers and scientists.

They always were military, well Navel actually. Why else would you have ranks like Admiral and Commodore?

When Saavik is ordered to take the Enterprise out of spacedock, Kirk looks like a nervous Dad giving his daughter her first driving lesson. Why is he worried? Sulu is actually working the controls and he’s not about to ding the ship into anything.

Sulu would still have to follow Savik's Orders. How would it look if he hadn't? What's the point of giving a junior officer an opportunity to pilot a ship out of space dock if the helmsman won't follow her commands?


When Reliant approaches the Enterprise, Khan quotes a Klingon proverb. When did he learn this? The last time he had access to a library was aboard the Enterprise. Even if the Enterprise databanks contained this proverb, I think Khan spent his precious time studying the
engineering/ship schematics and not alien cultures.

Uh, didn't Martha Mcgyvers, a member of Kirk's Crew, go with him to Ceti Alfa 5 and was is wife until she died from an eel in her head? No doubt she was familiar with Klingon Proverbs and told Kahn.

After Khan’s initial attack, the “main energizers” are knocked out. I assume this includes the warp drive otherwise why wouldn’t they flee? So if the warp drive is out (according to the Enterprise’s redesign in The Motion Picture) the phasers won’t work either as they channel power through the warp engines. Yet Kirk fires back at Khan with phasers.

Minor upgrades or Modifications to the system between TMP and WOK.

Why does Scotty bring a severely burned cadet Preston to the bridge instead of directly to sickbay? And why does Saavik the Vulcan have an emotional reaction to cadet Preston’s condition?

Part Vulcan, or maybe not as disciplined as Spock. Scotty was probably looking for McCoy, who he assumed was on the bridge. Why he thought that is anyone's guess.

In the underground facility on Regula, Carol Marcus muses that it took the Starfleet Corps of Engineers ten months to tunnel out the storage area. Ten months? Seriously? What happened to phasers that can vaporize rock or transporters that can remove it instantly? Scotty beamed up 400 tons of water and whales in Star Trek IV. I guess the Starfleet Corps of Engineers took a page out of Scotty’s book and grossly exaggerated their time to completion.

Did they say they used Phasers? I don't recall. Even if they used them or the transporter Would be practical? Wouldn't that cause instability if they removed the rock too quickly and cause a collapse? Anything involving Tunneling takes time to do it right no matter the equipment or time period.

When the Enterprise enters the Mutara Nebula, everyone lurches forward except Kirk.

Because he's Kirk.;)

Even after Kirk “gets it” and has the Enterprise drop down 10 000 meters (because Khan is just circling around on the same plane), after Khan passes overhead, Kirk has the Enterprise pop back up behind the Reliant.

Why not just tilt the Enterprise’s nose up 90 degrees and shoot the Reliant from underneath it as it passed over?


Because it's a more dramatic scene to have Enterprise rise up behind the Reliant.

Nobody considers beaming the Genesis device off the Reliant out into deep space. Spock need not have had to die![/QUOTE]

You didn't consider that will the battle Damage and main power off line that maybe there wasn't enough power to beam the Genesis device off the Reliant and transport it into deep space, providing of course the Transporter could beam the Device far enough that when it exploded Enterprise would be safely clear of the blast range.

During Spock’s eulogy, Kirk says that Spock’s soul was the “most human.” However in Star Trek VI, Kirk tells Spock that “everyone’s human” and Spock finds this remark insulting.

Spock was dead, why would he care what Kirk said at his funeral?

And Saavik the Vulcan cries her eyes out.

Again, either half Vulcan or lack of proper training.

This is Trek’s best? Pffft!Kevin

Well when you compare it to The Motion Picture, Final Frontier, Generations, Insurrection and Nemesis...

Seriously, It depends on your own personal tastes. The Wrath of Kahn is definitely a fan Favorite.
 
Seriously, It depends on your own personal tastes. The Wrath of Kahn is definitely a fan Favorite.


Sigh....he know's, this is a tongue in cheek critique to compliment the Into Darkness thread complaints...You really had to be there.
 
Sigh....he know's, this is a tongue in cheek critique to compliment the Into Darkness thread complaints...You really had to be there.

Oh, I just thought he was someone who saw the movie once and didn't get some stuff. My bad.....
 
Oh, I just thought he was someone who saw the movie once and didn't get some stuff. My bad.....

Dude, that is awesome! Too funny, and totally understandable. :) No, he is a HUGE fan who is making fun at all the complaining about Into Darkness.
 
Minor upgrades or Modifications to the system between TMP and WOK.

I thought they had battery power? "Enough for a few shots but not enough against their shields" or something like that.

This is a great reason to rewatch the movie.
 
I thought they had battery power? "Enough for a few shots but not enough against their shields" or something like that.

This is a great reason to rewatch the movie.

Always a great reason to rewatch the movie, but here's the scene.

Kirk: Scotty, what's left?
Scotty: Just the batteries sir! I can have auxiliary power in a few minutes!
Kirk: We don't have a few minutes! Can you give me phaser power?
Scotty: A few shots sir!
Spock: Not enough against their shields.
Kirk: Who the hell are they?
 
So some of the 'criticisms' are due to not understanding the film itself. Plenty of problems with "The Angry Bitterness of John Harrison" that aren't just simple misunderstandings. They're just bad writing.
 
So some of the 'criticisms' are due to not understanding the film itself. Plenty of problems with "The Angry Bitterness of John Harrison" that aren't just simple misunderstandings. They're just bad writing.

Right, just like some of the criticisms of Into Darkness. Like Jeyl asking why Khan put his crew in the torpedoes when it was Marcus that did that.
 
Then address my concerns and explain how a criminal Starfleet washout gets given an officer's commission after less than a few weeks in the academy and promoted to the Captain of a starship with the power to level the surface of entire planets.
 
So some of the 'criticisms' are due to not understanding the film itself. Plenty of problems with "The Angry Bitterness of John Harrison" that aren't just simple misunderstandings. They're just bad writing.

I have suffered through much more challenging screenplays of films that seem to get a pass, like Inception, and the recent Batman film. There was a crap ton of bad writing where I as the viewer had no idea where they were going. In the case of Inception I think it was just intellectual douchiness, Batman just made no sense unless you were steeped in the lore. Into Darkness was a pretty straight forward affair. You can keep trying to knock down the OP's post or go and bash Into Darkness in the appropriate thread.
 
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Then address my concerns and explain how a criminal Starfleet washout gets given an officer's commission after less than a few weeks in the academy and promoted to the Captain of a starship with the power to level the surface of entire planets.

Pike has a lot of sway, Marcus thought he could use Kirk as a patsy.
 
I think WoK is a very good film, but like others have said "best" is very subjective. I've personally always liked Undiscovered Country of all the Trek films with the original cast. Again, just my opinion and everyone's will be different. Although almost everyone agrees that ST:V is probably the worst with the original cast.
 
Right, just like some of the criticisms of Into Darkness. Like Jeyl asking why Khan put his crew in the torpedoes when it was Marcus that did that.

Are you sure?

Kirk: Why is there a man in that torpedo?
Khan: There are men and women in all those torpedoes. I put them there.

*later*

Kirk: And what exactly would you like me to do with the rest of his crew, sir? Fire them at the Klingons, end 72 lives? Start a war in the process?
Marcus: He put those people in those torpedoes. I simply didn't want to burden you with the knowledge of what was inside of them.
 
Are you sure?

Fair enough. I recalled incorrectly, mea culpa. Still, the point is that people are searching for any excuse to not like STID. E.G. "Then address my concerns and explain how a criminal Starfleet washout gets given an officer's commission...."

This is fairly obviously explained in the film. Pike gets the Enterprise, picks Kirk. Fine, argue that it's bad writing if you must, but there was an explanation for it in the movie. Pike wanted Kirk for his first officer, because both films show that Pike has an intense interest in wanting Kirk to succeed. That's the explanation.

If one doesn't understand that subplot between Kirk and Pike, then yes, Kirk getting promoted to First Officer might seem weird.
 
Pike wanted Kirk for his first officer, because both films show that Pike has an intense interest in wanting Kirk to succeed.

Why? The only thing that Pike saw in Kirk is the very thing that destroyed the seven Federation ships and almost the Enterprise.

PIKE: You know, that instinct to leap without looking, that was his nature too, and in my opinion, it's something Starfleet's lost.

Kind of hard to argue that Starfleet doesn't leap without looking after they receive a vague distress call from Vulcan and immediately load ships full of cadets and shoot them towards the planet without so much as getting intel from other sources, even while they were on their way. Kirk actually works things out, pieces together bits of information, and suggests to Pike that they should probably be careful when approaching Vulcan. And by suggest, I mean insisting "WE HAVE TO STOP THE SHIP!". It's lazy writing when the writers try to say "This character is cool because he jumps without looking!" and showcase his awesomeness by doing the exact opposite. It's like Archer in "Broken Bow" when he ends the first episode with "We can't be afraid of the wind, Ensign."

Two episodes later...

Strange New World said:
Reed: Sir, we can't safely land in this wind with a thruster out.
Archer: Archer to Tucker.
Tucker: Captain, aren't you forgetting something?
Archer: We're going to have to wait until the wind dies down. Try to manage till then.

Can't be afraid of the wind, except when it's scary. Leap without looking, but please be sure it's safe. I wouldn't have minded this contradiction so much if they had just acknowledged this in the film itself that leaping without looking isn't what Starfleet needs, but that would require a bit of cleverness on the writers' part and from all their works, they are completely and utterly incapable of being clever with this material.
 
The burned cadet Scotty brought to the bridge was his nephew.
Deleted scene and book.

Even more reason to bring him directly to sickbay! :lol

I must admit, I never could figure that one out.

The only answer that makes a lick of sense to me (theory only of course)---

The turbolift malfunctioned and brought Scotty to the bridge rather than sickbay. Some "round about" supporting "evidence" (well sort of ;)) is Spock's comment later that (the turbolifts) were inoperative below C deck.

That or like a horse running into the barn, he went to the bridge instinctively (I don't really believe this though).


By the way- the deleted scene is just gold on Doohan's acting. He has to eventually tell his sister that her son is dead. :(


Sigh....he know's, this is a tongue in cheek critique to compliment the Into Darkness thread complaints...You really had to be there.

What Bryan has said is true. My critique IS satirical. What Kerr Avon has said is unimportant and I do not hear his words. ;)


Kevin
 
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