A legendary Star Trek producer revealed his favorite film in the franchise

Of the 13 existing “Star Trek” feature films, there is broad consensus that Nicholas Meyer’s 1982 sequel “Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan” is the best. Many Trekkies like Khan’s larger-than-life character and Ricardo Montalbán’s equally expanded performance, as well as the film’s thrilling, climactic ship-to-ship combat sequence. To remind readers, “Khan” climaxes when the eponymous character hijacks a Starfleet ship called the USS Reliant and uses it to fight Admiral Kirk (William Shatner), who is aboard the USS Enterprise. . You see, Kirk had left Khan behind on the planet Ceti Alpha V in the original series episode “Space Seed”, unaware that an environmental cataclysm had turned the entire planet into a desert. Khan barely survived, and when he finally escaped from Ceti Alpha V, all he thought about was revenge.

“The Wrath of Khan,” which features a story credited to Harve Bennett and Jack B. Sowards (who is also credited with writing the screenplay), thematically deals with dealing with consequences. Previously, Kirk had been an outspoken but reckless captain who rarely faced the consequences of his actions. “The Wrath of Khan” not only pits him against a forgotten enemy, but also discovers that he had an adult son (Merritt Butrick) whom he never met. It’s about growing up and reevaluating one’s life. Then, in the end, Spock (Leonard Nimoy) dies, proving that there will always be consequences. Youth will not last forever and one can never leave one’s past behind.

Bennett was not only a writer on “The Wrath of Khan,” but also a “Star Trek” producer who entered the franchise in 1980 after the financial disappointment of “Star Trek: The Motion Picture.” After that, he would stay on to produce several more films in the franchise.

In 2010, Bennett was being interviewed by StarTrek.com when, naturally, he was asked which of his “Star Trek” movies he liked best. Perhaps naturally he said it was “The Wrath of Khan.”

It’s worth noting that Leonard Nimoy’s 1986 film, “Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home,” was, by a wide margin, the most financially successful “Star Trek” film, at least until the release of “Star Trek” by JJ Abrams in 2009. Bennett, a producer, was instantly tempted to call “Voyage Home” his favorite simply for that reason. But then, after a moment’s thought, he had to admit that he, along with most of the world’s Trekkies, preferred “Wrath of Khan.” In his own words:

“My instinct is to say, ‘You can bet IV is my favorite,’ but then I have to stop and say that I love ‘IV,’ but ‘II’ will always have a special place in my heart for the reasons we discussed and more. ”

Bennett was not a Trekkie when he was hired to work on “The Wrath of Khan” and had to go back and watch every episode of the original series to prepare. The episode “Space Seed,” he explained in the StarTrek.com interview, spoke to him and left him wondering what Khan would look like 25 years after those events. Interestingly, it took a non-Trekkie to create the story of one of the most beloved “Star Trek” movies of all time.

But of course, Bennett had more to say about “The Voyage Home,” since it also had a novel concept. That’s the movie in which the crew of the Enterprise, after hijacking a Klingon ship they renamed Bounty in “Star Trek III: The Search for Spock,” travel back in time to the year 1986 to recover a pair of humpback whales. It seems that a mysterious and all-powerful space probe in the future is emptying Earth’s oceans in search of some humpback whales, and the planet has been screwed since humanity hunted whales to extinction centuries before. Bennett liked that movie too, as do most moviegoers.

As noted above, “Star Trek: The Motion Picture” was a commercial disappointment, so a new creative team (without “Star Trek” creator Gene Roddenberry) was hired for the sequels. Bennett, a rookie, struck gold with his “Wrath of Khan” idea, but it was a risk at the time. If “Wrath of Khan” had flopped, it could have been the last “Star Trek” movie. Fortunately, both that film and “The Search for Spock” did well, and, in Bennett’s words, “By the time we got to ‘IV’ we were confident.” Bennett considered the film’s time travel plot to be a great way to appeal to a broader audience beyond Trekkies.

It worked. Bennett loved the movie and loved everyone seeing it. “Wrath of Khan” may have been his favorite, but “Voyage Home” garnered more lip service from the producer. As he himself put it:

“Coming back to the present created something that nothing else could have done: introduce ‘Star Trek’ to a non-Trek audience. All you have to do is remember those scenes on the streets of San Francisco. People don’t.” I don’t identify with the characters as stars of ‘Star Trek’, but as another crazy person from San Francisco. I love the lady’s reaction to Chekov when he asks, “Where can I find the nuclear devices?” That whole scene featured ‘Star Trek.’ at the same time to people who had never heard of him. That’s why it was the biggest success and in many ways the most popular of what I did.”

The reference to “nuclear sails” comes from Chekov (Walter Koenig) who is looking for nuclear power for his spaceship, but has no idea where he can get it. He knows the nuclear-powered ships have what he needs, but he doesn’t know where they are. Then he simply starts asking people passing by (including an extra who only got the role because the film’s production had his car towed), in a Russian accent, where he could find “nuclear objects.” In 1986, during the Cold War, this was particularly fun.