Star Trek: Into Whiteness
It's been 2 weeks now since I saw 'Star Trek: Into Darkness'. Guess it's about time I posted *why* I'm so upset....
So here is the reason why the whitewashing of Khan in ST:ID matters.
And why it matters so much to *me*.
(mild spoilers, and then only if you're a Trekkie who's been living under a rock the past month.)
'Star Trek' has been very special to me, for nearly all my life, because it stood for something important and has such a strong positive progressive message.
I'm giving away my age when I say 'Star Trek: The Original Series' was my first fandom. Back then, it was the ONLY Trek fandom (no movies yet, no TNG, Voyager, DS9 or Enterprise yet). So yeah, I'm way older than most folks reading this post.
I was a young kid during the civil, racial and international unrest of the 60s and early 70s, during the Kennedy and MLK assassinations, Vietnam, Watergate, and the Cold War between the US and USSR with their nuclear arsenals pointed at each other and threatening the end of life on Earth as we know it.
I discovered ST:TOS when it played on a local station in syndication in the 70s, years after it had been canceled by NBC.
At the time I was a nerdy, geeky, extremely shy and socially clueless adolescent who was desperately unhappy and socially isolated. In fact, I have felt like a social outcast for most of my life. That was particularly so when I found ST:TOS.
ST:TOS literally became a lifeline and got my pre-teen/early-teen self through some very dark times. ST was a beacon of hope for me. TV seemed like my only friend then. And there on my screen, on those early Sunday mornings back in the day, there was the starship USS Enterprise, with its unique, diverse crew: an African woman was bridge officer, with a Vulcan First Officer, a Japanese helmsman, a Russian navigator, a Scottish engineer, a Southern doctor and a brash, handsome young captain. (And if Gene Roddenberry had had his way, there would have been a female first officer). It was quite unusual for 1966, to say the least, and even in the mid-70s.
The world seemed like a bleak, depressing place to me, but in the midst of it all, ST:TOS offered *hope*. Hope that one day we would overcome all the social turmoil, that one day such a diverse group as the crew of the Enterprise could not only live and work together, but come to love and respect one another and become a *family*. It wasn't that race was homogenized -- instead there was the Vulcan philosophy of IDIC. Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations. Our differences come together to create beauty and harmony. The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.
Gene Roddenberry tried to include diversity wherever he could. One of the most iconic characters in ST was Khan Noonien SIngh in the ST:TOS episode 'Space Seed' in 1967. Khan was a product of the Trek-verse Eugenics Wars (WW III) where "a group of ambitious scientists sought to improve the human race through selective breeding". Khan himself was the most successful of the supermen-tyrants: "absolute ruler of a quarter of your world, from Asia through the Middle East". What was so unusual about Khan was that his genetic superman was *not* a white European. Was *not* the blonde, blue-eyed Aryan master-race that Hitler had tried to create only 20 years before ST:TOS aired. Khan was described as being from "the northern India area, probably a Sikh".
So when I heard the spoilers for ST:ID (before it opened), that Benedict Cumberbatch -- a very white British actor -- had been cast as Khan Noonien Singh, one of the most iconic PoC in ST and science fiction, it felt like a slap in the face to ST:TOS and Gene Roddenberry -- and *me* personally -- and everything 'Star Trek' stands for.
I reluctantly went to see ST:ID, hoping there was some explanation for such an egregious change and whitewashing. Hoping that J.J. Abrams & co. hadn't actually done such a thing. But NO.... There is NO explanation, no rationalization, no it's-an-alternate-universe-alternate-timeline handwaving that can justify what they've done to the legacy of Gene Roddenberry and ST:TOS.
I paid careful attention to what was said in ST:ID about Khan/John Harrison. They were deliberately vague about Khan and his origins, enough to give J.J. & co enough room to try to weasel out of a whitewashing accusation --- they never gave the name of Khan's ship, the S.S. Botany Bay; John Harrison only says his name is 'Khan'; it's Spock Prime that says his full name of Khan Noonien Singh, but Spock Prime hasn't seen what Khan looks like.
But it's pretty f**cking obvious to anyone who knows anything about ST that John Harrison is supposed to be *the* Khan, originally played by Ricardo Montalban in 'Space Seed' and the movie 'Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan'.
I just don't get it -- If they really wanted to use Cumberbatch, or were afraid of the backlash of having a PoC as a terrorist, it could have been so EASILY fixed! All they had to do was say that the first guy they tried to revive for cryo-sleep died in the process, and Harrison was someone else on the ship. And that he took the name Khan in honor of his dead commander. Or whatever.
Or maybe they could have brought back another memorable ST:TOS character, such as Gary Mitchell. Cumberbatch would have been perfect as Gary. Or -- *gasp* -- they could have done an ORIGINAL storyline! Imagine that! Instead we get a bad remake of the best of the TOS movies.
But Cumberbatch should *not* have been cast as Khan Noonien Singh.
The only reason, plotwise, for it still to be Khan it this film, is so they could recycle some of the old plot points from ST:TWOK. And so they could have someone in the reboot do Shatner's infamous line "Khaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan!"
The last straw for me was reading a comment from the writers that the idea of the villain being Khan was merely an Easter Egg for the TOS fans....
O.O
....There are no words....
*sigh*
ST wasn't just another 60's scifi show. It was ABOUT something. It had a message, a powerful message that spawned a huge fan following that turned a marginally successful TV show into a cultural phenomenon that's still around nearly 50 years later. It was because of Trek's powerful message of HOPE for the future of mankind.
Nowadays, some of that message can be overlooked if you watch ST:TOS, because of the dated special effects, costumes, and sometimes heavy-handed writing. But it has had such a long legacy because it meant so much to so many people.
Like me.
But I don't know what the J.J. Abrams reboot stands for.... other than making a buck. The familiar names are there. But the SOUL is gone. The HEART is gone. Style, but very little substance. Lots of flashy action... but the plot makes no sense.
They've turned a progressive, philosophical show into a series of action movies. Popcorn movies.
That's NOT what Star Trek ever was.
And so, my friends, *that* is why I'm so angry and disappointed about 'Star Trek: Into Darkness'. I've seen every other incarnation of Trek many many times, including the 2009 reboot. But not ST:ID. I've seen it once, and I have no intention of seeing it again and giving them another dime of my money.
x-posted to Tumblr
So here is the reason why the whitewashing of Khan in ST:ID matters.
And why it matters so much to *me*.
(mild spoilers, and then only if you're a Trekkie who's been living under a rock the past month.)
'Star Trek' has been very special to me, for nearly all my life, because it stood for something important and has such a strong positive progressive message.
I'm giving away my age when I say 'Star Trek: The Original Series' was my first fandom. Back then, it was the ONLY Trek fandom (no movies yet, no TNG, Voyager, DS9 or Enterprise yet). So yeah, I'm way older than most folks reading this post.
I was a young kid during the civil, racial and international unrest of the 60s and early 70s, during the Kennedy and MLK assassinations, Vietnam, Watergate, and the Cold War between the US and USSR with their nuclear arsenals pointed at each other and threatening the end of life on Earth as we know it.
I discovered ST:TOS when it played on a local station in syndication in the 70s, years after it had been canceled by NBC.
At the time I was a nerdy, geeky, extremely shy and socially clueless adolescent who was desperately unhappy and socially isolated. In fact, I have felt like a social outcast for most of my life. That was particularly so when I found ST:TOS.
ST:TOS literally became a lifeline and got my pre-teen/early-teen self through some very dark times. ST was a beacon of hope for me. TV seemed like my only friend then. And there on my screen, on those early Sunday mornings back in the day, there was the starship USS Enterprise, with its unique, diverse crew: an African woman was bridge officer, with a Vulcan First Officer, a Japanese helmsman, a Russian navigator, a Scottish engineer, a Southern doctor and a brash, handsome young captain. (And if Gene Roddenberry had had his way, there would have been a female first officer). It was quite unusual for 1966, to say the least, and even in the mid-70s.
The world seemed like a bleak, depressing place to me, but in the midst of it all, ST:TOS offered *hope*. Hope that one day we would overcome all the social turmoil, that one day such a diverse group as the crew of the Enterprise could not only live and work together, but come to love and respect one another and become a *family*. It wasn't that race was homogenized -- instead there was the Vulcan philosophy of IDIC. Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations. Our differences come together to create beauty and harmony. The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.
Gene Roddenberry tried to include diversity wherever he could. One of the most iconic characters in ST was Khan Noonien SIngh in the ST:TOS episode 'Space Seed' in 1967. Khan was a product of the Trek-verse Eugenics Wars (WW III) where "a group of ambitious scientists sought to improve the human race through selective breeding". Khan himself was the most successful of the supermen-tyrants: "absolute ruler of a quarter of your world, from Asia through the Middle East". What was so unusual about Khan was that his genetic superman was *not* a white European. Was *not* the blonde, blue-eyed Aryan master-race that Hitler had tried to create only 20 years before ST:TOS aired. Khan was described as being from "the northern India area, probably a Sikh".
So when I heard the spoilers for ST:ID (before it opened), that Benedict Cumberbatch -- a very white British actor -- had been cast as Khan Noonien Singh, one of the most iconic PoC in ST and science fiction, it felt like a slap in the face to ST:TOS and Gene Roddenberry -- and *me* personally -- and everything 'Star Trek' stands for.
I reluctantly went to see ST:ID, hoping there was some explanation for such an egregious change and whitewashing. Hoping that J.J. Abrams & co. hadn't actually done such a thing. But NO.... There is NO explanation, no rationalization, no it's-an-alternate-universe-alternate-timeline handwaving that can justify what they've done to the legacy of Gene Roddenberry and ST:TOS.
I paid careful attention to what was said in ST:ID about Khan/John Harrison. They were deliberately vague about Khan and his origins, enough to give J.J. & co enough room to try to weasel out of a whitewashing accusation --- they never gave the name of Khan's ship, the S.S. Botany Bay; John Harrison only says his name is 'Khan'; it's Spock Prime that says his full name of Khan Noonien Singh, but Spock Prime hasn't seen what Khan looks like.
But it's pretty f**cking obvious to anyone who knows anything about ST that John Harrison is supposed to be *the* Khan, originally played by Ricardo Montalban in 'Space Seed' and the movie 'Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan'.
I just don't get it -- If they really wanted to use Cumberbatch, or were afraid of the backlash of having a PoC as a terrorist, it could have been so EASILY fixed! All they had to do was say that the first guy they tried to revive for cryo-sleep died in the process, and Harrison was someone else on the ship. And that he took the name Khan in honor of his dead commander. Or whatever.
Or maybe they could have brought back another memorable ST:TOS character, such as Gary Mitchell. Cumberbatch would have been perfect as Gary. Or -- *gasp* -- they could have done an ORIGINAL storyline! Imagine that! Instead we get a bad remake of the best of the TOS movies.
But Cumberbatch should *not* have been cast as Khan Noonien Singh.
The only reason, plotwise, for it still to be Khan it this film, is so they could recycle some of the old plot points from ST:TWOK. And so they could have someone in the reboot do Shatner's infamous line "Khaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan!"
The last straw for me was reading a comment from the writers that the idea of the villain being Khan was merely an Easter Egg for the TOS fans....
O.O
....There are no words....
*sigh*
ST wasn't just another 60's scifi show. It was ABOUT something. It had a message, a powerful message that spawned a huge fan following that turned a marginally successful TV show into a cultural phenomenon that's still around nearly 50 years later. It was because of Trek's powerful message of HOPE for the future of mankind.
Nowadays, some of that message can be overlooked if you watch ST:TOS, because of the dated special effects, costumes, and sometimes heavy-handed writing. But it has had such a long legacy because it meant so much to so many people.
Like me.
But I don't know what the J.J. Abrams reboot stands for.... other than making a buck. The familiar names are there. But the SOUL is gone. The HEART is gone. Style, but very little substance. Lots of flashy action... but the plot makes no sense.
They've turned a progressive, philosophical show into a series of action movies. Popcorn movies.
That's NOT what Star Trek ever was.
And so, my friends, *that* is why I'm so angry and disappointed about 'Star Trek: Into Darkness'. I've seen every other incarnation of Trek many many times, including the 2009 reboot. But not ST:ID. I've seen it once, and I have no intention of seeing it again and giving them another dime of my money.
x-posted to Tumblr