Wrath of Khan Magazine article from 1982

[SCE2Aux]

A friend of mine found this magazine and, knowing that I was a big Star Trek fan, very kindly gifted it to me. It's a lovely time capsule and fascinating to read. There's some great behind the scenes photos, and details on shooting the film. My camera phone isn't the best, but it should be more or less legible, and give folks like me an idea of what went into making films in the 80s.

 

[Khan 2.0]

quite a few rare pics in there and great cover with all those now absolute classic movies (82 has to be the best year/summer for SF)..plus ['Revenge' of the Jedi] was still being called that then? no wonder Trek II had to change from 'Vengeance of Khan'

 

[Green]

Owned that book! Just those few pictures have several stills from the deleted scenes.

 

[Vger23]

Great find! I read every word of that article. Some of those pictures are pretty rare (Chekov in sickbay, Terrell on the ground, etc). I also like the references to "Gamma Regula" and the ascertation that Project Genesis had "universe ending" capabilities.

I was just a little too young to remember clearly (6 years old), but I can't imagine what the hype must have been for this film back in 1982. All the media and promotional material was so exciting. Does anyone remember what the anticipation was like?

 

[Enterprise is Great]

I just remember people freaking out because it had come out that Spock would be dying. Also there were a bunch of articles in Starlog magazine. I was a regular reader of that so I read all the articles in there about TWOK.

 

[Therin of Andor]

Does anyone remember what the anticipation was like?

Yep. In February 1982, we had a "Star Trek" convention in Medlow Bath, Australia, and a club member with Japanese ancestry brought along a copy of "Super-Visual", a gorgeous Japanese language book that was actually Volume 3 in a series, and this book covered TOS Season 3, Filmation's TAS, TMP and featured the first several publicity pics from "The Wrath of Khan": Kirk, Spock and McCoy in the new maroon uniforms (we were reminded of Canadian Mounties) and our first glimpse of then-unknown, Kirstie Alley, as Lieutenant Saavik. "Super-Visual" managed to scoop "Starlog" by many months! Our friend translated all the captions. Imagine 15 or so fans surrounding one magazine, oooohing and aaaaahing.

Rumours were rampant. I was lucky that Paul Winfield happened to be in Sydney, filming a movie, and I scored an interview! He actually confirmed the rumour we'd heard about an impromptu scene, of Terrell rolling down a sand dune, having to be abandoned because the only available stunt guy was put into blackface. (See the top left pic in the third double-spread in the "Fantastic Films" pages above.) Terrell and Chekov were to get startled by a child's face at the porthole of Khan's cargo bay dwelling.


Khan's baby by Ian McLean, on Flickr

He also mentioned that Saavik and Kirk got along much better that Alley and Shatner. We were confused by this, until we finally saw ta penpal's tape of the US ABC-TV version of ST II, with the alternating closeups of Saavik and Kirk in the elevator (instead of the wider two-shot, used in all other versions of the film), and it appears they are flirting with each other.

Official, licensed books and magazines could often take three months (sea freight) to arrive Down Under. There were rarely local printings, so we always kept watch. One collectibles shop got in three copies of the "Starlog" movie magazine a few weeks before our (delayed) premiere, so using the stills in that, a group of us convinced one of our Mum's to make uniforms, another knitted the collars, I made insignia badges (out of ice cream containers painted gold) and the felt sleeve and shoulder trims for each uniform. (The Saturday morning before the gala premiere, we were granted free tickets to a preview, which gave us an additional chance to tweak our costumes! One person won the novelisation, not yet in shops, which was taped underneath their chair. So jealous!)


Therin of Andor and Danni, State Theatre, Sydney by Ian McLean, on Flickr


Captain Therin and friends at ST II's gala premiere by Ian McLean, on Flickr


STII premiere night by Ian McLean, on Flickr

 

[Grant]

Boy would I love to see the scenes of Chekhov and Terrell finding the baby on Ceti Alpha again. It's been years since my visit to UCLA and my audio recordings are a poor substitute for actually looking at the footage again.

 

[SCE2Aux]

^ I always find it remarkable how much work doesn't make it into a movie. Reading this article helped me put into perspective the amount of things that were tried, and ultimately dropped/changed.

Most of the time I'm happy with their editing decisions (the TWOK special edition edit, for example is a much inferior product despite its extra content imho).

The trick, I suppose, is knowing what to cut whilst you're inside the maelstrom that is film production. It can't be easy to be objective in such an environment.

 

[Firebird]

Boy would I love to see the scenes of Chekhov and Terrell finding the baby on Ceti Alpha again. It's been years since my visit to UCLA and my audio recordings are a poor substitute for actually looking at the footage again.

Ever since moving to SoCal, I've been making semi-regular trips to UCLA's special collections, and I repeatedly forget to set up an appointment to view that rough cut. You don't happen to remember what collection it's included with, do you? I seem to remember the last time I tried to checked, I could never find it.

 

[ChristopherPike]

What have there been? Two, three audio commentaries down the years on the various releases of TWOK?

And nobody's ever just asked Nick Meyer about Khan's baby, or if he can remember anything about the cut scenes.



I'm happy this other early cut apparently survives (in the UCLA?), and you'd figure could be loaned to whoever might be working on documentaries or special features in the future.

 

[Grant]

No Doubt UCLA would allow Paramount to make a copy so that they could use it for deleted scenes for reference or interviews but Paramount probably just doesn't care at this point to ever include deleted scenes for Star Treks 2, 3, 4 and 6.
And no I don't know what collection it is part of because a couple of my relatives who live in San Diego set up the visit for me.

 

[Maurice]

They don't "loan" items in the special collections.

 

[Grant]

how about making a copy and giving it to the actual people that gave it to them in the first place?

 

[Firebird]

how about making a copy and giving it to the actual people that gave it to them in the first place?

I've heard from one of the librarians in USC's Cinematic Arts library that Paramount isn't the most cooperative in situations like this. They had a lot of problems getting back items they loaned to PP from the Robert Wise collection during work on the TMP Director's Edition. All of these librarians talk with each other, so I'd bet UCLA wouldn't want to deal with PP pulling shenanigans, either. UCLA also got burned by 20th Century Fox after Fox yanked their production archives back into their own facility, so I think their tolerance for studio interference is low.

 

[drt]

I was just a little too young to remember clearly (6 years old), but I can't imagine what the hype must have been for this film back in 1982. All the media and promotional material was so exciting. Does anyone remember what the anticipation was like?

In small town America where I grew up there was very little. I only picked up the occasional issue of Starlog (my only source of genre news in those days) and had no idea there even was a Star Trek 2 until I saw a TV trailer a couple of weeks before it came out. The tie-in materials, which were pretty minimal, showed up about the same time as the theatrical release.

Quite the contrast to TMP, which was promoted very heavily.

 

[publiusr]

Owned that book! Just those few pictures have several stills from the deleted scenes.

I'm not sure all of the images were deleted scenes

Some of the ship scenes here:

Were ILM cards showing some of their effects capability. In the moovie, Reliant's stump trails sparks, not blood (above)

a copy of "Super-Visual", a gorgeous Japanese language book that was actually Volume 3 in a series, and this book covered TOS Season 3, Filmation's TAS, TMP and featured the first several publicity pics from "The Wrath of Khan":"Super-Visual" managed to scoop "Starlog" by many months!

The zine in question?
https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/star-trek-special-super-visual-1755708945
https://www.collectors.com/entertai...nese-souvenir-program-19/-3050733424409748385

I think 1982 was the best year to be a fan. Things seemed more futuristic then than they do now, somehow.

 

[Marsden]

In small town America where I grew up there was very little. I only picked up the occasional issue of Starlog (my only source of genre news in those days) and had no idea there even was a Star Trek 2 until I saw a TV trailer a couple of weeks before it came out. The tie-in materials, which were pretty minimal, showed up about the same time as the theatrical release.

Quite the contrast to TMP, which was promoted very heavily.

I was just thinking similarly, TMP was huge, and ST II was like, oh they're trying again, maybe this will be good.

 

[Armus]

A friend of mine found this magazine and, knowing that I was a big Star Trek fan, very kindly gifted it to me. It's a lovely time capsule and fascinating to read. There's some great behind the scenes photos, and details on shooting the film. My camera phone isn't the best, but it should be more or less legible, and give folks like me an idea of what went into making films in the 80s.

Love the saturated colors, all that red, the glossiness of the photos, the smell of those old magazines.

 

[Therin of Andor]

The zine in question?
https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/star-trek-special-super-visual-1755708945

No, that's the second volume, focussing on TOS Season 2. Volume 3 features Season 3, as well as TAS, TMP and the promo pics for ST II.

https://www.collectors.com/entertai...nese-souvenir-program-19/-3050733424409748385

That's the Japanese version of the program.

 

[Two-Bit]

Boy would I love to see the scenes of Chekhov and Terrell finding the baby on Ceti Alpha again. It's been years since my visit to UCLA and my audio recordings are a poor substitute for actually looking at the footage again.

I have only recently become aware of the baby and the UCLA print. I'm shocked that this hasn't been leaked to the public! Can you tell me how you were able to view it? Were you a student/do you have to be a student? Is it as easy as strolling onto campus and asking to check it out? Are your audio recordings available anywhere? What all extra do you remember being in it? Sorry for all the questions I just got very excited at the prospect of there being new footage of my favorite Trek movie that i've never seen.