star trek genghis khan

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The Savage Curtain

• Episode aired Mar 7, 1969

Kirk, Spock, Abraham Lincoln and Vulcan legend Surak are pitted in battle against notorious villains from history for the purpose of helping a conscious rock creature's understanding of a co... Read all Kirk, Spock, Abraham Lincoln and Vulcan legend Surak are pitted in battle against notorious villains from history for the purpose of helping a conscious rock creature's understanding of a concept he does not understand, "good vs. evil". Kirk, Spock, Abraham Lincoln and Vulcan legend Surak are pitted in battle against notorious villains from history for the purpose of helping a conscious rock creature's understanding of a concept he does not understand, "good vs. evil".

• Herschel Daugherty
• Gene Roddenberry
• Arthur Heinemann
• Arthur H. Singer
• William Shatner
• Leonard Nimoy
• DeForest Kelley
• 29 User reviews
• 11 Critic reviews

• Captain James Tiberius 'Jim' Kirk

• Mister Spock

• Chief Security Guard
• (as Carol Daniels DeMent)

• (as Robert Herron)
• Ghengis Khan
• Lieutenant Hadley
• (uncredited)

• All cast & crew
• Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

Did you know

• Trivia Lincoln tells Kirk, "There is no honorable way to kill, no gentle way to destroy. There is nothing good in war, except its ending." This speech, written by the Star Trek screen writers, has become so popular that some people mistakenly believe it to be something the real Abraham Lincoln said.
• Goofs Mr. Lincoln asks Captain Kirk, "Do you still measure time in minutes?", to which Kirk replies, "We can convert to it, sir." Hours and minutes are used regularly in the Trek Universe.

Abraham Lincoln : [interrupting] What a charming negress. Oh, forgive me, my dear. I know that in my time some use that term as a description of property.

Uhura : But why should I object to that term, sir? You see, in our century, we've learned not to fear words.

• Alternate versions Special Enhanced version Digitally Remastered with new exterior shots and remade opening theme song
• Connections Featured in Bring Back... Star Trek (2009)
• Soundtracks Theme Music credited to Alexander Courage Sung by Loulie Jean Norman

User reviews 29

• Feb 17, 2022
• March 7, 1969 (United States)
• United States
• Official Facebook
• Stage 32, Paramount Studios - 5555 Melrose Avenue, Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, USA
• Paramount Television
• Norway Corporation
• See more company credits at IMDbPro

Technical specs

• Runtime 51 minutes

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Star trek’s eugenics wars & 3 khan timelines explained.

Here's everything you need to know about the devastating Eugenics Wars, and the 3 different versions of infamous Star Trek villain Khan Noonien-Singh.

Arguably Star Trek 's greatest villain, Khan Noonien-Singh (Ricardo Montalban) has cropped up in several different Star Trek projects across multiple timelines. Introduced in the Star Trek: The Original Series episode, "Space Seed," Khan was a genetically enhanced human who became "the most dangerous adversary the Enterprise ever faced." In the original Star Trek canon, Khan rose to power in the 1990s along with several other genetically augmented tyrants. Soon after, wars broke out between the augments and their subjects in a conflict that became known as the Eugenics Wars.

After the events of TOS' "Space Seed," Captain Kirk (William Shatner) stranded Khan and his people on the barely-hospitable planet, Ceti Alpha V. In the following fifteen years, Starfleet never checked up on the augments, despite the fact that the orbit of Ceti Alpha V shifted, making the planet even more dangerous. Khan sought his retribution against Kirk and the USS Enterprise in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan , eventually causing the death of Spock (Leonard Nimoy). After TOS and Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan , subsequent Star Trek series have added to the complex history of Khan Noonien-Singh , sometimes complicating (or rewriting) the previously-established timeline.

What Is Khan’s Eugenics Wars In Star Trek’s Original Timeline?

As established in the Star Trek: The Original Series episode "Space Seed" and Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan , the Eugenics Wars were a devastating conflict that occurred in the mid-1990s. Sometime before this, scientists had been experimenting with genetics and selective breeding in an attempt to create superior humans. The scientists hoped that these superhumans, or augments, would be able to bring peace to Earth, but the augments grew overly ambitious and power-hungry. In 1992, Khan Noonien-Singh became the absolute ruler over one-fourth of the Earth's population. Though several other augmented humans seized power during this time, Khan became known as the "best of the tyrants."

Though it remains unclear how the Eugenics Wars began, the conflict proved to be utterly devastating, resulting in over 30 million deaths. The last tyrant to be overthrown, Khan's reign came to an end in 1996. Though they had been condemned to death, Khan and 84 of his followers managed to escape by placing themselves in cryogenic sleep aboard the SS Botany Bay. The rest of the augments had been wiped out and humanity grew fearful of any kind of genetic manipulation. Soon after the end of the Eugenics Wars, Earth banned genetic engineering entirely. Despite the ways this ban became a justification for discrimination against the genetically-modified Illyrians, the augment ban remained in effect throughout the 23rd and 24th centuries.

Strange New Worlds Changed Khan’s Eugenics Wars Timeline

In the Star Trek: Strange New Worlds season 2 episode, " Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow ," a young Khan (Desmond Sivan) appears in 21st-century Toronto, Canada. The episode follows Khan's descendent La'an Noonien-Singh (Christina Chong) and an alternate universe version of Captain Kirk (Paul Wesley) as they find themselves in the 21st century. As they work to figure out what event changed the timeline, they discover an undercover Romulan operative named Sera (Adelaide Kane) who planned to assassinate the young Khan. Sera reveals that Romulans have been attempting to slow the progress of humanity in order to keep them from achieving space travel and warp speed.

Since the Romulans have been manipulating history, the rise of Khan and the augments, as well as the ensuing Eugenics Wars, happen later than previous Star Trek series have stated. In an interview with CinemaBlend , Strange New Worlds' co-showrunner Akiva Goldsman confirmed that the dates of certain events, including the Eugenics Wars, were pushed forward "in order to keep Star Trek in our timeline." Star Trek supposedly takes place in the future of our timeline, and this change in Trek canon makes that still plausible. In "Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow," La'an and Kirk successfully prevent the child Khan's death, setting up the future return of the powerful dictator.

J.J. Abrams’ Star Trek: Khan's Eugenics Wars Happened In The Kelvin Timeline

Set in the alternate Kelvin timeline, J.J. Abrams' Star Trek movies introduced yet another version of Khan Noonien-Singh , this time played by Benedict Cumberbatch. In Star Trek Into Darkness, Captain James T. Kirk (Chris Pine) and the crew of the USS Enterprise encounter Khan posing as a Starfleet officer who went rogue. In this version of the timeline, the Eugenics Wars took place in the 1990s, after which Khan and his people were exiled into space. After the destruction of Vulcan, Admiral Alexander Marcus (Peter Weller) eventually found the SS Botany Bay drifting in space. Despite knowing Khan's violent history, Marcus revived Khan, believing he would prove useful in the upcoming war with the Klingons.

Admiral Marcus created a false identity for Khan as Starfleet Officer and Section 31 agent John Harrison. Khan began helping to design new weapons and ships, including the USS Vengeance, a Dreadnaught class vessel. Because Marcus had threatened Khan's people, Khan eventually turned against him and declared war on Starfleet. Though Kirk and the Enterprise crew eventually stopped him, Khan still managed to cause a great deal of destruction. It seems that Khan remains dangerous and vengeful regardless of the timeline, but it remains to be seen how future Star Trek projects will treat the infamous tyrant.

Creating the Klingons

We now know the Klingons as a people driven by honor and tradition, but they started out as the opposite. The Making of Star Trek , co-authored by Gene Roddenberry while The Original Series was still in production, describes the “number-one adversary of the Federation” as “[m]ore powerful than the Romulans” and “less admirable characters.”

Their only rule of life is that rules are made to be broken by shrewdness, deceit or power. Cruelty is something admirable; honor is a dispicable trait. They will go out of their way to provoke an incident with the Federation.

The Next Generation and Deep Space Nine would reverse the roles, with the Romulans becoming duplicitous and never striking the first blow.

The Original Series

The Making of Star Trek goes on to describe the Klingon Empire as an “absolute dictatorship” where assassination is common:

Their society is totally devoted to personal gain by the cleverest, strongest or most treacherous. As a result, their vessels often operate much like “privateers” and warlike acts are a way of life. Life on all levels is completely supervised and extensive use is made of “snooping devices” to help maintain total control.

Gene Coon, who wrote the episode “Errand of Mercy” in which the Klingons first appeared, deliberately modeled the species on America’s communist rivals in the Cold War: primarily Russia, to a lesser extent China. Much like the proxy wars of the twentiethe century, the Federation and the Klingons supported opposing sides in a civil war in “A Private Little War”.

The Klingons were allowed no redeeming qualities. Producer Robert Justman wrote to fellow producer Fred Freiberger at the time “Day of the Dove” was being made:

[L]et us never set up a situation whereby those adversaries of ours give any indication of ever being anything but highly aggressive and self-seeking opponents.

Gene Roddenberry disagreed. During the 1990 SeaTrek cruise, Majel Barrett recalled that her husband “never did like the Klingons, because they were represented as being ‘all bad.’ Gene said, ‘There is no such thing as a whole race that is all bad.’ He really hated that.”

The script of “Errand of Mercy” described the Klingons as “Oriental”-looking. Beyond that, makeup designer Fred Phillips had little to go on. “I had never heard of a Klingon before,” he is quoted as saying in These Are the Voyages: TOS Season One . “And nothing in the script that I read told me what it was.”

John Colicos, the actor who played the Klingon commander Kor in “Errand of Mercy”, had a significant influence on the makeup design. He proposed to take inspiration from Genghis Khan, another ambitious military commander, and Dr Fu Manchu. Phillips “thought that was a hell of a good idea,” Colicos told Star Trek: Communicator in 1995.

The look took only about 20 minutes to apply, according to Colicos, and it was relatively cheap. As a result, the Klingons replaced the Romulans as Star Trek ’s favorite villains.

For the aborted Star Trek television series Phase II , John Meredyth Lucas wrote a two-part episode “Kitumba” that would have radically changed Klingon culture and society.

Lucas, who had produced half of the second season of The Original Series , borrowed from Japan give the Klingons a god-like ceremonial head of state, called the Kitumba, who resides on a Sacred Planet. Day-to-day authority would rest with a Warlord — analogues to the Japanese shogun — who lives on Ultar, the Klingon home world.

The story would have revealed that only members of the warrior caste are called “Klingons”. They are served by technicians and subjects.

The Next Generation established the existence of a Klingon High Council, chaired by a chancellor. But the emperor returned in “Rightful Heir”, when a Kahless clone is elevated to the long-vacant Klingon throne.

Fred Phillips was given the chance to recreate the Klingons for Star Trek: The Motion Picture , which had a much bigger budget, but it was costume designer Robert Fletcher who invented the now-distinctive Klingon cranial ridges.

“I did sketches for the Klingon, including the knobby forehead and head,” Fletcher said in an interview for the 2002 DVD of Star Trek III .

The Makeup Department, very generously, said, “That’s great, we’d like to use it.” Gene Roddenberry was not too enthusiastic. He thought they should look more like just people. I said, “Yes, but these are real aliens, and they’re evil aliens.” I think the people, the audience, wants to see something that is not just folks, that goes beyond just folks.

Roddenberry came around and suggested that the cranial ridges might be an outgrow of the Klingon spinal cord, proceeding up the back of the neck and over the head.

Fletcher agreed:

In my mind, all the bumps on the forehead and so forth are vestigial remains of a people that evolved like crustaceans, like lobsters, who have their skeleton on the outside of their bodies.

The makeup went through various iterations. The final product was uncomfortable for the actors to wear. Mark Lenard, who played one of the Klingon commanders in the movie, recalled in an interview with Starlog that the nose piece, which extended down from the upper area of the head piece, over the actor’s nose, was “pretty warm” and itched.

Fletcher refined the Klingon look for Star Trek III , telling Cinefantastique in 1987:

There had never been a good marriage between the forehead appliance and the actors’ faces. We tried to keep them in character rather than have these obstructive things on their heads.

Applying the makeup took two hours per actor each day. By the time of Star Trek IV , John Schuck, who played the Klingon ambassador, spent up to four-and-a-half hours in makeup before shooting.

The Klingon costumes were inspired by Japanese culture. Fletcher is quoted in The Making of the Trek Films as saying, “I always liked to think of them as authoritarian, almost feudal, like Japan had been.”

William Campbell, who had played Koloth in “The Trouble with Tribbles”, and who would reprise the role three decades later for the episode “Blood Oath” of Deep Space Nine , said during the 1991 SeaTrek cruise that he had a “difficult time” with the makeup changes:

When they did the first movie, it looked like the Klingons had gone through some metamorphic stage. In the classic series, the Klingons looked like humans. I never understood the reasoning behind the extensive makeup change except for the reason that it is a new show.

Roddenberry and Phillips came up with the explanation that there might be different Klingon races, but this was never mentioned on screen.

The Next Generation

Roddenberry initially wanted no Klingons, nor Romulans, on The Next Generation in order to differentiate it from The Original Series . Writer and Co-Producer Herb Wright claimed credit for softening Roddenberry’s position in an interview with Cinefantastique in 1992, “by squeezing a Klingon on the bridge.”

It was Justman who provided the most persuasive argument: putting a Klingon in Starfleet would be a great way to show that a century had passed since the original show, and that both human and Klingon attitudes had grown.

Dorothy C. Fontana, a veteran writer of the first Star Trek , agreed there would be story opportunities if the second showed the Federation and the Klingons at peace.

Roddenberry relented, which led to the creation of Worf. But he was still adamant that there would be “no stories about warfare with Klingons” on The Next Generation , and that these Klingons should be different.

Michael Dorn, who had watched the original Star Trek growing up, recalled in a 1991 interview with The Official Star Trek: The Next Generation Magazine that Roddenberry told him, “Forget everything you’ve ever read or heard about Klingons.” Klingons would have redeeming qualities after all.

Makeup artist Michael Westmore could borrow from the movies to create Worf’s look. He also wanted to add something of his own, writing in the Star Trek: The Next Generation Makeup FX Journal that he got Roddenberry’s and Producer Rick Berman’s permission “to lend a little more ferocity to their overall appearance.”

Westmore made the forehead ridges more pronounced, so they were more visible on the small television screen. “I took it a step further,” he told Cinefantastique in 1991, “and brought it into their nose area, so it doesn’t just look like a forehead that we’ve added on.”

Westmore and his team created a different ridge pattern for every Klingon — a decision he would quickly regret:

It was the beginning of what I would eventually call “Klingon Hell”: the self-imposed task of sculpting a new and different head for virtually every Klingon actor.

Maurice Hurley, the Season 1-2 producer who co-wrote “Heart of Glory”, believed the Klingons helped bring a sense of balance to the series. “The show gets so intellectually smug and self-serving,” Edward Gross and Mark A. Altman quote Hurley as saying in Captains’ Logs: The Unauthorized Complete Trek Voyages . “With the Klingons you’re dealing with emotion and passion,” and that’s something The Next Generation needed every now and then: “someone willing to storm the barricades.”

Ron Moore fleshed out these concept. His first script, “The Bonding”, was Moore’s ticket aboard the Star Trek staff.

“I didn’t start out with the intention of focusing on Worf,” he told Cinefantastique in 1990. But when Michael Piller, who had by then taken over from Hurley as producer asked him to combine two stories into a script that would become “Sins of the Father”, Moore had the chance to put his mark on Klingon culture.

“They had these real intricate codes of honor and poetry, like the samurai,” Moore told Star Trek: The Magazine years later.

They were also like the Vikings; they were big, brawling, larger than life, they liked to drink and sing big songs like the Vikings, or at least our conception of the Vikings. That was where I began with the culture.

Contradicting The Original Series , Moore insisted that Klingons weren’t “evil, tyrannical pirates bent only on pillage and plunder.”

They have a strict, almost unyielding code of ethics and honor and take their responsibilities as rulers seriously. … Klingons respect courage, strength and cunning, in that order … Klingons respect the declared war, the killing stroke, the blood feud, death in the field of battle and clear positions of hostility.

Moore also argued it was time to stop thinking about the Klingons as Star Trek ’s version of the Soviet Union:

The place where the Russians were when I was doing the Klingon shows just wasn’t as relevant any more. The [Berlin] Wall had fallen and it was all about the collapse of this empire, and what they were going to do internally, and how do they become a democracy. I didn’t want to take the Klingons down that road, because it would have essentially defanged them, and I liked keeping them more dangerous.

One Russian influence remained: like the Communists who once governed the Soviet Union, the Klingon elite didn’t live up to its stated ideals.

That was one of the great contradictions of the empire; the society is built around a concept of being honorable, but those principles are often sacrificed and compromised by people like Duras.

Conspiracy, intrigue, larger-than-life personalities — the Klingons lend themselves to what Moore described as “Shakespearean” drama. “It made it more interesting if it wasn’t quite so clear whose side was right.”

Klingon women

The writers’ bible of The Original Series claimed the Klingons had “no patience with women, even their own, and treat them as sometime useful animals.”

“Dave of the Dove” had suggested that wasn’t entirely true. There were two women in Kang’s crew.

Moore established in “Redemption” that women were not allowed to serve on the Klingon High Council (although a female Klingon had been present in the Great Hall during “Sins of the Father”). It differentiated them from the Federation and the Romulans, he argued: Klingons were “a traditionally patriarchal society, even if many elements have disappeared with time.”

Indeed, from Kahlest (Thelma Lee), who calls the Klingon chancellor “fat” to his face, to Worf’s love interest K’Ehleyr (Suzie Plakson) to the Duras sisters (Barbara March and Gwynyth Walsh), none of the Klingon women of The Next Generation seemed particularly deferential to patriarchy.

Improved makeup

The appearance of ever more Klingons forced Westmore to give up his practice of creating a unique look for each one. “Instead of making a cast of each actor’s head,” he explains in Star Trek: The Next Generation Makeup FX Journal , “I would measure their head when they walked in the door.”

If their head size was close to that of a preexisting mold, we would create our new design on an available head mold. Quite often, if we had two actors with similarly-sized heads, I would sculpt the first forehead design and after taking a mold from it, the clay sculpture would still be intact. This would eliminate the need for “basing it up”; the process of putting the clay on the mold.

Rather than spend a whole day on a new sculpture, Westmore would be able to resculpt the second head design in three or four hours.

William Shatner gave Westmore’s counterpart on the fifth Star Trek motion picture, Richard Snell, leeway to experiment with different forehead designs. “I always felt that their foreheads should be like a thumbprint,” Snell told Cinefantastique , “and on V , Shatner said, ‘Go ahead, make ’em different.’ I thank him for that. That opened the door and now the sky’s the limit.”

Michael J. Mills, one of Snell’s makeup artists, recalled in a 1992 interview with Cinefex that Nicholas Meyer gave slightly stricer instructions on Star Trek VI : “He wanted the audience to watch the actors’ faces and not be distracted by the makeups. So every one had to be a custom job – which translated out to be about three-and-a-half hours.”

Deep Space Nine

When Moore transitioned from The Next Generation to Deep Space Nine , he felt Klingon culture had been established well enough to poke some fun at it. “This is a point where you’re saying they are kind of silly,” he told Star Trek: The Magazine in 2000. “Let’s enjoy that and laugh at them. Not make them look like fools, but let’s not kid ourselves; they do some pretty crazy stuff.” The Klingons of Deep Space Nine were rambunctious, but the Dominion War arc also gave them the chance to prove that they really were brave warriors.

In an attempt to persuade more Next Generation viewers to switch to Deep Space Nine , Michael Dorn joined the third series in its fourth season. “The Way of the Warrior” put Worf and the Klingons front and center.

The writers initially toyed with a Vulcan exit from the Federation, but Ira Steven Behr suggested it should be the Klingons who break off diplomatic relations. “That might have more heat to it.” Rick Berman loved the idea.

So did Dorn, who told Jeanne M. Dillard for the book Star Trek – Where No One Has Gone Before that allowing the Federation and Klingons to be at war again “makes the Klingon characters what they were originally created to be.”

“Trials and Tribble-ations” forced Deep Space Nine to reckon with the still-unresolved issue of the Klingons’ changed appearance from The Original Series . But even Moore, who created so much of Klingon culture, couldn’t think of a simple way to explain the discrepancy.

So we just said, “Just have Worf say it’s a long story and leave it at that, you know? And that’s fine.” And it’s a wink and a nod to the audience, like, “Okay, we know this doesn’t make sense. Just go with us, okay?”

Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stevens ultimately came up with an explanation for Star Trek: Enterprise : in an attempt to create a biological weapon, Klingon sciencists inadvertently unleashed a virus that smoothened out the Klingon forehead.

Moore did rethink the limited role of Klingon women. While writing “You Are Cordially Invited”, in which Worf would marry Jadzia Dax (Terry Farrell), he realized he had done Klingon woman a “disservice” by not allowing them to get involved in politics. “The fallout from [that] was that the role of Klingon women got much smaller, and I hadn’t intended to do that,” he told the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion .

So I figured that if men run the Council and rule the houses, maybe women rule the social structure, and within that structure the mistress of a great house wields pretty much unchallenged power.

Moore barely got a chance to write Star Trek ’s most prominent female (half-)Klingon: B’Elanna Torres (Roxann Dawson). He transferred to Voyager after Deep Space Nine ended in 1999, but quit within weeks when he fell out with Producer Brannon Braga. He was able to write “Barge of the Dead” before he left, which revealed the Klingon version of Hell.

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• Starfield guides

How to make the best society choice for you in Starfield’s Operation Starseed

Which Society should you choose?

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Starfield ’s “Operation Starseed” is a Misc(ellaneous) mission you’ll pick up the first time you jump into the Charybdis system. It involves a lost colony of clones and a mysterious experiment.

The “Operation Starseed” mission itself isn’t overly confusing — it follows the same pattern as most missions, so you’ll just be following your HUD marker a bunch. But at the end of it, you’ll be asked to make a life-and-death decision about the lost colony.

Our Starfield “Operation Starseed” quest walkthrough will tell you how to find the Charybdis system, how to complete the “Operation Starseed” mission, who to side with during the mission’s final conflict, and what effect your Operation Starfield choice will have.

How to start the Operation Starseed mission

To get the “Operation Starseed” mission, you’ll first have to reach the Charybdis system. It’s a hike, so you might have to upgrade your ship a bit to get there.

You’ll find Charybdis toward the center of the map, far to the right of the more familiar systems.

Operation Starseed explained

When you arrive in the Charybdis system, you’ll hear an automated message telling you to Go to Crucible on Charybdis III .

There, you’ll talk to a robot named Tobias, but he’s really just there to introduce you to Ada Lovelace . After that, you’ll talk to Franklin ( Delano Roosevelt ), Amanirenas , and Genghis Khan . It’s a whole thing. You’ll also bump into Wyatt Earp and Amelia Earhart.

Each of the leaders heads a faction — called a Society — of clones. The three Societies are:

• The Renegades , led by Genghis Khan , don’t feel any real connection to their source material and want to escape the Crucible’s Mission to seek their own destiny.
• The Believers , led by Amanirenas, believe they’re basically reincarnations of their genetic donors and are ready to go take over the Settled Systems.
• The Pragmatists , led by Franklin, who take a more middle-of-the-road approach and seek to prove themselves capable before integrating into the Settled Systems.

Around this point, Wyatt Earp will call out to you in Crucible. He’ll set you on a quick side quest, the “Secret Lives” mission, where he claims to have information for you about FDR. He doesn’t, though, but he’s got a secret of his own.

Next, you’ll go to the Facility where Crucible’s whole experiment is overseen. The Facility is on the opposite side of the planet from Crucible (its antipode ) so you’ll have to fly there. On your way in, you’ll have to clear out some local wildlife. Then you can head inside and find clues about the Facility. (Specifically, you’re looking for Diary Page - Discovering Galathea, Diary Page - Escape, Diary Page - Reborn, Diary Page - Genghis Explosion, Anonymous Last Words, Diary Page - Ada’s Questions, and Ada’s Diary - Heart of the Facility .)

Sadly, you can’t access the computer in the Facility (yet), so it’s time to fly back to Crucible.

How to make the best choice in Operation Starseed

When you return to Crucible with the clues from (and about) the Facility, you’ll have choose which Society to give Facility information . This is, effectively, siding with one of the factions.

Who you side with doesn’t actually impact your game in the long term, so your choice is really about whose worldview you agree with — kind of a nature versus nurture argument. The decision you make will, however, determine who you have to fight in a few minutes. You’ll (likely) have to kill at least one of the leaders you don’t side with, but the leaders are all the same level so one fight isn’t harder than any other.

It really comes down to your own preference. We’ll explain who you’ll have to fight (and why) in the next section.

Whoever you side with will send you to talk to Ada Lovelace who will point you to the Bel system. When you investigate Bel V , you’ll find a Navigation Beacon that lets you follow the Beagle’s trail to Zelazny I where you’ll find the Beagle in orbit among the asteroids. Dock with it. Your goal is a computer where you’ll download the Security Override Code .

Before you can do anything with it, you’ll have to involve yourself in a fight.

See [leader] about an emergency

Back at Crucible, things have gone sideways. Whoever you sided with will call you to tell you a fight is about to break out and ask you to attend meeting with Crucible leaders .

• If you sided with the Pragmatists , Genghis Khan will start a war. You can convince Amanirenas to not get involved. If you do, you’ll only have to kill Genghis Khan. Otherwise, you’ll have to kill both Genghis and Amanirenas.
• If you sided with the Believers , you can convince Franklin not to fight and you can get Genghis to leave Crucible. This is the (most) peaceful option, so long as you don’t think about it too much .
• If you sided with the Renegades , you can get Franklin to stand down if you convince Genghis not to destroy Crucible. Amanirenas, however, will have to be killed.

Once the shooting is done, you’ll have to see if Ada Lovelace can decrypt Security Override Code. Spoiler: she can.

How to resolve Operation Starseed’s ‘everyone hostile’ bug

There is currently a bug that pops up in the aftermath of the fight. Sometimes, all of the Crucible colonists remain aggressive toward you after the fight. There are two ways around this:

• Only shoot the leader(s) . If you ignore the other clones and only attack the leaders, it seems to avoid this bug.
• Head back to your ship and sleep for an hour . If you flee the fight and take a quick nap, the other clones will reset.

Deal with the Facility

With the Security Override Code in hand, head back to the Facility. After shooting your way to the Facility Datacore, you’ll lock in your final decision:

• Reboot and restore current Mission parameters does, basically, nothing. It maintains the status quo. It does not, however, officially side you with one of the leaders. You'll get 3,000 credits.
• Reboot and choose a new Super-Admin officially sides with one of the leaders and puts them in charge. You’ll be rewarded with 6,000 credits.
• Initiate Full Project Cleanse kills all of the Crucible clones and gives you 2,000 credits.

Meanwhile, if you’re into smuggling and contraband, there are some harvested organs in the locked room behind you.

If you kept the clones alive, you’ll just have to report back to Crucible. It’ll become a place you stop off and visit (but there’s not a lot to do there).

You can, however, add Amelia Earhart to your crew now that “Operation Starseed” is complete.

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Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Reveals Unexpected Khan Connection

Strange New Worlds just invoked the legacy of iconic Star Trek villain Khan Noonien-Singh.

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Khan Noonien-Singh is widely considered to be Star Trek ‘s best villain. Introduced in The Original Series episode “Space Seed,” Khan (as played by Ricardo Montalbán) would go on to be the eponymous villain in Star Trek II : The Wrath of Khan , effectively killing fan favorite character Spock in the feature film’s climax. (It’s OK… he got better.) Subsequently, the character made appearances in other corners of the franchise, including on Enterprise , Deep Space Nine , and in the (worst) reboot film Star Trek Into Darkness , where he was played by Benedict Cumberbatch. Now, a different Noonien-Singh is poised to play a main character on Strange New Worlds , the series set during Captain Pike’s tenure as the Enterprise captain. English actress Christina Chong has been announced as La’an Noonien-Singh in the upcoming Trek show. Color us intrigued…

First, some backstory: Khan Noonien Singh was a genetically engineered superhuman who, during the Eugenics Wars of the 1990s (you remember those, right?), controlled more than a quarter of the Earth. When deposed, Khan and 84 of his super-friends escaped from Earth on a freighter ship, placing themselves in a cryogenic sleep. Khan wakes up more than two centuries later, when the Enterprise finds his ship. Once a power-hungry ruler, always a power-hungry ruler, so Khan quickly moves to take over the ship, with the help of the apparently impressionable Enterprise historian Marla McGivers . Kirk eventually manages to stop Khan, and sentences him and his friends (including future wife Marla) to life on an uncolonized planet known as Ceti Alpha V. Let’s just say the sentencing backfires, with Khan coming back with a vengeance in The Wrath of Khan 15 years after the events of “Space Seed.”

Given that Khan is still in cryogenic sleep during the years Strange New Worlds is set (and has been for more than 200 years), it’s unclear how this new Khan character could be related to the iconic villain… but you don’t just slap the surname “Noonien-Singh” on someone without a solid plan. (Right, J.J. Abrams?) The most obvious explanation would be that La’an is a descendant of Khan’s family, but in the world of Star Trek , the possibilities are endless. Time travel is a recurring plot mechanic in the franchise, which means La’an could be an even closer relative than the broad timeline implies. Could Khan and Marla have had a child who somehow survived everything going south on Ceti Alpha V… who then travels back in time? Yes, it’s a bit contrived but there an almost-canonical precedent for a Khan kid. At some point in the Wrath of Khan production process, Khan had a child , but the subplot/character was cut from the story.

Star Trek’s Most Underserved Characters Will Be Back in Strange New Worlds

Star Trek Doctors, Ranked By Crankiness

My favorite theory? La’an is Khan’s sister, daughter, or other close relative from before Khan went into cryogenic sleep. Augments like Khan had many, for want of a better term, “superpowers”: They are five times as strong as the average human, and much more durable with stronger heart muscled and greater lung efficiency. Additionally, they are very smart. But perhaps their most useful trait is their expanded lifespan; Augments live twice the average lifespan of a human. If La’an is an Augment (and has an excellent skin care routine), then she could be Khan’s contemporary from the 90s or shortly thereafter. Khan was no doubt forced to leave people behind when he fled Earth. Was La’an one of those people?

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Whatever Strange New Worlds ‘ reason for naming a character Noonien-Singh, I hope it’s a good one. There’s so much potential when it comes to the space Khan holds in Star Trek canon, and the recent Trek invocation of that legacy was a muddled mess. Strange New Worlds , don’t f this up.

How do you think La’an will be related to Khan? Let us know your theories in the comments below.

Kayti Burt | @kaytiburt

Kayti is a pop culture writer, editor, and full-time nerd who comes from a working class background. A member of the Television Critics Association, she specializes…

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Useful Notes / Genghis Khan

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"Conquering the world on horseback is easy. It is dismounting and governing that is hard."

Want to know why you never get involved in a land war in Asia ? Genghis Khan note  "Chinggis Haan" is a closer pronunciation of his name, primarily due to the fact that Mongolian and many Turkic dialects don't have a hard "c" sound, but generations of English-speakers have pronounced it "Genghis Khan" thanks to an incorrect translation of Persian, so "toe-may-tow/t'-mah-toe". However, the Chinese transliteration of his name is rather accurate: "Chengjisi Han" (成吉思 汗)。 (circa 1162 – August 18, 1227), birth name Temüjin Borjigin, is why.

To say that he was brutal was an understatement, but those who got it the worst were traitors and anyone who killed his messengers . The former were killed in horrific fashions such as boiling them in oil , while he razed any nation stupid enough to do the later.

In fact, Genghis Khan's conquests possibly caused an evolutionary shift, as wild species populations in Central Asia exploded because all the humans who would otherwise till the arable lands and keep them at bay were dead or refugees; this also led to a brief lowering of global temperatures as the takeover of farmland by forests caused a noticeable dip in atmospheric carbon levels. One of the worst Mongol atrocities was the destruction of Baghdad, led by one of Genghis Khan's grandsons. At the time, Baghdad was a jewel of world civilization since it had been the Islamic center of commerce and learning for centuries. It is said that the Tigris River ran not only red with blood, but black due to the ink from the quantity of books thrown in the river. Ironically, Hulagu Khan (the Khan who did all that) later got his ass kicked from the Muslim Khans of the Mongol Hordes, particularly Berke Khan. This civil war eventually ended with Nogai Khan, a Muslim, ending as the most powerful figure and kingmaker amongst the Mongolian tribes excepting Kublai Khan. Before that, Hulagu's advance into Palestine was decisively defeated by the up-and-coming Mamluk Dynasty at the Battle of Ain Jalaut.

Genghis' exploits against Islam brought him to knowledge of the old Europe, where news became so hot that he was initially conflated with the legend of the Prester John, a fabled Christian king of the Orient locked in his own fighting against Muslim states. The Europeans first believed Genghis was a son of this Prester John, and when his true identity became known, the legend changed so Genghis had now defeated Prester John during his conquests. The Frankish kingdom and its various Crusader states later exchanged some diplomacy with Genghis' descendants, but negotiations of an alliance against Islam were unsuccessful - Mongols tended to view other peoples as either enemies or subjects.

In the 21st century, the clan name of Genghis Khan, the Borjigiin, became the most common surname in Mongolia, even among those who are almost certainly not descended from the Mongolian royal family. For decades, Mongolian communist government banned use of surnames, condemning it as an obsolete legacy of the feudal past . After the ban was lifted but original names were lost, many Mongols opted for an opportunity for Meaningful Rename , by choosing the surname of their country's greatest hero.

Genghis Khan's dynasty only ever commissioned one major historical text, The Secret History of the Mongols , written not long after Genghis Khan's death for the royal family. The original Mongolian manuscript was lost, but the text survived through an early Chinese translation. Only in the 20th Century did further translations (including English) finally become available. While it contains some folkloric exaggerations, it is generally considered a fairly honest account rather than the sort of glorified flattery one might expect, and is considered a major authority on the details of Genghis Khan's life. Probably indirectly responsible for a fair bit of recent re-evaluations of the Mongols as more than bloodthirsty barbarians.

Trope Namer for the Genghis Gambit , and Trope Maker for A Villain Named Khan .

Tropes as portrayed in fiction:

• Alternative Character Interpretation : In Mongolia and Central Asia he's the Big Good ; China is mixed-to-positive-in-retrospect after Yuan rule displayed benefits for the country, although recently they have been a bit colder to him; Eastern Europe tends to be rather negative on him as his son's hordes actually hit there, held Russia for centuries and devastated Poland and Hungary; and the Middle East is very negative on him as his troops wiped out a large portion of Persia's population and his grandson sacked Baghdad. In Western Europe, which was The Unfought except the Italian trade colony of Caffa in his descendants' time (which survived but had a role in The Plague ), as stated above either seen as a just ruler, a vicious barbarian or Evil Is Cool .
• Bury Me Not on the Lone Prairie : Legend has it he requested to be returned to Mongolia and buried in an unmarked grave, which to this day has never been found. The Secret History of the Mongols lists the year he died and no other details, while The Travels of Marco Polo suggests it was a Mongolian custom for khans to be buried in a mountain called Altaï. There are many legends surrounding his grave, such as a river being diverted over it (like Alaric I and King Gilgamesh), that it was trampled by horses, that trees were planted over it, that permafrost was involved, or that the gravediggers and pallbearers were killed after he was interred, followed by the killers then being killed by different soldiers to ensure no one would know or find the location of the Great Khan's grave.
• Equal-Opportunity Evil : The man was certainly brutal, but he handed out promotions on merit, not on things like money, race, ethnicity, religion or birth. Some of his generals started out as slaves and climbed up the ranks. He also implemented complete freedom of religion at a time where Europe and the Middle-East were pissing away entire fortunes and wasting thousands of lives in wars against the Christians/Muslims/the wrong kind of Christian/the wrong kind of Muslim.
• Fiery Redhead : He was red-haired and violent according to Mongol and Kazakh folk tales, generally depicted as black or brown haired by Western accounts. An exception would have to be Mongol , which is actually a joint Russo-Kazakh-German film which is noted to be the only half-way historically accurate depiction of his life, where Genghis is played as a kid by Odnyam Odsuran, a red-haired child actor of Mongol descent. (Of course, Tadanobu Asano , the guy who played adult Genghis, was black-haired and Japanese and didn't look a a thing like him except for the beard and hairstyle.)
• Historical Hero Upgrade : Whilst he did indeed introduce some progressive policies for the time, his conquests caused the deaths of as many as 60,000,000 people (which is almost as many as died in World War II ) if you go with a high estimate and 30,000,000 if you go low (still more than the fatalities in World War I .) 60,000,000 in the Middle Ages would have been 17.1% of the world's total population. However, many still remember Genghis with admiration.
• Modern pop culture thinks of him as a barely sentient barbarian warlord, leading his horde on an orgy of Rape, Pillage, and Burn . In reality, he outlawed the kidnapping and selling of women, opposed slavery and torture, lowered taxes, usually made a point of sparing women and children in his raids note  emphasis on the usually , and introduced total religious freedom (virtually unheard of at the time). However, he perpetrated the scary rumors about himself and his hordes to enhance his reputation as a Memetic Badass so he's as much to blame for this trope as anyone else.
• Genghis Khan and the Mongol Empire is also despised in the Middle-East since a large bulk of his victims originated from that region with some going as far as saying he embarked on a genocidal campaign against Muslims attributing destruction of the Khwarazmian Empire and Baghdad as evidence. As evidenced by his religious tolerance, Genghis didn't have a bone to pick with Islam itself, only some of his opponents such as the Kwarazmians happened to be Muslims - and they had slighted him first by executing his emissaries . Personally a Tengrist, he really didn't care if sworn enemies - or valued friends, were Christian, Muslim, Buddhist or Taoist. In addition, the sack of Baghdad perpetrated by his grandson Hulagu was criticized by Mongols that converted to Islam such as the Golden Horde's Berke, who fought Hulagu's Ilkhanate partially for this reason.
• Manly Facial Hair : Statues, coinage, books, posthumous portraits - the only thing they each have in common is giving Chinggis a massive beard. Justified, given that Mongolia is amongst the coldest places on Earth so keeping a beard would have been practical.
• Memetic Badass : In addition to actually cementing himself as this in popular folklore via spreading of rumors and actual war atrocities he committed in his conquests, Genghis Khan is universally seen as one of the biggest Four-Star Badass who ever lived in history, often to the point of both his supporters and haters genuinely admitting he was probably the best commander who ever lived in the Medieval period (or at least during his lifetime). Many authors and film directors often refer to the Khan's memetic folklore warrior image when portraying him in fictional works in which he destroys entire civilization within two weeks, if not several days, upon personally going to a region to take command of the local Mongol force. In so many fictional works taking place in the Medieval period when Khan was alive, there is almost always gossip among bystanders in the story about how the world is ending because the Mongols might be coming to their town next to invade and many generals and officers in such stories are often spending a good bulk of their screen time trying to debate how to fight off a possible Mongol Horde invasion. Even video game portrayals imitate Genghis Khan's popular military image where the Mongols are portrayed as the Lightning Bruiser faction of the game and AI controlling Mongols (often under the same or similar name as the Khan) are often the most difficult to defeat.
• Out with a Bang : One legend say that he died after raping  a Chinese princess captured as a war prize, either from a heart attack or because she killed him with a blade she kept hidden . This is almost certainly false; modern historical consensus is that he died of the bubonic plague.
• Rape, Pillage, and Burn : Downplayed or exaggerated depending on where the writer falls on the Alternate Character Interpretation . He certainly tolerated it all to some degree, and at the same time certainly could and did control and regulate it more than most, but that didn't mean it didn't happen. A lot. Indeed, a lot of the control he exerted was so that he could weaponize it against those that would try to resist.
• Repressive, but Efficient : Under his rule - the Pax Mongolia - you could walk from modern day Ukraine to modern day Hong Kong without running into any bandits or other hostiles. If you were under the protection of the Mongols people thought twice about messing with you.

Appears in the following works:

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• Mazinger Z : During a speech, Dr. Hell declared that he would achieve what Genghis Khan was unable to do ( conquering the world ).
• In the Marvel Universe , the Marvel version of Fu Manchu (who's now Exiled from Continuity ), Iron Man villain The Mandarin (and by extension his son Temujin), and 50s Yellow Peril villain The Golden Claw all claim descent from Genghis Khan and continue their ancestor's dream of world conquest, the first through a crime empire, the second through technological expertise rather than sheer force, and the third through an ancient conspiracy of companies and entities named " Atlas ". Notably, in-story, only the last, the Golden Claw, has a claim to be the true heir of the Khan, as he possesses the spirit banner of Temujin himself, and later makes the hero Khan of the Atlas Empire.
• DC Universe villain Vandal Savage , who is immortal, has used multiple aliases throughout his history as a conqueror and villain, with "Genghis Khan" merely having been one of them.
• Conan the Barbarian (1982) contains a sideways reference to the Khan in the title character's famous answer to the question "What is best in life?" note  "To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentation of their women!" , which is paraphrased and condensed from a similiar line attributed to Temujin: "The greatest happiness is to vanquish your enemies, to chase them before you, to rob them of their wealth, to see those dear to them bathed in tears, to clasp to your bosom their wives and daughters." Conan also has a sidekick named Subotai, which was the name of one of Genghis Khan's chief generals and strategists.
• The Conqueror , an unfortunate 1956 movie where the part of Genghis Khan is played by John Wayne in yellowface . Also unfortunate in that it was filmed downwind from a nuclear testing site, leading to the possibly-exaggerated story that an unusually-high number of people involved in the film - including Wayne himself - developed cancer in the following years.
• Genghis Khan , an only slightly less unfortunate 1965 one where he's played by Omar Sharif .
• Genghis Khan: To the Ends of the Earth and Sea : A 2007 Japanese production which is pretty historically accurate.
• The Fall of Otrar , a 1991 Kazakhstani film directed by Ardak Amirkulov which shows Genghis Khan's destruction of the Khwarezmid Empire from the viewpoint of the latter. Genghis appears in only two scenes and painted as an overarching, albeit charismatic and frightening, Evil Overlord .
• Mongol , a 2007 biopic where he's played by Tadanobu Asano .
• The Mongols (in which he's played by Italian actor Roldano Lupi - yellowface applies to him and every other actor playing Mongols in the film, Jack Palance as his son Ögedei included) anachronistically shows Genghis attempting to conquer Poland in 1240, while he actually died in 1227 when he besieged the rebellious Western Xia in China.
• He also joined Bill and Ted on their Excellent Adventure.
• The Mask of Fu Manchu involves the titular villain trying to obtain the sword and mask of Genghis Khan, hoping to reincarnate as Khan, unite the peoples of Asia , and make war on the white race . This makes little sense as most Asiatics (including the stereotypically-Chinese Fu Manchu) would regard a resurrected Khan as a foreign tyrant to be resisted and not rallied-around. If he were to be magically resurrected, the people who would follow him are Mongolian and Turkic peoples (some Hungarians might also, due to the Hungarian people having also been Steppe warriors back in the day). All of whom are Eurasian Steppe peoples who consider themselves culturally and historically apart from other Asians.
• Shiwan Khan, nemesis of The Shadow made the absurdly improbable claim that he was his last descendant, and felt that it was his duty as his heir to finish the Great Khan's mission of conquering the entire world.
• Genghis Khan is one of the 100 revived souls featured in Kamen Rider Ghost: The 100 Eyecons and Ghost’s Fateful Moment .
• A novel in the Assassin's Creed expanded universe, The Secret Crusade, has Altaïr ibn-La'Ahad's son, Darim, joining fellow Assassin Qulan Gal in hunting Ghengis since he's not only a Templar ally, but also has a Sword of Eden. Qulan is the one that shoots Ghengis's horse to make him fall and while the Khan boasts his empire will last forever, Darim executes him with a crossbow bolt.
• A trilogy of novels in the Forgotten Realms setting revolve around Yamun Khahan, a clear stand-in for Genghis Khan.
• The Conqueror trilogy ( Wolf of the Plains , Lords of the Bow and Bones of the Hills ) by British author Conn Iggulden follows the story of Genghis Khan from birth to death. Followed by other books about his successors.
• In the 14th century Genghis pops up in none other than The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer . "The Squire's Tale" deals with Genghis (rendered in Chaucer as "Cambyuskan") looking for a husband for his beautiful daughter.
• The Private Life Of Genghis Khan , a sketch by Douglas Adams and Graham Chapman , presents the man himself as a blood-thirsty warlord by day, paranoid neurotic by night.
• Steppe is set in a far-future society where reading is now obsolete and people are educated by watching historical recreations in the form of LARP games, namely the history of the Asian steppe culminating with Genghis.
• In the Star Trek: The Original Series episode "The Savage Curtain", a duplicate of Genghis Khan was created by the Excalbians as part of an experiment to better understand the concepts of "good" and "evil". (Clearly, the show's writers perceived him as evil; see Alternate Character Interpretation above.) Less forgiveably the writers perceived him as almost childishly barbaric. Whatever else he was, he wasn't stupid.
• Was pitted against Hannibal on an episode of Deadliest Warrior .
• A Noodle Incident in Doctor Who has the Doctor mention that his army tried and failed to break into the TARDIS at some point.
• He's a minor character in The Legend of the Condor Heroes (2008) , The Legend of the Condor Heroes (2017) , and the novel's other adaptations.
• He appears in Marco Polo in a flashback to Kublai Khan's childhood, using birds with lit ropes tied to their feet to burn down a Chinese city.
• Legends of Tomorrow : In Season 5, he's one of the souls that Astra resurrects out of Hell to sow chaos throughout history. Though in his case, he only resurrected after he was already in his tomb, so he had to spend a few centuries digging his way out, finally succeeding in the 1990s. He then makes his way to Hong Kong, which the British are preparing to hand over to the Chinese, where he proceeds to take over the local triads and hatches a scheme to kidnap the visiting Prince Charles.
• Genghis Khan's likeness is used in Kamen Rider X as the basis for the kaijin Genghis Khan Condor.
• The German disco band Dschinghis Khan was named for him, and they wrote a song of the same name about him too.
• Iron Maiden also named an instrumental track after him, appearing on their album Killers .
• Dan Carlin's Hardcore History covered the conquests of Genghis Khan, and his successors, in his Wrath of the Khans series.
• It was (in the earlier editions, at least) the Mongol invasions that created Khorne . Also, Khorne's first and most powerful Daemon Prince, Doombreed , is said to have been a bloodthirsty warlord , anterior to the public appearance of the God-Emperor . Among fans, Genghis is the favorite candidate, through he isn't the only one .
• The loyalist Primarch Jaghatai Khan also count as a stand-in for the guy .
• Mogul Kamir from the same franchise is basically Genghis Khan with a super-strong cyborg arm, a laser firing bionic eye, AND A ROBOTIC WARHORSE.
• The Great Kurgan, as described in Forgeworld's Tamurkhan: The Throne of Chaos supplement for Warhammer Fantasy Battle is basically his Chaos-worshiping, spiky daemonic super-human warrior equivalent. Tamurkhan himself is very loosely based on the later Turco-Mongolic warlord Tamerlane ...despite being a Body Surfing maggot.
• As with other Historical Domain Characters , Julius Carn from the World Heroes series is based on him..
• The usual leader of Mongolia in Civilization , and while aggressive, not as warlike as the Aztecs, Zulus or Huns. In Civilization V , he gets a combat bonus against City States, and a speed buff to all mounted units. The AI flavouring does take the City State attack bonus to heart, so you might not get along with him if you're allied with many city states. He's among the most loyal leaders if you get on his good side . In Civilization VI , he gives his cavalry units bonus combat strength and the ability to capture enemy cavalry units, even cavalry units exclusive to other civilizations.
• He has a campaign in Age of Empires II . He's also a Hero Unit , although it appears only at the first minutes of the first level and he isn't playable. However, he is the strongest Hero Unit, with 300 Health, 25 attack, 2/2 armor, 5 of range and he's a Horse Archer. There's a reason why the "Blood" type Multiplayer Scenarios has him as the last unit that you unlock. A glitch in early versions (long since patched out) could cause him to come under player control by accident, making the first level ridiculously easy.
• Koei made an entire series of strategy games centering around him. You can either choose to fight him or be him .
• Crusader Kings II : He shows up as a historical character, and as of The Old Gods DLC, he and the massive army he brings with him are playable. He is however referred to (marginally more accurately) as Temujin Khagan. The Horse Lords'' DLC gave him and other steppe nomads an unique form of "nomadic" government. It's also possible for a Mongol Player Character other than Temujin himself to declare themselves Genghis Khan.
• PAYDAY 2 : Part of the backstory of the eponymous jewel in the diamond heist. The trailer for the heist's release states that according to legend, the beginning of its travels was with the great Khans, and it holds the nickname (among others) of the "Eye of Temujin".
• Escape from Hell (1990) has Genghis Khan bored in Hell's reception area and eager to join your party.
• Ghost of Tsushima : Although Genghis Khan doesn't appear, as the game is set during the historical 1274 Mongol invasion of Japan, Big Bad Khotun Khan proclaims himself as the warlord's grandson and cousin of Kublai.
• Honor of Kings : Genghis Khan is one of the non-Chinese people to be included in the mostly Chinese roster as a marksman-type hero that rides on a beast and can lay traps on the battlefield to catch enemies off guard.
• The Chaos Timeline is an Alternate History based on the premise that Genghis dies early, before he can start his conquests. The world soon looks very different...
• Epic Rap Battles of History had him go up against the Easter Bunny. Needless to say, there was no contest.
• Not Genghis Khan per se, but the Mongol Empire as a whole is a Running Gag on Crash Course , where John Green will make a declarative statement, then follow it up with "unless you are the Mongols" ("We're the exception!")
• Fought Mahatma Gandhi on Celebrity Deathmatch , and lost, though only because their personalities had been accidentally swapped in a time-travel accident.
• He was a contender for the role of Part-Time Villain on Penn Zero: Part-Time Hero , but lost the role to Rippen due to his Evil Laugh .
• His clone is a recurring character in Clone High , but unlike his infamous clonefather, he's a dimwitted Gentle Giant .
• The third episode of Time Warp Trio , "You Can't, But Genghis Khan", has a surprisingly benevolent portrayal. The boys wind up in Mongolia due to the magic book accidentally homing in on a Mongolian Barbeque menu. There they meet and befriend a young Temüjin, nicknaming him "TJ", alongside his future wife, Börte. The pair help the trio in finding the magic book to get them back home, whilst the trio help them against some of "TJ's" early enemies after the death of his father.
• In Young Justice , the villain Vandal Savage has been known by many names and titles over the course of his 50,000-year life , among them Genghis Khan.
• He appears in the prologue of the Bob Morane episode "The Crown of Golconda". His name is typically mispronounced as it is in the west and he neither has the red hair or green eyes he actually had, but rather the stereotypical black hair and dark eyes. His alleged descendant Mr. Ming is the main antagonist of the series.
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Genghis Khan

Genghis Khan was regarded as one of the most vile tyrants in history well into the 23rd century, recalled in the same breath as Julius Caesar , Adolf Hitler , Ferris , and Maltuvis . [1] On Stardate 5906.4 , the Excalbian Yarnek created a simulacrum of Genghis Khan to represent the side of evil in a battle against good. [2]

Notes and References

• ↑ Roddenberry, Gene (Executive Producer). "What Are Little Girls Made Of?" . Star Trek , season 1, episode 7 (Production number 10). Directed by James Goldstone . Written by Robert Bloch . Desilu Productions . 20 October 1966 .
• ↑ Roddenberry, Gene ( Executive Producer / Story and Teleplay ) and Freiberger, Fred ( Producer ). "The Savage Curtain." Star Trek , Season 3, Episode 22. Directed by Herschel Daugherty . Teleplay by Arthur Heinemann . Paramount Pictures Corporation , 7 March 1969.
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Inside Secrets of the Making of Star Trek II: Wrath of Khan and "Space Seed"!

Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan towers over the history of movie space opera. But where did Star Trek's greatest villain come from, and how did the movie resurrect him? Sociology professors John and Maria Jose Tenuto have spent months researching the real-life history of Khan, and they shared tons of inside information with us. Plus never-before-seen behind-the-scenes photos!

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Khan Noonien Singh, of course, is the tyrannical genetically enhanced warlord who dominated half the globe during Star Trek 's version of the 1990s. He first appeared in an episode of the TV show, "Space Seed," and then rocked the 1982 movie Wrath of Khan , played both times by Ricardo Montalban.

The Tenutos, who are professors at the College of Lake County in Grayslake, IL, are long-time Star Trek fans. But they were visiting University of Iowa for another reason, and discovered that Wrath of Khan director Nicholas Meyer had donated his papers, including script drafts, memos and photographs, to the University's library. The Tenutos became obsessed with discovering the details of Wrath of Khan 's genesis, including stuff they hadn't found in the official "making of" book . And then, they decided to visit Los Angeles and look at Gene Roddenberry's papers at UCLA, and the CBS/Paramount archives for similar info about the episode "Space Seed," Khan's debut.

In looking at both Khan stories, the Tenutos were motivated by Meyer's dictum that creativity thrives with limitations — and they wanted to see how the limitations that both productions faced made them more creative. They're giving a talk tomorrow at 7 PM at the Vernon Hills Library in Vernon Hills, IL.

We spent about an hour on the phone with John Tenuto, and here's what we found out about both stories.

The photographs below were taken on the Wrath of Khan set, mostly by set photographer Bruce Birmelin, and are courtesy of The Papers of Nicholas Meyer Collection in the Special Collections Department at the University of Iowa Library.

The thing you have to realize about "Space Seed," says Tenuto, is it was being created very early in the run of Star Trek . When writer Carey Wilber pitched the story in September 1966, Star Trek had only been on the air for three weeks. Wilber only had a few episodes to go on, and the show's production team was still working out a lot of stuff as well.

For example, Spock is really really different in Wilber's original outline — he has much stronger psychic powers, and at one point when the rest of the Enterprise crew thinks Kirk is dead, Spock can sense telepathically that Kirk is alive. Spock also tries to use his mental powers to do a "Jedi mind meld" (so to speak) on Lt. Marla McGivers, the traitor on board the Enterprise. Also, the episode begins with Kirk and Spock playing chess, and Spock cheats at chess using the computer. And wins. Later, Spock confesses to McCoy that he feels ashamed for cheating.

Meanwhile, in Wilber's script draft, Kirk speaks in a very formal, militaristic fashion, and producers Gene Coon, Robert Justman and Roddenberry himself spend a lot of time in memos explaining to Wilber that Kirk speaks plainly, in a comfortable fashion. Also, Wilber includes Yeoman Janice Rand as a major character in his 18-page proposal.

The other thing that comes across in the memos that Coon, Justman and Roddenberry were writing was a concern about how Star Trek's future was going to be presented. For example, in Wilber's original script, we know that Marla McGivers is obsessed with the past because she knows about music. She starts singing a melody, and Lt. Uhura asks, "What are you doing?" Uhura doesn't know what music is, because there's no music in the future. Of course, the show already had scripts in the pipeline where Uhura herself sings. But on a larger note, the producers didn't want to depict a future that had no art or music, or culture, or awareness of history.

Yes, Khan was a Viking

You've probably heard before that Khan was originally a Viking-type character, with blond hair. But the original villain of "Space Seed" wasn't genetically enhanced, nor had he ruled any part of the Earth.

In Wilber's original proposal, the Botany Bay contains a criminal named Harold Erickson, who's a blond, Aryan character. "He wasn't even a criminal with an empire, just a criminal," says Tenuto. He wasn't stronger than Kirk or particularly intelligent, and his power came purely from raw brutality and anger. Erickson's plan is to defrost his gang, take over the Enterprise, and become space pirates.

In Wilber's scenario, the overpopulated Earth decided to get rid of some of its criminals by putting them into suspended animation and shooting them into space for a 1,500-year round trip. But it's 500 years later, and the Botany Bay has broken down. (At this point, nobody had nailed down how far in the future Star Trek takes place, and 500 years seemed a reasonable figure.)

Of course, there's a logical flaw in this plan: Why waste the immense resources needed to freeze criminals cryogenically and shoot them into space? It makes no sense — in fact, in the final episode script, Kirk asks if the people on the Botany Bay might be criminals, and Spock carefully points out this logical flaw in that idea.

In keeping with the "space pirate" idea, Erickson actually keelhauls Kirk in Erickson's script draft — he puts Kirk in a spacesuit and tosses him out of the ship with a tiny air supply. (This is when Spock realizes Kirk's alive using his psychic powers.) Marla McGivers gives Kirk a thruster, which lets him return to the Enterprise. But the producers carefully explained to Wilber that you can't have people in space, for cost reasons. (Roddenberry wrote to Wilber: "You may ask yourself how we do a science fiction show with no special effects. We do it with a lot of trickery.")

How Khan became Khan

Gene Coon, the guy who gave us the Klingons, started writing a lot of memos, 6 or 7 pages long, pushing the idea that Erickson could be Kirk's equal, not just a thug. This episode could have someone who actually challenges Kirk in a significant way. And because he comes from the past, he could be allowed to violate the norms of Starfleet. "They seem to recognize that Khan could be Kirk's Joker or Lex Luthor," says Tenuto.

Instead of just a criminal, why not make Harold Erickson a criminal who controlled much of the world in the 1990s? Like a super underworld boss? Coon wrote his own script draft in December — but it's Roddenberry's last-minute midnight script polish that fixes a lot of the problems and creates the "Space Seed" we know and love.

"As very late as early December [1966], you're still having drafts where he's this Viking-like guy," says Tenuto. In Coon's script, the character goes by John Erickson, but then reveals his true name to be Ragnar Thorwald. Coon's rewrites start to introduce the idea that this villain is genetically enhanced, and was the leader of the "first world tyranny."

So how did the character's name change? From his interviews and the paperwork, Tenuto learned that the casting of Ricardo Montalban caused the name change. "Montalban's casting really altered the character in terms of who he became," says Tenuto. Also, "once they knew that Montalban was taking the role, you can see a shift in the dialogue [in the scripts] to become more romantic."

Casting director Joseph D'Agosta cast the best actor for the role, instead of just finding someone who fit the blond Aryan image — and the character improved as a result, says Tenuto.

Once Montalban was lined up, they decided the character would be named Sabahl Khan Noonien, which is the name he still has in James Blish's book adaptation. Why the name Noonien? Gene Roddenberry had a Chinese friend in the 1940s, named Noonien Wang, whom he'd lost touch with. He hoped that one day this episode would air in China, and Wang would see "Noonien" and Roddenberry's name, and get in touch. Roddenberry was still trying to reach his friend in the late 1980s, which is why Data's creator is Noonien Soong.

NBC's research company suggested changing the character name to Govin Bahadur Singh, because the name "Khan" had implications about the character's Sikh ethnicity. But Roddenberry wanted both Khan and Noonien in the name.

The final script draft is covered with scribbles, in Roddenberry's handwriting, as he makes last-minute changes. Here and there, the name "Erickson" is crossed out, and the name "Khan" is written in pencil — because they forgot to change it in some places.

The Wrath of Khan

You might already know that Wrath of Khan was planned as a TV movie, produced by Paramount's television department. When William Shatner signed up to star, that's what he was signing up for. But when the studio started to look at what they had, and the good ideas that were in the mix, they started to think maybe this could be another big-screen movie, says Tenuto.

So here are the versions that the story went through on its way to Meyer's final rewrite:

• Star Trek II: The War of the Generations , proposal by Harve Bennett

Kirk learns that there's a rebellion on a Federation colony, and goes to rescue Carol Marcus and their son David — except that David is the leader of the rebellion. And then they discover the rebellion is actually fomented by Khan, who's manipulating everything behind the scenes. This version has no Spock, because Nimoy wasn't on board.

• Star Trek II: The Omega System , script by Jack B. Sowards

The "Omega System" is a Federation weapon of mass destruction, which Khan gets control over. In this version, Marla McGivers is alive. Carol Marcus is replaced by Janet Wallace, from the episode "The Deadly Years. " Saavik is a man, and basically replaces Spock. Khan has mental powers. The Reliant is a Constitution-class ship, meaning the Enterprise is facing an identical-looking starship. Art director Michael Minor was the one who read this script and said the Federation should not be developing a WMD. That's where the idea of the Genesis Device, which has a benign aim, comes from.

• Untitled Script by Samuel A. Peeples (writer of "Where No Man Has Gone Before")

Khan isn't in this script. Saavik is a woman. Instead of Chekov going down to the Ceti Alpha with Terrell, it's Chekov and Sulu. Instead of finding Khan, they find two superpowered aliens, a man and a woman, who act very much like villains from a Star Trek: TOS episode.

Meyer took all of these drafts and ideas and combined them into a script which he called Star Trek: The Undiscovered Country — but Paramount execs rejected that name because they didn't get it, says Tenuto. So they went with Vengeance of Khan — except that Lucasfilm requested they change that title because it was too similar to their upcoming Star Wars: Revenge of the Jedi . Hence the "Wrath" title, which Meyer thought sounded weird.

One thing that shows through in Meyer's notes and memos is his willingness to turn around script rewrites quickly. If an actor wasn't happy with the script, Meyer would offer to turn around a new draft for them before they had to leave town — in a few days, in other words. That way, the actor could read the revised script on the plane.

Unfortunately, nobody had asked Montalban if he was willing to be in this film, even though they'd been writing Khan into their scripts for a year or two. Tenuto says when they finally approached Montalban, he wasn't sure if he could return to the role of Khan after so many years — especially after he'd been playing Mr. Roarke on Fantasy Island for so long.

Meyer's earlier drafts have some pretty interesting differences from the final version. Like, in Meyer's draft, Khan and Kirk meet in person, and have a swordfight. Khan wins, and leaves Kirk wounded and bloody, which is when Khan gives the "I shall leave you as you left her" speech. The swordfight sequence was dropped for cost and time reasons, which means Kirk and Khan never meet in the final movie.

There's also the famous mystery of the Khan Baby — fans have seen set photos showing a baby in Khan's outfit, crawling around near the Genesis device. In a nutshell, Meyer and the producers reasoned that Khan's group would have been procreating during their time on Ceti Alpha — so in the early draft, when Chekov and Terrell find the Botany Bay, the first thing they find is a baby, unattended, in a crib. Later, that same baby is crawling around as Khan prepares to launch the Genesis Device, killing it along with everyone else.

Sowards' script includes the death of Spock — but he dies very early in the movie, sort of like Janet Leigh in Psycho . And in fact, the fans got wind that Spock was going to be killed off, which is why Meyer "kills" him in the first five minutes of the movie, as a fake-out. Nimoy was unsure about returning to the role, but decided to come back to give Spock a dignified send-off.

These set photos are a treasure trove, and they show stuff like sand being brought into an empty soundstage to create Ceti Alpha (see photo above), and the immense detail that went into Kirk's fireplace, which you only see for a few seconds on screen.

All photos courtesy of The Papers of Nicholas Meyer Collection in the Special Collections Department at the University of Iowa Library

Ricardo Montalban and Nicholas Meyer.

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• 12th century births
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• Ancient Humans

Genghis Khan

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Genghis Khan (ca. 1162 – August 1227) was a Human Mongol dictator of the 12th and 13th centuries .

In 2151 , upon learning of the power of the Malkus Artifacts , Captain Jonathan Archer wondered what the tyrants of human history, including Genghis Khan, would have done with such a device. ( ENT - The Brave and the Bold, Book One short story : " Prelude: Discovery ")

James T. Kirk mentioned Genghis Khan to Roger Korby in 2266 , after Korby implied human programming leading to near-practical immortality as the major impact of transferring the human consciousness into an android body. ( TOS episode : " What Are Little Girls Made Of? ")

In 2269 , an image of Genghis Khan was created by the Excalbians in a plot devised to better understand the concepts of "good" and "evil". ( TOS episode : " The Savage Curtain ")

External links [ ]

• Genghis Khan article at Memory Alpha , the wiki for canon Star Trek .
• Genghis Khan article at Wikipedia , the free encyclopedia.

Genghis Khan (Excalbian)

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After Kirk killed Green, Khan and the others retreated. Upon viewing this, Yarnek , the Excalbian representative, observed that " The others have run off. It would seem that evil retreats when forcibly confronted. " ( TOS : " The Savage Curtain ")

External link [ ]

• Genghis Khan at Memory Beta , the wiki for licensed Star Trek works