• Flying SquidM
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    278 months ago

    Yep.

    Joachim : We’re all with you, sir. But, consider this. We are free. We have a ship, and the means to go where we will. We have escaped permanent exile on Ceti Alpha V. You have defeated the plans of Admiral Kirk. You do not need to defeat him again.

    Khan : He tasks me. He tasks me and I shall have him! I’ll chase him 'round the moons of Nibia and 'round the Antares Maelstrom and 'round perdition’s flames before I give him up!

    His obsession with Kirk was his own downfall. It’s actually an interesting parallel with Spock’s sacrifice. Spock sacrificed his life because he believed that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one. Khan sacrificed his people and then his own life because he believed his own needs outweighed the needs of his people.

    • @RustyEarthfire
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      238 months ago

      At the risk of stating the well-known, Khan’s line references Moby Dick:

      He tasks me; he heaps me; I see in him outrageous strength, with an inscrutable malice sinewing it.

      and:

      Aye, aye! and I’ll chase him round Good Hope, and round the Horn, and round the Norway Maelstrom, and round perdition’s flames before I give him up.

        • gregorum
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          68 months ago

          when Chekov is in the Botany Bay cargo carriers/shelters and looks at the bookshelf, there’s a very conspicuously-placed copy of Moby Dick sitting there.

        • @uid0gid0
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          8 months ago

          As Kahn is activating the Genesis device he directly quotes Ahab from chapter 135, starting with “to the last…”

          Towards thee I roll, thou all-destroying but unconquering whale; to the last I grapple with thee; from hell’s heart I stab at thee; for hate’s sake I spit my last breath at thee.

          • @weariedfae
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            18 months ago

            Reading the text of Moby Dick? Okay, cool.

            Hearing it performed by Ricardo Montalban? Some of the best goddamn poetic prose ever.

      • Flying SquidM
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        58 months ago

        Exactly. Kirk is his white whale and his obsession with killing him ends up being his death.

        • Captain Aggravated
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          28 months ago

          Kahn read Moby Dick, was in the habit of quoting it, completely missed the point of the book.

          I’m laughing at the ‘superior intellect.’

          • Flying SquidM
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            18 months ago

            Hey man, tell it to Spock. He’s the one who called Khan “quite intelligent,” which is not exactly something he’d say about most of his fellow crew.

            Of course, Khan then proved himself to be a complete idiot afterward, so maybe it’s just that Spock is a poor judge of these things. Maybe McCoy was the genius all along.