Movies - TV
Star Trek III Scuttled Plans For A Full-Blown Khan Spinoff
By DEVIN MEENAN
For Star Trek audiences, Khan went from a villain of the week to the greatest of all thanks to his reappearance in the film "Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan."
Before "The Wrath of Khan," however, "Star Trek: The Motion Picture" was underwhelmed. Paramount hesitated about a sequel, and Leonard Nimoy didn't want to return as Spock.
According to the "Star Trek" oral history book "The Fifty-Year Mission" by Edward Gross and Mark Altman, there were plans to take the franchise in a different direction.
The writers wanted to do a prequel spin-off chronicling Khan's life between his debut in the "Star Trek" episode "Space Seed") and his return in "The Wrath of Khan."
In "Space Seed," Khan was exiled to Ceti Alpha V, a lush but untamed planet that turns into hell. Khan lived there for 15 years before hijacking the USS Reliant Starfleet vessel.
A spin-off titled "Star Trek: Prison Planet" was written about those 15 years Khan would have spent on the planet, but it was dropped when Paramount prioritized "Star Trek III."