Awesome / Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan

• Enterprise clearing the spacedock. While a blatant reuse of the visual effects from the first movie, with the addition of James Horner's Awesome Music, aptly titled as "Enterprise Clears All Moorings" to mark Star Trek's naval roots, it turned an awesome scene to a doubly awesome one, when it feels like the Enterprise herself is saying "I'm back". Compare the scene from the first movie to this.
• A small one, but give Chekov credit for his balls of steel. When he and Terrell first meet Khan, Chekov openly sneers at Khan, dismissing him as "a criminal," and a liar even when it's obvious that Khan could kill them both, or snap his fingers and have his mooks kill them. Even after he realizes how obsessed Khan has grown, and how much Khan hates Kirk, Chekov still gives Khan a Shut Up, Hannibal!, basically saying to Khan, "You're the one responsible for the fix you're in, asshole." It's only when Khan reveals the Ceti eels that Chekov starts to panic (and who can blame him).
  • When one thinks about it, Chekov has quite a few awesome moments. Even when Khan gets ready to Mind Rape Chekov and Terrell with the eels, Chekov doesn't spill the beans about Genesis; he tries to reason with Khan. Then when ordered to kill Kirk, Chekov can't go through with it and he ends up rejecting the eel's influence, causing so much self-pain that he knocks himself out cold. And immediately beforehand, Terrell - who doesn't know Kirk and has no loyalty to him - knows he won't be able to resist Khan's influence for long, so he turns the gun on himself rather than commit cold-blooded murder. Really, Khan underestimated everyone at Starfleet. Finally, after he's been treated, Chekov goes straight to the bridge and asks Kirk if he can help out. Kirk's reply: "Man the weapons console, Mr. Chekov." And it is Chekov who fires the three shots that kick the crap out of both the Reliant and Khan (see below).
  • Notably, once Chekov mans the weapons console, the Enterprise has her full crew on board for the first time in a long while. They're well-nigh unbeatable now.
• Midshipman Peter Preston, Scotty's nephew, had two awesome moments: First, as Kirk is inspecting Engineering, he tells him "If the Admiral can't see the facts for himself, then, With All Due Respect, he's as blind as a Tiberian bat!", which impresses him. Later, during Khan's first attack, causing severe damage directly to the Engineering section, Peter's fellow cadets are panicking, but he manages to rescue a fallen engineer from being trapped behind the emergency door. Sadly, he dies from injuries later.
  Scotty: He stayed at his post when the trainees ran.
  • The novelization states clearly that Peter's act of staying at his post and monitoring the systems probably saved the ship. Without this timely act, the ship would've lost virtually all power, and therefore would've had nothing that could've forced Reliant to retreat.
• The initial attack of the Reliant on the Enterprise. The cuts back and forth as Khan has them lock on, Kirk realizing too late what is about to happen and the phasers cutting in, causing massive damage. The reaction of Khan is fantastic as he finally gets to live out what he's been dreaming of for so long.
  • When Khan first appears on the Enterprise screen, he's wearing the most shit-eating smirk you can imagine. Kirk's reaction is nothing but stunned disbelief as he stands, taking a moment to realize it's Khan and can't believe this guy has come back to haunt him.
• Kirk and company strike back with one prefix code, a few wits, and their knowledge of "how things work on a starship" just when Khan thought victory and revenge were firmly in his gloating grasp.
  Kirk: (quietly) Mr. Sulu, lock phasers. Fire on my command.
  Sulu: (equally so) Phasers locked.
  Khan: Time's up, Admiral.
  Kirk: Here it comes. Now, Mr. Spock.
  • Starfleet's computer technicians deserve some credit for thinking to put in a back door to their systems, just in case it was needed.^note It was designed for accessing and getting control of derelict ships, but it still worked perfectly for the situation.
  • Hell, just Kirk's order of giving fire. Unlike Khan going full on Large Ham while ordering the attack, Kirk just calmly and cold-bloodedly deals them out, reminding everyone that when it comes to it, Kirk is more than capable of being cool and professional.
• Kirk and company are trapped in the middle of an asteroid, and the Enterprise is presumably too far away to rescue them. Then he pulls out his communicator and requests that Spock beam them aboard. As everyone looks at him, completely stunned, he just smirks: "I don't like to lose."
  • All of this immediately after explaining that he beat the Kobayashi Maru test by hacking it. Whipping out his comm and summoning the Enterprise only justifies his point. Kirk will play your game, but ultimately he plays by his rules.
    Kirk: I don't believe in the no-win scenario.
  • Minor bit, but McCoy is the only one who doesn't look stunned; he smirks. You can read his expression as clearly saying "That's the Jim Kirk I remember." He's spent the better part of the movie worried for Kirk's mental wellbeing, and even though they're still in dire straits, he's obviously pleased that Kirk has taken hold of the reins again.
• Khan's Dying Declaration of Hate, triggering the famous Kirk scream:
  Khan: I've done far worse than kill you. I've hurt you. And I wish to go on hurting you. I shall leave you as you left me, as you left her; marooned for all eternity in the center of a dead planet, buried alive. (Jump Cut to Kirk's communicator) Buried alive...
  Kirk: (shaking with rage) KHAAAAAAAN! KHAAAAAAAAAAN!
  • Kirk's reaction is also awesome on a rewatch, because he's playing things up; the situation is far less lopsided than Khan's been led to believe.
  • And again, in the Moby-Dick dialogue: "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..."
  • "Ah, Kirk, my old friend. Do you know the Klingon proverb that tells us revenge is a dish best served cold? It is very cold... in space."
  • "He TASKS me! He tasks me, and I shall HAVE him. I'll chase him around the moons of Nibia and around the Antares Maelstrom and ROUND PERDITION'S FLAMES before I give him up!" Hell, pretty much anything that Khan says.
• Enterprise herself gets one during her crew's Battlestations montage. And she was pretty dinged up, no less!
  • Then as they head toward the Mutara Nebula, Spock notices Reliant slowing down. Kirk immediately knows exactly what to say to press Khan's Berserk Button:
    "Khan, this is Admiral Kirk. We tried it once your way, Khan, are you game for a rematch? Khan... I'm laughing at the 'superior intellect'."
• The whole Battle of the Mutara Nebula, from Enterprise's desperate run into the nebula (with awesome Scenery Porn), to the battle itself, and to Enterprise's painfully slow escape from the Genesis Effect, complete with James Horner's perfect Orchestral Bombing. All that positive adrenaline is then quickly made tainted for you for good measure.
  • Special mention must go to the Enterprise slowly rising up behind the unaware Reliant, a scene in which everyone in theaters cheered at. First she torpedoes Reliant's own launcher, leaving a husk behind—then she directly phasers Reliant's left nacelle, just short of making it completely explode. Then she fires another torpedo straight at the pylon, severing the damaged nacelle and sending backlash throughout the rest of Reliant, effectively crippling the whole ship. ^note  At this point, the level of debris and simple destruction shown simply hadn't been seen in ST before, and it's glorious.
  • Kirk giving the order to fire on the Reliant. It's a brief scene, only a word long, and he's reveling in the upset he's about to deliver to Khan.
  • Finally, after knocking the crap out of the Reliant, Kirk tells Uhura, "Send to commander Reliant: surrender and prepare to be boarded." It's the ultimate insult: Kirk won't even call Khan by his name or speak to him directly, not to mention the fact that after everything he's done, he made the choice not to kill him. Unfortunately, Khan has one last trick up his sleeve...
    • The fact that after everything, Kirk is still willing to bring Khan in alive to stand trial for his actions.
• Let's just say it. Spock's Heroic Sacrifice, even knowing how it ends. Roger Ebert says it best: "He makes a choice in Star Trek II that would be made only by a hero, a fool, or a Vulcan." You get a quick shot of his face before he gets up, and you see him make the decision with no fear, no self-pity, only sheer deduction and dedication to his captain and crew. He just calmly walks into a compartment flooded with lethal radiation and tugs open the stream to fix it. Bad. Ass.
  • And once it's done, his first concern is to make sure it was worth something, then to comfort his best friend as he dies, showing no pain or fear except for breathless, halting speech. Nobody has ever faced danger with such inimitable dignity.
  • With hindsight possibly the greatest and most subtle Sequel Hook ever: "I'm sorry, Doctor, I have no time to explain this logically." (cue the mind meld) "Remember."
• Sulu gets a quiet moment when Enterprise is trying to escape before the Genesis Torpedo goes off. When the crew notes how much time they have, and how far they are from Reliant, Sulu calmly says, "Not going to make it, are we." No real fear; he doesn't like the idea of dying this way, but he can take it. Sulu, and by extension the rest of the crew (including the cadets), would certainly Face Death with Dignity if Spock hadn't decided to sacrifice himself.
• At the absolute last moment:
  Technician: Sir, the mains are back online.
  Kirk: Bless you, Scotty. Go Sulu!
  (in a heartbeat, the Enterprise warps away from Reliant, mere seconds before the Genesis Device detonates)

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