Harry Kim is Chinese?

Television, Movies Games and Books Star Trek
#1

Harry Kim is “Chinese”? I know the actor is. Garret Wang’s family is from Taiwan, and he thinks of himself as Chinese American, but according to himself, he only found out that Kim is Chinese after Voyager ended.

Apparently, Garret Wang assumed that Harry Kim is Korean American like… i think every trek fan out there, and he played it as such. But the writers always planned for Kim to be Chinese, and always wrote lines like “there’s a ancient Chinese proverb” for Harry to say to Paris.

I remember Kim saying stuff like that and thought it was random, but I do know some Koreans (school in South Korea) that have a pretty good understanding of Chinese literature because it was part of their high school curriculum, so i thought that’s what was going on.

Kim (Gold) is a Chinese and Korean last name, though now Mandarin Chinese generally would spell it as Jin, Cantonese would spell it as Gam. Holo immigrants is the only group that would spell it as Kim, and there are far more Koreans (if only proportionally) with that last name.

And if you name an Asian character Harry Kim without ever explaining he is Chinese, wouldn’t everyone just assume he is Korean?

So Janeway’s ancestor was from Indiana. Torres was half hispanic and half Klingon. Chakotay was Native Americans that moved to the de-militarized zone. Tuvok is Vulcan. Neelix is a Talaxian born on Rinax. Kes is Ocampan. 7 was named Annika Hansen and born in Tendara colony. Tom Paris is i guess just American.

We know so much about each crew member’s past. Yet Kim never made mention of him being Chinese on the show?

Sadly according to revived Korean romanization, Koreans are supposed to spell Kim as Gim…

#2

Unfortunately, that’s just another example of all Asians being interchangeable in American entertainment. John Cho plays Sulu in the new Star Trek movie, Daniel Dae-Kim and Grace Park are of Chinese descent on Hawaii Five-O, James Kyson-Lee was Japanese on Heroes, etc. :frowning:

#3

And Simon Pegg plays a Scottsman even though he’s from England, and I’m pretty sure the dude who plays Spock isn’t even a real Vulcan!

:wink:

Gotta say, I’m not sure why this is a big deal. It seems like we’ve evolved into a culture with seriously conflicting biases: “Actor X cannot play that character because he/she is from country Y!” doesn’t seem compatible with “We are all human, we must look beyond racial bias!”.

#4

hey all,

here’s a (non-exhaustive) list of actors who are Chinese-mixed (like me, heheh :smiley: )… in case you didn’t know…

Others

Also, the Manchu imperial family that ruled the Qing dynasty also had their surname Sinicized to that same character “Jin” (Gold). I gather there’s lot of "Jin"s in Heilongjiang…

Jin (Gold) is also pronounced as “Kim” in the Hokkien dialect.

#5

i have no problem with actors playing outside of who they are, i have a problem with the writers not fleshing out Kim. We know the back stroies of the entire crew, except Kim. To the point we don’t even know that he was not Korean.

I mean if the writers picked Kim as the last name of a Chinese dude, you think they thought it through because it’s not easy to land on that decision. most writers probably wouldn’t make up a french character named Arnold Schwarzenegger. If they decided to do that, they’d give him a back ground story to explain, even if the story in 400 year into the future.

Take Jean-luc for example. I am fine with a english actor playing a french character. I am fine with the character being a Frenchmen speaking with perfect English accent. But at least he was French, not English or German. If the writers did decide they want to have a Englishmen named Jean-luc Picard, I am sure there’d be episodes devoted to explain how that came about.

But not when it comes to Ensign Kim. even the actor didn’t know he was supposed to be playing a Chinese character, that kind of blows.

#6

What? We’re doing that to Korean now?

That’s a curious one. I can see them leaving it open as to whether he’s Chinese vs. Chinese-American (or whatever) but ‘Kim’ is an odd choice, especially for an American audience.

#7

Is there a link to an article or video of Garrett Wang talking about this? I can’t find any references and I’d like to learn more.

#8

There’s a lot of Jin in Heilongjiang because it has largest ethic manchurian and korean groups in China.

Though Jin in Manchurian was Aisin, which is a Tungustic root word for gold. And further connected to the Turkic root for gold, altin, which also forms the word Altaic, and Tungustic languages is a branch of Altaic. All the Turkic/Altaic people that traveled across the steps likes to name themselves after gold. Such as the golden horde (Altan Ord).

My favorite half Asian actor is… Dean Cain. That is a solid dude. He’s superman for me. He is half Japanese, last name Tanaka, changed it because his mom remarried.

#9

Interesting stuff, hansioux! So many people want to box this up to make it easy fodder for whatever political argument they want to have, but you’re really getting at the interesting parts: What affect did the whole concept have on the writer’s room, and what affect might the confusion among writers, actor, and directors have on the direction of Kim’s character?

Harry was an important part of the Voyager ensemble. Sure, he was great fodder for never-gets-the-girl jokes and such. But pick almost any significant plot throughout the series and there’s Kim right in the middle of it, doing something key to the episode’s outcome.

I’m not dissatisfied with the way it turned out, but I’d have loved to see more development of Kim’s past. Near the end of the series we started to get some, including even a few Kim-centric episodes. I wonder how much different they’d have been if everyone was on the same page re: his nationality?

He played Kim as a very driven character, someone pushed by his parents to excel in his career. That’s a bit of the stereotype for Koreans here, and not entirely unsupported by popular example. (I remember Margaret Cho talking about her home life in that way.) Is the Chinese environment similar?

#10

clips from 2009 Dragon Con

//youtu.be/-3AtY0w8gWg

it is around 1:10

i rewatched the whole thing and realized it’s right in part one…

#11

Here is more about Garret-
http://www.modamag.com/garrettwanginterview.htm

This among the creme-ala-creme! I loved listening to this interview when the podcast first came out, lottsa good stuff here…

http://geekson.com/archives/archiveepisodes/2006/episode111406.htm

He sounds like someone you could really approach and have a good discussion with, and I loved the behind the scene politics he discusses.

Hope you like it.:slight_smile:

What the Hell I will throw this one in for free-
http://geekson.com/archives/archiveepisodes/2006/episode111406.htm

If I am correct, this is the interview with Joss during the writers strike and the creation of his ‘Dr Horrible’ series. Good stuff!

#12

It’s probably not a big deal in most cases if the character is Korean or Chinese, especially for a show set in the future. However, if it was never in spelled out what his nationality was, I think that shows how underdeveloped the character was. Not only wasn’t it ever established on screen, even the writers hadn’t decided or agreed upon it, which is pretty bad.

#13

OR, possible positive interpretation: Maybe the fact that nobody saw a need to make a point about this is actually a super good thing; The implication being that by the 24th century, we’ve embraced our humanity without needing to import baggage. In the 1800s, someone from one town might strongly identify with that as their identity as opposed to someone from another town 10 miles away because they spend their entire lives within walking distance of where they were born. By 2010, people identify themselves on a national basis and, in some cases, state. By 2350 or whatever, maybe it just doesn’t matter what country your ancestors came from in the same way that I don’t care if the people I work with live in Springfield,OR or Corvallis,OR. It’s just not a big deal, and hardly conversation-worthy.

#14

That may well be. Takei had a hand in that with making his character identify with French musketeers rather than more obvious choices. Still, the frakin’ writers should at least have an idea of where the character is from. It’s pretty basic background stuff.

I suspect they just had him as ‘undifferentiated asian’ so they could slot him into a given nationality if it seemed appropriate for a future story. (This happens with white actors all the time.) But that’s what makes the ‘Kim’ surname such a curious choice. If there’s one Asian name that most Americans will link to a specific country(ies) it’s that one. C.f., Rodenberry’s choice of ‘Sulu.’

#15

Philippines?

#16

I think what some people are getting at is that in the case of a character like Kirk, we all know he’s from Iowa. We know that definitely from the movies in the 80s and 90s, and probably from the 60s. Similar for other main ToS Trek characters. You can make similar argument for Enterprise.

But, it seems in the TNG era, the writers did not focus so much on that piece of character development. I do not remember off hand, for example, where Geordi is from (although it may have been mentioned, it was not focused as much on). I do remember Tasha Yar having a tough childhood though. So, TNG era writers prolly did not think nationality or accurate ethnicity as important.

Is that good or bad? That’s prolly a matter of personal interpretation. But, for an actor to go through an entire run of a series thinking his character is one ethnicity, only to find out after the fact that the character is another shows a lack of communication between the writers and actors at least.

Garret Wang’s reaction sorta reminds me of this scene from See No Evil, Hear No Evil where Pryor plays a blind man.

//youtu.be/IK1Pjgix79k

I get a laugh thinking of Geordi pulling a similar scene. d:

#17

After the Sulu Sea. The point I was making is that it’s not a common name.

#18

Right, you mentioned people associating it with a specific country, so I picked the country I associate with the name Sulu because it abuts that sea.

#19

OK, he might have been too clever by half there.

Hrm. Now I’m wondering if there’s a surname that’s considered specific to an anglospheric country (that’s not specifically tied to one person, e.g. Churchill or Dundee.)

#20

i dunno, the last name Johnson for me always immediately associates with America. Not because of its slang meanings. Just because there seems to be a lot of Johnsons…