Kahn Souphanousinphone

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Kohng Koy Kahn Souphanousinphone, is a fictional character and the evil neighbor antagonist on the animated series King of the Hill.^[2] He and his wife Minh and daughter Connie live next door to the Hills. Kahn works in the Information Technology industry as a system analyst. An immigrant from Luang Prabang, Laos, Kahn represents the new American trying to assimilate into the melting pot of Arlen, Texas.

Like many immigrants, Kahn is preoccupied with achieving "the American dream". In his case, this means succeeding financially, having his daughter excel academically, and keeping up with the Joneses (or the Hills, as the case may be). Kahn brags about his material possessions and puts down his neighbors, calling them names like "hillbilly" and "redneck". He also has an affinity for '80s pop music, and is prone to behavior associated with upscale white-collar suburbanites, such as shopping at Williams-Sonoma and drinking Ketel One. Kahn idolizes Ted Wassanasong, another Laotian-American, who is more affluent than Kahn. However, Kahn does not realize that Ted, and presumably most of the local Asian community, dislikes him; he has forbidden his daughter to date Bobby Hill, with Kahn's preference being that Connie date Ted Wassanasong's son Chane. Kahn's favoritism toward Chane is evident in the episode Bobby Goes Nuts, when both Chane and Bobby crash a slumber party at the Souphanousinphone's house. When Kahn finds both of them in Connie's room he forces Bobby to leave through the window while Chane is allowed to leave through the front door; he later declares Bobby's kicking of Chane in his crotch "unforgivable" (although he admits he's conflicted because Bobby did the same thing to Hank, much to Kahn's delight). Kahn's greatest fear is that his daughter might someday marry Bobby, who embodies everything Kahn dislikes about white Americans. However, it is worth noting that in the season 2 episode "The Son That Got Away", Kahn mentions to Hank that "Bobby's not a bad kid" and that it's "the Gribble kid that worries him" when he and Hank get lost in "The Caves", a popular teen make-out spot that Bobby, Joseph, and Connie have gone off to.

Kahn quietly respects Hank (whose names are, incidentally, anagrams of each other), being particularly aware that Hank is in many ways his equal. Although Kahn frequently disparages Hank's blue-collar tastes and avoids socializing with him, Kahn has admitted that Hank is his best friend. When a thuggish neighbor moved into their neighborhood, Hank formed an alliance with Kahn to drive him out. In another episode when Dale, Hank and Kahn go to Mexico for vacation and must illegally return to the US by jumping the border fence, Kahn risks his status in America to help Hank over safely.

Kahn is a non-practicing Buddhist. He also gets very irritated when people ask him if he is "Chinese or Japanese", and was forced to constantly remind Hank and the rest of his neighbors (save Cotton Hill, who knew Kahn was Laotian by sight) about his Laotian heritage when he first moved into the neighborhood. A sympathetic view of Kahn came about when Minh's retired Army General father visited them and was as cruel and insulting towards Kahn as Kahn usually is towards his neighbors. Minh and Hank combined to lift Kahn's spirits and eventually convinced the General to mute his unbending feelings of contempt for Kahn.

In one episode, while Hank and Peggy are talking about the anonymity of the Internet, Peggy briefly alludes to Kahn having bipolar disorder. This may explain Kahn's more harsh nature.

In the last episode, "To Sirloin With Love," Kahn is shown closing Connie's book and telling her to take the night off, showing that perhaps he has learned to not be such a harsh father.

References

1. ^ Three Days of the Khando
2. ^ The relevant material from the cited page describes the character as an "antagonistic neighbour". See Suzanne Buchan, David Surman, and Paul Ward Animated "Worlds" (J. Libbey Publishing, 2006), 97.