After hitting several pre-production bumps, the third, currently-untitled Star Trek reboot movie appears to be ready to go!
Paramount has just announced that they have hired a new replacement director, and finally slotted in a release date for the new Star Trek offering. The movie will be directed by Fast and Furious director, Justin Lin, who was on a short list of directors being considered to replace previous director, Roberto Orci, formerly the rebooted series’ co-writer, who bowed out of helming for reasons unknown, though will stay on the project as writer and producer.
The third Star Trek, or thirteenth if you’re still counting from the movies of the old canon, will officially come to theatres on July 8th, 2016 as well. This is a few months ahead of the original show’s premiere date, though it did premiere on the 8th of a month, in September of 1966.
As speculated, the movie is being groomed to coincide with the franchise’s 50th anniversary in 2016. It’s presumed that the lead reboot cast, which includes Chris Pine as Captain James T. Kirk, Zachary Quinto as Spock, Karl Urban as Doctor Hank “Bones” McCoy, John Cho as Hikaru Sulu, Simon Pegg as Scotty, and Zoe Saldana as Njota Uhura, will all return for this new movie. Currently, no plot details are known, including where it may be set, or whether a new or classic villain will be used, as the reboot series has done both at this point. Apparently, according to Roberto Orci shooting down a rumour, the movie’s story will however not feature any element of time travel, a recurring plot hook throughout the Star Trek franchise, and one of the main plot elements of the original 2009 reboot movie.
The first two movies in the rebooted Star Trek movie series were directed by J.J. Abrams, who also helped produce the series through his Bad Robot Productions outfit. Now however, Disney has wooed away Abrams to direct next year’s seventh movie in the Star Wars series, Star Wars: The Force Awakens, which was the first of several production setbacks for the third Star Trek reboot movie.
Fortunately, at least one stroke of good luck was had, as Marvel previously held the July 8th, 2016 release date that the new Star Trek movie has snatched up for itself. Marvel originally planned to release a movie debuting their latest Marvel Cinematic Universe hero on that date, Doctor Strange. though was forced to delay the film to November 4th, 2016 in order to cast Benedict Cumberbatch in the title role. The new date allows Cumberbatch to complete his obligations to 2016’s fourth series of Sherlock in the title role, without interfering with his new (likely multi-film) contract with Marvel for Doctor Strange. Ironically, Benedict Cumberbatch was also featured in the rebooted Star Trek movie series, portraying main villain, John Harrison, later revealed to be classic Star Trek villain, Khan Noonen Singh, in 2013’s previous movie, Star Trek into Darkness.
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