The saga of bringing the third story of the modern day crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise to theaters has been an epic voyage and it looks to get even more interesting as time runs out on the production. Director J.J. Abrams decided to upgrade space franchises, when he got the opportunity of a lifetime to restart Star Wars with The Force Awakens. He stayed on as a producer, but the search for a new captain had begun.
Writer Roberto Orci was chosen to helm the movie, despite having minimal experience at being a director. Orci eventually lost the job and there was an uncomfortable vacancy until Paramount settled on Fast & Furious director Justin Lin. It was announced that the movie would be released in 2016. However it wasn’t quite ready to go into production, since the split with Orci was because the studio reportedly was not pleased with his script.
It was unclear who was handling the screenwriting duties for the movie until now. It was revealed by Deadline, that actor Simon Pegg (Star Trek, Shaun of the Dead) will get a serious upgrade in his responsibilities for the third film. According to Deadline:
He will co-write the script with Doug Jung, creator of the TNT series Dark Blue. Pegg’s already a pivotal player in the JJ Abrams-produced Paramount/Skydance pic; he also will reprise his role as Scotty, the engineering wiz originated by James Doohan in the original 1960s Gene Roddenberry series. Don’t be surprised if Scotty beams up further on the call sheet. Jung also wrote for Bad Robot and Paramount a film called Diamond, which is how he got the gig.
It would seem that Pegg would be ill-prepared to script such a huge film. However a closer look at his IMDB resume reveals that he was the co-writer on a surprising amount of movies, including Shaun of the Dead, Paul, and At World’s End. All of those are solid comedies with a definite science fiction influence. It’s apparent that Paramount is going for a straight-forward action film with a lot of humor. One of the biggest complaints about the Abrams’ reboot, besides the lens flares (see below), is that they lack the trademark Roddenberry philosophy. It is yet to be seen if Pegg and Jung can also infuse the series with the social commentary that the franchise is more known for.
It isn’t unprecedented for an actor with writing credentials getting the opportunity to rewrite a script. Seth Rogen writes most of his own material. While Paul Rudd recently got the chance to rewrite Ant-Man with Adam McKay. However, Star Trek is a franchise with a long history and particular fanbase. It is a huge task for anyone to undertake and hopefully they have a fun angle on the material.
Paramount is probably trying to keep things as simple as possible, as the film is slated for a July 2016 release. The clock is certainly ticking and they are holding a prime release date in the summer season with a cast ready to shoot. All signs are pointing to this being the classic case of the third film in a movie trilogy going off the rails. So we will be sure to bring you all the latest as the movie takes shape.
The untitled third rebooted Star Trek film is scheduled to hit theaters on July 8th, 2016.
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