J.J. Abrams Scouting Locations For STAR TREK 2

By Matt Holmes / October 3, 2011

Channel 4 gave J.J. Abrams' rather genius reboot of the Star Trek franchise it's national UK television premiere last night and I once again found myself caught up in the alternative universe he and writers Damon Lindelof, Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman dreamed up. I can't wait to see more adventures with this cast and for the new Trek high council to boldly take us where no Star Trek film has before (please note what I said there... I'm not too keen on seeing anything repeated from the previous canon. It's new villains/new stories from here, please. i.e. no Khan, no Borg, no shoe-horned in cameo from William Shatner, etc). Original stories is the order of the day! As we already know, the Star Trek 2 script which J.J. Abrams will direct has recently been turned in at Paramount as pre-production hits warp speed towards it's early 2012 shoot, for a June 2013 release. Now because of this interview with Orci, we know exactly what stage the production crew are in on the sequel and that's scouting locations (which usually comes just before the casting of the new characters);

The cast is excited. We have a director. We€™ve started scouting locations. The second time around the crew is already together from the start, so we can jump right into the adventure.

With no back story or introduction for the main crew required for the sequel, we can expect that the new movie will dive us straight into the action of a new adventure. We have previously heard Star Trek 2 may have a time jump of a few years from where we left Chris Pine's Kirk and Zachary Quinto's Spock just beginning in their roles as Captain/No. 1 of the Enterprise, and hopefully Abrams looks at recent successful sequels after an origin story (Spider-Man 2, X-Men 2 and The Dark Knight being the best) and realises the villain needs to beefed up for the sequel. Eric Bana's Nero was cool for a movie that was designed as a showcase for the crew, but here we need a baddie crafted as smartly as Khan (but NOT KHAN!) to be a real threat to the Enterprise. Our questions as to who the villains are/what the story is/and new castings should be answered before the end of the year as the film shoots February time. Meanwhile Orci, creative director on a new set of IDW comic books set around these characters, has been feeding his comic writers with details of Star Trek 2 so they can prepare for a relevant lead-in. Mike Johnson, one such writer, says;

As we get closer to the next movie, the stories will begin to foreshadow the events of the movie, such as possibly introducing new characters we will see onscreen€ pun very much intended.

It€™s fantastic to have Bob€™s input, because he can steer us clear of story elements that might conflict with what€™s coming up in the next movie, and we can lay in subtle clues to what€™s coming up so that once you see the new movie you can go back and see how it evolved in the comics€.Bob and I have discussed the major beats of the next movie, which is a great help in laying clues in the comic. We have very few secrets, that I know of anyway.

So perhaps if you pick up those comics you may notice a few early hints towards the new film! Previously; 5 Things We Expect J.J. Abrams€™ STAR TREK 2 To Have10 Choices For STAR TREK 2 Villains