J.J. Abrams takes Empire through the STAR TREK trailer

By Matt Holmes /

Alot of people have given their two cents about the STAR TREK trailer (though unbelievably, one of my best mates who has been a life long TREK fan, still can't even drum up the interest to even watch the thing because he is so disgusted by the whole idea of a reboot) but apart from a few comments previously, I have kept relatively silent so far. All I want to say on the matter at this point is that if J.J. Abrams and Paramount had made the decision to use this kind of epic scale BUT with a whole new and original cast and crew, then I would be far more supportive of what they are creating here. But in using Kirk, Spock, Scotty and the likes, well I don't think it works. It feels odd, an imitation that you can't live up to and in it's own way it's limiting when it's suppose to be freeing. You have to keep coming back to the things that make these characters memorable to the fans of the original TREK no matter how much a different direction you take, you have to keep a semblance of what they were before and their relations to one another. Going completely new... like they did in the 80's with Star Trek: The Next Generation was without a shadow of a doubt the way they should have gone with this franchise. Can you imagine in the mid 80's if they had decided to remake the original TREK with a new Kirk, etc? Think of all the Next Generation stories we would have missed out on... The best thing Abrams has going for him is his characterisation, just look at how compelling the original characters are in Lost, I think we would have truly been wetting ourselves over the prospect of this movie if he had taken the time to create something new. Empire have posted a great feature showing a couple of dozen images cut directly from the STAR TREK trailer with most having a sentence or two from J.J. Abrams explaining the artistic choice of what the shot means for the movie. I have taken the best bits below for you below but you can CLICK HERE TO SEE THEM ALL YOURSELF.

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"I think that what this movie's bringing is a remarkable new and energetic young cast and a treatment of the world of Star Trek that I think is as intimate as the story is massive in scope. This is a treatment of Star Trek with action and comedy and romance and adventure, as opposed to a rather talky geekfest."
"The idea with the trailer was to start with something unexpected and Earth-bound and then thrust you into the world of Trek."
"Kirk, at this point, is all potential and he's rather aimless. He's a good guy but he does some foolish things, mostly because he doesn't quite know how to use his power and what to do."
"The night you meet him in the movie is the scene in the bar. That's pretty much a typical night for him. The woman he's trying to pick up, in this case Uhura, just happens to be the one who's there that night. It's not that he isn't capable or smart but he's directionless and part of his story in this movie is becoming the man that we all expect to see. "
Personally, I missed this from the trailer but the above image is Ben Cross (as Spock's Vulcan father) and Winona Ryder (as Spock's human mother).
"Trek is something that some people might expect to be a kind of low energy experience. I'm hoping people who see the action here, who maybe have pre judged what Trek is, will open their eyes a little wider and say 'oh, that's not what I thought it was going to be.'"
Is that a scene from a battle between the movie's villain Nero, played by Eric Bana and Chris Pine's Kirk?
"There are a couple of good monsters in this, which is unusual for Trek. Neville Page designed them. He did the Cloverfield monster and he did an amazing job. He's a brilliant designer."
Trek Movie have a similar kind of breakdown you can enjoy HERE.