Star Trek in Six MTV Movie Awards Categories

Just when you thought the award shows ended with the Oscars, we get a reminder that there is one more to go. The MTV Movie Awards has opened up voting for nominees through April 9th for your favorite movies and stars in many categories.

From these votes a short list of nominees will be determined which will open a final round of voting from May 11th to June 5th. The winners will be announced live on MTV on June 6th at 9PM EST. From what I can tell the list seems to be based on movies released between March 2009 to March 2010 (only way to explain Hot Tub Time Machine's inclusion). This year Star Trek has a chance in six categories, with multiple nominees in many of the categories.

Star Trek specific categories
Best Movie
Best Kiss - Spock & Uhura
Best Fight - Kirk & Sulu vs. Romulans or Kirk vs. Nero
Best Ass-Kicking Star - Chris Pine or Zoe Saldana
Best Breakout Male Star - Chris Pine or Zachary Quinto
Best Villain - Nero (Eric Bana)

Support Star Trek star
Best Female Performance - Zoe Saldana (Avatar)

To vote for Star Trek and other favorites, click here. The website does require you have or create an account and you can only make one choice per category so I guess some will have a hard choice to make.

Star Trek Sequel Starts in 2010 or 2011?

While at the Empire Awards ceremony this weekend, Simon Pegg (Scotty) provided an update on the sequel, "I bug J.J. on a regular basis and he just fobs me off. But I saw Zoe Saldana recently and she reckons that it’s going to be soon. I would imagine it’ll be toward the end of the year, but I can’t guarantee it."

This has led to speculation that the film could start shooting soon. As TrekMovie.com points out, this seems unlikely and I have to agree. Their sources expect shooting to start next year, possibly in late Spring or early Summer.

The main reason I don't expect the film to be ready for the cameras until next year is simply because the core crew is too busy. Star Trek (and assumed but not confirmed sequel) Director JJ Abrams is ramping up work for Mission: Impossible IV which he is executive producing for a summer 2011 release. Meanwhile the Star Trek sequel writers Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci are working on finishing Fringe Season two, prepping for season three and finishing up their script for Cowboys and Aliens for release next year. Basically with these and other projects they will not have a real gap in their schedule until late this year. At this point I would be surprised if a script exists outside the basic outline stage.

Do to their schedules; I suspect the Star Trek script progress will be a complete outline by beginning of the summer followed by various drafts being produced for the remainder of the year. By December, they will probably find time to work out the scheduling with full pre-production cranking up early in 2011. The goal will probably be to get before the cameras by May 2011 as they will want to provide plenty of buffer for visual effects creation, possible 3D conversion (not yet discussed but it will be a topic by this time next year), and for the promotional swing that Abrams and the writers will have to take for their respective movies coming out that summer.

So long story short, do not expect any real news of the sequel getting before the cameras this summer. With the movie not scheduled until June 29th, 2012 there really isn't any reason to rush the process or any reason to try to get filming started this year.

IDW June Star Trek Comics

IDW Publishing has released their publishing plans for June 2010 which includes two Star Trek comic books and one trade. If your interested in the books, just let your local comic book store know. For the full details of plans, click here.

Star Trek: Burden of Knowledge #1
Scott Tipton and David Tipton (w) • Federica Manfredi (a) • Manfredi, Joe Corroney (c)
The newest adventure of the classic Enterprise crew begins here! When a routine Federation diplomatic visit turns suddenly and unexpectedly violent, Captain Kirk, Mr. Spock and Dr. McCoy find themselves kidnapped and halfway across the galaxy! A new Original Series-era miniseries from the creative team behind Spock: Reflections!
FC • 32 pages • $3.99

Star Trek: Leonard McCoy, Frontier Doctor #3
John Byrne (w & a) • Byrne x 2 (c)
A planet at war-but all is not as it seems. Especially not when Dr. McCoy finds himself face to face with someone who seems to be from the wrong century! This issue picks up threads from both the Assignment: Earth and Crew minis. Features two covers by Byrne, including a single-panel "gag" cover.
FC • 32 pages • $3.99

Star Trek: The Next Generation: Ghosts TPB
Zander Cannon (w) • Javier Arnada, Joe Corroney (a) • Joe Corroney (c)
Captain Picard and the crew of the Enterprise respond to a distress call and find a terribly wounded scientist aboard a marooned ship. While evaluating the planet below (and its two warring nations) for possible Federation membership, Picard discovers to his horror that the survivor of the disaster is foreseeing his death. More so, Picard is rattled at being identified as one of the phantoms that haunts the seriously wounded researcher they rescued! Written by Eisner-nominated writer Zander Cannon (Top Ten).
TPB • FC • $19.99 • 120 Pages • ISBN: 978-1-60010-682-8

Abrams' Spock, Uhura Kiss on Simpsons

Last night's The Simpson's had an unexpected nod to JJ Abrams' Star Trek by creating the transporter room turbolift kiss between Spock and Uhura from the recent film. Of course it was done Simpson style but a pretty solid recreation. The brief sequence was part of a montage of famous movie kises (most I don't recognize) as Bart experienced his first real kiss from a girl. The clip below is from Hulu, so not available to anyone outside the US.

TrekMovie also has another Simpson's clip from their fourth season involving The Shat (Happy 79th Birthday) and others for "Star Trek XII"; ironic considering what is coming in two years.

Star Trek Medley During Changing of the Guards

Found by the TrekMovie, below is a video of the Buckingham Palace band playing a medley of Star Trek themes during the Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace. Pieces played include the original TOS, Deep Space Nine, and Voyager intro themes. The band playing pop culture themes is not unusual but still interesting none the less.

STO: New Expanding Universe Trailer

Cryptic has released a new trailer for Star Trek Online that shows off new content that will soon be added to the game including Klingon and Borg content. (via Blues News)

Star Trek Online Update Plans

Cryptic Studios is moving forward with update plans for their now month old MMORPG Star Trek Online complete with Common Ground Fact Sheet and new "Expanding Universe" trailer (which has a hint of Q). The "season 1" plans include lifetime subscriber bonuses, wargames for Federation PvP play, new map, additional customization of uniforms and hairstyles, new L'Tanco Battle Cruiser, and more. (via Blue's News)

Nimoy Talks Star Trek, Fringe and Conventions

In an interview prior to his planned appearance at the Emerald City Comic Con in Seattle, WA this weekend, Leonard Nimoy spoke with the Seattle News Tribune about Star Trek, its sequel, and future plans.

Highlights:
- Nimoy said making the film was "a very moving experience." and "All of this is flattering beyond words" when told of Spock's part in the storyline.
- On participating in the sequel, he said "There is a sequel being written. I suspect I won’t be involved. I’m OK with that."
- Nimoy indicated that 2010 may be his last on the convention circuit, "I think this is the last year I will do this. It’s exciting, but I think I’ve done enough of it. I’m looking forward to concentrating on my personal life."
- Nimoy will be returning to Fringe, filming about three to four episodes for the series starting in the next few weeks.

TrekMovie, after summarizing the article, also posted a radio interview with Nimoy with KIRO FM 97.3 which you can find here at the bottom of the article.

Star Trek Online, Amazon's Gold Box Deal of Day

For the rest of the day Amazon has Star Trek Online as its Gold Box Deal of the Day for up to 44% off. The regular edition is $27.99 instead of $49.99 while the Collector's Edition is $47.99 instead of $79.99. Once the sale is over, I will probably just delete this post.

Leonard Nimoy on Big Bang Theory?

Big Bang Theory Executive Producer Bill Prady has indicated that he is interested in getting Star Trek's Leonard Nimoy to make a cameo on the show for next season, at least according to EW's Ausiello Files blog.

“We’ll probably make a general inquiry,” says Prady. “And if there’s enough interest, we’ll develop a story. The fans have said that’s the dream get, and we agree.”

Nimoy currently occasionally guests on Fringe but has indicated he hopes to discontinue the role and maybe officially retire. He also already turned down a similar invitation for season two. Big Bang now got a much bigger audience since then. However, Fringe benefited from Star Trek writers and director's creating and writing for the show, an advantage that Big Band cannot exploit. Maybe pure fanboy devotion will be enough for Nimoy to appear on the program. I doubt it though.

Star Trek Franchise Wins First Ever Oscar

JJ Abrams' Star Trek achieved a goal none of the previous ten films were able to achieve, an Oscar win. The film won Best Makeup for Marney Burman, Mindy Hall, and Joel Harlow. Based on the outdated information at Memory-Alpha (missing Star Trek's 2010 nominations), the Star Trek franchise has received 14 total nominations over its entire history. The film did lose in its three other Oscar nominated categories of Sound Editing, Sound Mixing, and Visual Effects. The full list of winners can be found here.

Here is the text of their acceptance speech:

Mindy Hall: I don't want to step on your tail. It's hard to follow that face. We thank you, the Academy. We thank J.J. Abrams, your vision inspired us, your energy kept us going and your insistence on perfection brought us here. We thank Bad Robot, Paramount Pictures, we felt your support every day.

We had an amazing staff of artists, over 40. We share this with you and we'll be giving your names backstage at that backstage Thank You Cam. Thank you very much.

Barney Burman: Happy anniversary, baby!

Makeup
* “Il Divo” Aldo Signoretti and Vittorio Sodano
* “The Young Victoria” Jon Henry Gordon and Jenny Shircore
* “Star Trek” Barney Burman, Mindy Hall and Joel Harlow (winner)

Sound Editing
* “Avatar” Christopher Boyes and Gwendolyn Yates Whittle
* “Inglourious Basterds” Wylie Stateman
* “Star Trek” Mark Stoeckinger and Alan Rankin
* “Up” Michael Silvers and Tom Myers
* “The Hurt Locker” Paul N.J. Ottosson (winner)

Sound Mixing
* “Avatar” Christopher Boyes, Gary Summers, Andy Nelson and Tony Johnson
* “Inglourious Basterds” Michael Minkler, Tony Lamberti and Mark Ulano
* “Star Trek” Anna Behlmer, Andy Nelson and Peter J. Devlin
* “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen” Greg P. Russell, Gary Summers and Geoffrey Patterson
* “The Hurt Locker” Paul N.J. Ottosson and Ray Beckett (winner)

Visual Effects
* “District 9” Dan Kaufman, Peter Muyzers, Robert Habros and Matt Aitken
* “Star Trek” Roger Guyett, Russell Earl, Paul Kavanagh and Burt Dalton
* “Avatar” Joe Letteri, Stephen Rosenbaum, Richard Baneham and Andrew R. Jones (winner)

Congratulations to Marney Burman, Mindy Hall, and Joel Harlow.