Star Trek In London

Star Trek has its red carpet premiere with the cast and director JJ Abrams in London. As part of that CNN and Slashfilm each did articles on it.

CNN's article is basically a summary of the story (prequel story, how the Enterprise crew gets together) and the plans to make it accessible for Trekkies and non-Trekkies alike ("[We had] to take something that has pre-existed us for decades, and make it feel legitimate, and vital, and relevant for today," Abrams said). The full article is here.

Slashfilm's article is coverage of the press conference with everyone. Below are a few snippets of Part 1 and Part 2 of the transcript.

what aspect of the original Trek seemed the most insurmountable?
Abrams: I think that the world of Star Trek is so much bigger than anything I’ve worked on before. The scope of it is so crazy and despite it being Star Trek and being a fantasy our goal was really it make the thing feel real and alive and it’s a strange one because it s dealing with a lot of over the top, you know, science fiction, it’s a clear fantasy, but I really wanted to make sure you believe it and the only way to do that is with the characters. So the bigger sort of challenge was to take something that has pre-existed us by decades and make it feel legitimate and vital and relevant for today and the only way to do that is through the characters that these actors, I think, brilliantly portray. None of the visual effects spectacle would matter if you didn’t care about and believe those characters. That was the thing that was the goal we had and I believe that they achieved it.

why Nero didn’t have the typical Romulan crest of ridges on his forehead.
Eric: I inherited my look from JJ and our wonderful designer Neville Page who sent me secretly encoded drawings of how Nero would look and I just went ‘Yep, that looks great’… I don’t know how to answer that question. Probably more for JJ.

[Did] Saldana liked being the only female in the pivotal cast, surrounded by a bunch of blokes.
Saldana: I love it. It’s great. Not every day can a woman get up and go to work and not have to, like, va-voom herself and get there and she’s surrounded by this, like, hotness, sea of like men and still blend in like one of the buddies but at the same time too still be able to remain feminine. And you can only do that in a very responsible, sort of equal like and graceful environment so I’m very grateful to be working with these guys. They’re ‘blokes’ – I like that.