Abrams Talks Trek Sequel, More

As part of Paramount Pictures press event to promote their upcoming slate of home video releases including Star Trek, director JJ Abrams was on hand to help promote the release. Trekmovie.com spoke with the man were he discussed the sequel, Nimoy, and more. Below are snippets, the full interview is here.

Question: With the prequel, you have a chance to wipe the slate clean with maybe Romulans and Klingons. [In the next film] Do you have any intention of using the pre-existing monsters or characters, or bringing in a whole new mythology?
JJ Abrams: In going forward, the fun of this movie series is that we will have the opportunity, given its alternate timeline, to cross paths with any of the experiences, places, characters that existed in The Original Series. . We have to be really careful, doing that. I don’t want to do something that is so inside that, once again, only die-hard fans will appreciate. But I guarantee you , and we are just now working on the script and just now beginning the process of story breaking, whatever the story is and whatever the final movie ends up being, I know it will be something that the intent is that it will work on its own terms and be something that you don’t need to know and study Star Trek to get, but if you are a fan, there will be, hopefully, gift after gift of connections, references and characters that you, as a fan, hold near and dear.

Question: Any chance of you shooting the next Star Trek film in 3-D?
JJ Abrams: It is funny. Paramount talked to me about doing the first one in 3-D and, having it only be my second film, I was petrified just at the addition–I thought it would be another dimension of pain-in-the-ass. I thought I would be like, "oh my god, I just want to make a decent 2-D movie.” I was so worried that, instead of being a decent 2-D movie, it would have been a bad 3-D one. So I’m open to looking at it because now I feel a little bit more comfortable and, if I, in fact, direct the sequel to our Star Trek film, 3-D could be really fun, so I’m open to it. What I’ve seen of Avatar makes me want to do it, because it’s so crazy-cool looking.

Question: You have said the hardest decision for you with Star Trek was not including William Shatner in the movie, can you talk about the possibility of him being in the next one?
JJ Abrams: I am open to anything. I would love to figure out something. Given the challenge of introducing these new characters, given the burden of cast these new people, I feel like the first did some of the heavy lifting that needed to be done in order to free us going forward, maybe there is less of a burden and more of an opportunity to work with him again. We speak, we actually have a lunch date planned. I am fan, I am a friend of his, or he is at least a friend of mine–he may say otherwise on his blog today, I have no idea. I really couldn’t like him more and would love to work with him.