Abrams, Stars Promote Star Trek Into Darkness

For the last week or so JJ Abrams and some of the stars of Star Trek Into Darkness have been promoting its home video release. Most of the time they covered the same "you should see this movie" ground they covered when promoting the movie theater release but a few nuggets of interest were said. Eve talks about the underwear thing, Abrams answers questions on Khan & the video game, Peter Weller defends his character, and Kurtzman and Orci focus on story choices. Below are the links to the stories and segments I found interesting. My comments will be in italics.

Spinoff Online - JJ Abrams

I think the thing was that Khan really is the most iconic villain of the series, and it felt like an opportunity to see another side of Khan and to something that, like the first film did, use elements that people were familiar with but in a new. It’s a valid argument that it’s about time for them to go off and discover and see things that have nothing to do with what we’ve seen before, and I think we’ll always have some overlap. But I’m excited about the next chapter.

More Star Trek Into Darkness Cast Interviews

Star Trek Into Darkness has premiered in North America but that doesn't mean the marketing campaign stops. In an interview with Collider, STID producer Bryan Burk discussed editing the film, screening the film while maintaining secrecy, easter eggs and a whole lot more including other Bad Robot projects like the various TV shows from this season and next. Simon Pegg remains the example on how to do interesting interviews as he seems to just cause interviewees to ask better questions rather then the generic ones Pine and the rest tend to get. In his interview with Collider, he was in a blunt mood as he talked about maintaining film secrecy, his dislike of people dinging Abrams about his lens flares, and talked provided a few behind the scene antedotes. As for Karl Urban, he talks about trying to add more to McCoy then just sarcasm, film themes, the costumes and more. Alice Eve discusses how her character has a British accent, deleted scene and more. The links to the interviews are below.

Bryan Burk (Collider)
Simon Pegg (Collider)
Damon Lindelof (Collider)
Karl Urban (io9)
Chris Pine and Zachary Quinto (TrekMovie)
Karl Urban and Simon Pegg (TrekMovie)
Alice Eve (TrekMovie)
JJ Abrams (TrekMovie)

Sulu and Marcus Characters Videos, 4 German TV Spots for STID

Today brings us six new videos to promote Star Trek Into Darkness. The first two are brief character profiles of Sulu (John Cho) and Dr. Carol Marcus (Alice Eve) as the actors and JJ Abrams comment on the characters. After that are four 10 second long German TV spots that have a few quick new scenes.

Into Darkness Cast Discuss Movie at CinemaCon

While at CinemaCon being held in Las Vegas, various cast members of Star Trek Into Darkness and writer Damon Lindelof discussed the film before and after an 18 minute preview of the film. Highlights from the videos are below which can be found here here. In a separate video, John Cho (Sulu) discussed the film with Collider. You can find that video here.

Highlights:
- Zachary Quinto: "It is an erroneous notion that [Spock] doesn’t have an emotional life. "Spock’s journey in this film is learning how to honor that emotional life."
- Chris Pine on Kirk: "He is a man who has to learn to censor himself at times and our bad guy–John Harrison–basically levels this mirror in front of Kirk in which he sees all of his vulnerabilities and his fallibility and everything that is wrong with the way he leads his men and women into battle–and he brings him to his knees."

Alice Eve Denies Khan Rumors, Pegg Wants Abrams for Trek 3

Sunday was the British Academy Film Awards which honors films from around the world. Attending it were to native UK Star Trek Into Darkness cast members Alice Eve (Carol Marcus) and Simon Pegg (Scotty) who answered a few Trek questions. Alice Eve is flat out denies the Benedict Cumberbatch as Khan rumors saying "He is not playing Khan." Simon Pegg discloses he thinks that JJ Abrams "will do Star Trek [3]" after he completes Star Wars while voicing his support of preventing spoilers from leaking. Keep in mind this is a hope on Pegg's part and not inside information. Discussions on Star Trek 3 are probably not even going to start until after Into Darkness comes out. Videos below.

I suspect Paramount will take a wait and see stance until the schedule of Star Wars Episode VII becomes clear. They might wait on Abrams but if the Star Wars gets bumped to 2016 (which I think is all but inevitable), I just don't seem them waiting until 2017 for the next film to come out so will move ahead with a different director. It execs are really on the ball, once the numbers come in on 2 to judge its level of success, they need to get aggressive on at least prepping a script as Paramount should claim summer 2015 when Star Wars gets pushed back as coming out in 2016 against Wars is a non-starter and 2017 just means they might as well wait for Abrams. In short, any Abrams directing Star Trek 3 talk is idle speculation until two things happen - 1) Star Trek Into Darkness is judged a box office success and 2) the official release date of Star Wars Episode 7 is announced.

Empire Magazine's Interview, Hi-Res Images

Empire Magazine has posted hi-res images and one of their stories from their recent issue with Benedict Cumberbatch and Alice Eve. For the interview they seem to be providing commentary for the various images with comments on either what they were doing while filming a scene, characters and other actors. Below are a few highlights with the the full article and images here.

Cumberbatch: Ah, Chris. He’s got something on his face, the dirty boy. Seriously though, Kirk really goes through it by the end of the film…

Alice Eve: Actually, when you spilt food on your costume on set, that was called ‘doing a Chris Pine’ because he did it that much.

Cumberbatch: He did keep doing a Pine… He’d just take a drink in his hand and forget to put his mouth to it. The boy – sorry, the man – was so tired carrying that film, I’ve got to say. He’s brilliant in it, I’m really excited to see his performance.

Eve and Cumberbatch Discuss Star Trek Characters and Story

In an interview with IGN, Benedict Cumberbatch (playing John Harrison) and Alice Eve (Carol Marcus) discuss Star Trek Into Darkness. They talk about their characters, the movie's themes and filming the movie. No new story specifics were provided interesting to watch these two Trek novices discuss the movie.

More from Cast on Star Trek Into Darkness

Below are two videos combining interviews with the cast of Star Trek Into Darkness as they talk about the film from Entertainment Tonight and Access Hollywood. Nothing story wise is really revealed only saying its bigger, better, and gets more into the characters.

Eight Spoilers from Star Trek Into Darkness

Monday Paramount Pictures held a press event at Bad Robot's Headquarters in Santa Monica, California. On hand was JJ Abrams and a few cast members from Star Trek Into Darkness. The event was to help promote the teaser trailer (most screenings) and 9 minute preview (IMAX 3D only) that is coming out on December 14th with The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. One of the spoilers was already revealed when Paramount revealed that the name of Benedict Cumberbatch's character is John Harrison. TrekMovie reveals 7 other spoilers including character names, locations and a few story tidbits.

1) Alice Eve is Carol Marcus
The beautiful short haired blonde in the teaser of the teaser is Lieutenant Carol Marcus. In Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, the character was a civilian scientist working on instantly terraforming planets and was the ex-girlfriend of Kirk in his Starfleet Academy days from which she has his son. In the movie she is a member of Starfleet and probably does not have a previous relationship (or son) with Kirk until getting on board the Enterprise.

Alice Eve on STID Script, Abrams, Cumberbatch

In a brief interview with Digital Spy, new Enterprise crew member Alice Eve comments on the Star Trek Into Darkness script, director JJ Abrams and Benedict Cumberbatch. No spoilers revealed so still no clues on what her character is.

"The legacy aside, the reality of the experience was a great pleasure," Eve said. "It was special in every way, because the people who make the movie and are in the movie are all so impressive.

"The whole script is immaculately written - I read it in one sitting, and I just had the film in my head. It's that articulate and specific and imaginative."

On Abrams, she enthused: "He's a very intelligent, talented and determined man. Being around him is inspiring, and he engages you - you want to do your best for him, and tell his story in the way that he wants it told."

"On Starter For Ten, the scenes I had with Benedict, I was really incapable of keeping a straight face," Eve admitted. "He was just so funny, so it was a different experience working with him again. Less comedic!"

(via TrekMovie)

Alice Eve on Trek Set Pic

A new picture has surfaced on the Zachary Quinto Community site that shows Alice Eve, unknown person and Quinto posing while on a Star Trek set. When and where the photo was taken is unknown. The main point of interest is the outfit suggests a little bit more info on the character she is playing. The main point of interest is the costumes seem to match the same dark gray and black uniforms that John Cho (Sulu) and Zoe Saldana (Uhura) wore for the film. The new darker scheme also matches outfits that Quinto and Chris Pine (Kirk) have worn. So this indicates a member of Starfleet (no likely not Dr. Carol Marcus). The outfit also suggests not a member of the medical corps (so bye Christine Chapel). Since she is wearing the costume but no alien makeup unlike Quinto, she is probably a human character. This fits my theory of Yeoman Janice Rand but there are still a host of contenders including Lt. Maria Givers who fell in love with Khan and helped in escape in The Original Series episode. As usual time will tell.

More from Alice Eve on Trek Makeup

Alice Eve continues the press circuit to promote The Raven and continued to speak about Star Trek even though the Abrams cone of silence remains in full effect. In an interview with MTV she spoke about being the makeup chair. It might lead you to infer some alien makeup but really not enough info to make that leap.

"I'm a healthy amount of time in the makeup chair -- though not as long as Spock," Eve teased. "We were filming until very late last night, and I know that's all I can say. It's a top-secret operation; it's like a war. I'm having a lot of fun. It's a very special experience to be on J.J.'s movies, you know," she said. "He's a real good leader."

Alice Eve Briefly Talks Abrams and Trek Prep

In an interview with Access Hollywood to promote The Raven, Alice Eve spoke about working with JJ Abrams on the Star Trek sequel and how she watched The Original Series to prep for her role (which I think is Yeoman Janice Rand). Sadly nothing specific was revealed about the sequel.

"J.J., I guess, really wins your trust… and you don’t want to do anything that would like, rock his ship," she said. "He runs a real gentleman’s set and we’re like his amazing army and he’s the kind general,” she added of their "Star Trek" captain behind the scenes. "He’s like a very efficient, generous filmmaker. It’s been an amazing experience working with him. It’s really special, actually."

"I’ve watched all of them. My grandfather used to watch the original series in the ‘60s every Saturday at 5 o’clock, so it was nice for me because it was the only TV show he watched," she said. "Now, I’ve watched them all and there are some scenes with [William] Shatner that break my heart… It’s so sweet."

(via TrekMovie)

Alice Eve on Working with Cumberbatch

New Star Trek cast member recently commented to MTV about her also new co-star Benedict Cumberbatch who she has worked with several times before. Videos of the two together on screen can be seen here.

"I'm very excited to work with him again. He's so very funny, Ben," she said. "I don't know if you remember his character in 'Starter for 10,' but he was so funny. Like King of the Geeks, but he did it so well, and I found a lot of that hard to get through because he was so funny. I like him very much."

"It's similar to 'Starter for 10,' from my point of view, in that there is a group of young actors who have a team spirit, which is always so revivifying to be a part of," she said. "When there's a group of people who you can spend time with and work with and get to know, a real good experience, it's kind of like going back to university or something, when everyone has got the same objective. There's a lot of energy, and it's a nice thing to be a part of that group. That's the thing that excites me most about it. Obviously, there is a huge legacy there with 'Star Trek' and the fanatics, so hopefully they'll be satisfied."

Alice Eve Up for Star Trek Role

The Hollywood Reporter posts that Alice Eve (Entourage, Sex and the City 2) is up for a "big role" in Star Trek 2 that is currently in pre-production for a rumored January start date. There is no information on what the role is but for someone reason as soon as I saw a picture of her, "Yeoman Janice Rand" popped into my head.