Star Trek sequel scheduled for May 17, 2013 Release (1 Viewer)

[Rex Bachmann]

Nelson Au wrote (post #6):

Present Paramount management doesn't have the guts (or the brains) to go such a route.

 

[Radioman970]

Originally Posted by Bryan^H
I'd love to see the sequel start with Kirk, Spock, and Bones on an "Away Mission" on some really cool planet. That would make me happy.

I just had a Star Trek V flashback. Don't DO that!!! :*(



But done RIGHT that would be a great way to start it.

 

[Nelson Au]

Ah, Mr. Buchmann, surprised to see you comment!
In reading your post, I realized one of my comments you quoted wasn't well written by me. When I said the JJ Abrams Trek didn't have the same vide as TOS and I added "as it should be." I can see that it can be interpreted in another way as intended. I simply meant that the JJ Abrams films didn't have a TOS vibe, and really shouldn't have a TOS vibe. It is Abram's and the new writer's own take of TOS and as such, it stands as their version, as that should be. And that vibe felt like a mixture of Star Wars and The Little Rascals. The Little Rascals because it has this feeling of we're young, new and excited about getting out to space. The Enterprise launch scene in my head plays like "Ready Steady, Go!" And there's something actually kinda cool about that.
When I said the Alternate Time line was the only way to go, I was quoting the writers and Leonard Nimoy as they felt it was a clever way to get around the problem of possibly rethreading old ground. They felt it opens up the opportunities to go to where no one has gone before, if you'll excuse the quote. I didn't like it. It gave them license to do things TOS wouldn't or may not have done. But I have to give them props for pulling it off. I just don't buy the ideal of an alternate timeline. To me, Nero altered history and as such, the TOS timeline is wiped out, inspite of the writers intention that Quantum Mechanics and other such mumbo jumbo simply split the timelines and you now have 2 parallel universes going on. The TOS continues and JJ's timeline co-exists.
Finally, as far as emotional punch, I felt the pre-title sequence with the Kelvin was very well done. The death of the Captain was a shock and the suicide run into Nero's ship as George Kirk is talking to Winona was emotional for me as Kirk is born.
As far as the jokes about the Enterprise interiors as being "i-store" feeling, I think that's an unfair rap. I'm a designer. I really appreciate the design work done to the bridge and the corridors. If you look at it, think about it, doesn't it remind you more of a certain Kubrick film, or a Moonbase? It's a very similar aesthetic, except dressed up with some modern flourishes and the use of a bit of color to remind us of the TOS bridge.
So I have a mixture of feelings about this film. I like a lot of parts and I dislike the underlying McGuffin they use to propel the circumstances. The characters aren't bad, several are great, McCoy and Pike. Especially Pike. I hate the external design of the Enterprise and the brewery. I'm sure the film makers got that message about the brewery!And the Enterprise is a major character and I'm sad to see her the way she is reconfigured with such poor proportions.
Finally, another thought about the size of the Enterprise. In the 1968 book, The Making of Star Trek, there is a illustration of the Enteprrise overlapping the US Navy Aircraft carrier Enterprise. They are of similar length. And if I recall correctly, the crew of the real Enterprise was 1000. Given the saucer section on the fictional TOS Enterprise is pretty big, I'm thinking the TOS Enterprise probably could have a crew that big in the saucer section alone. Maybe I can count the cabins drawn up by Franz Josephs from the 1973 blueprints........

 

[RickER]

But Nelson, you have to admit, the engineering section looked just like what it was...a brewery!

Hell, the second i saw it, i said that is a milk, or some other kind of processing plant. I hated it. Still takes me out of the flick. The classic TOS never resorted to the 50s thing of using a electric company ( or some such place) sub station, to be a space ship interior! Lots of cool dials and control panels.

Well, they look just as futuristic as a processing plant. Not at all.

You know what made me proud. My 17 year old son didnt like the new movie. He said TOS was better. This from a boy who will not watch old movies or TV shows.

 

[Nelson Au]

Hey Rick! I am in complete agreement about the use of the brewery for the Enterprise engineering section and those giant stainless steel tanks where Uhura was working. Same with whatever they used to film the bowels of the Kelvin. I could see the concrete on the side walls of the staircase as Captain Robau is going down to the shuttle. Pretty bad!

I'm only talking about the Bridge and corridors and sickbay and the transporter room too. Those were well done. I think all the hate about the use of a brewery has reached the designers of the sequel.

Your son has good taste!

 

[SilverWook]

Since Battlestar Galactica, (the dark and gritty one) did similar things with it's engineering sections, maybe Abrams and company thought they could do the same?

Shooting in real locales sometimes works though. Silent Running was largely shot in the innards of an old aircraft carrier, wasn't it?

 

[Josh Steinberg]

I had no problems with the brewery. I had no problems with pretty much everything in the film - I flat out loved it. And this coming from someone who fully expected the new movie to be terrible. Only twice in my life, as the lights have gone down in the theater, have a said a silent prayer to myself, "Please don't suck" -- before this movie, and before Episode III. I wasn't let down either time.

No, it's not TOS, but let's face it -- there's no way it could have been. Before this movie came out, I was saying to people, there's no way to remake this part of Star Trek because it's not as if there's a novel they can go back to and reinterpret. William Shatner is Kirk. Kirk is Shatner. Same for everyone else. I just didn't think it could be done in such a way that I could enjoy it. And then the first trailer came out, showing the building of the Enterprise, and I'm still thinking, "there's no way this could work, but it's a cool teaser." Then the second trailer comes out, and I'm thinking "this actually looks pretty cool". And then the third one comes out, the one where Pike says, "Your father was captain of a starship for 12 minutes; he saved 800 lives" -- and that line gave me goosebumps, made me think, "OK, this might actually work." Just the way that there was some emotion invested into the idea, not just a bunch of people in familiar looking outfits blowing shit up.

Ironically, after seeing the new Star Trek, I went home thinking, "OK, JJ Abrams, I have to stop making fun of you and at least give your other work a chance. I will now watch Fringe and Lost" - and I did, and I don't regret that either. But this Star Trek... I probably saw it about ten times in theaters, most of them in IMAX (I was lucky that I was living in Boston at the time, where the Aquarium, which has the biggest screen in New England, was showing it long after it disappeared from all other IMAX theaters.) It was bright, it was beautiful, it had effects that were completely convincing, characters that felt both familiar and new at the same time. By having Nimoy appear in it, it served as both a farewell to the classic Trek that I so loved as a child (and was a better send-off to the original crew members than Shatner's appearance in Generations) and opened another chapter. And frankly, after years of seeing Paramount spending as little money as possible to milk the most out of the Star Trek franchise, to see a movie that was given a huge budget where the filmmakers were allowed to dream, and dream big, that in and of itself was pretty awesome.

I can't claim to know a ton about quantum physics (or really anything at all.. about physics, that is!), but string theory seems to be at least somewhat accepted, and I can get behind the idea of alternate universes. I mean, if Nero and Spock Prime went through a black hole and came out in the past and their actions changed things... it seems at least somewhat possible that as events would have played out later in the 24th century, those characters might never have had opportunity to come back in time, and therefore, how could they have gotten there in the first place? It makes as much sense as anything else to me. And by doing it that way, this film felt both like a sequel and a prequel... that is, it took place in a time period before the original Star Trek but in a way seemed to come after everything else. It doesn't really matter that much -- I'm just kind glad about the idea that they don't have to do things in such a way where it somehow has to fit in with all the previous episodes and movies. I think it would be a much harder film to make, and a far less enjoyable one to watch, if it was predicated on being "filler" in the existing story as we know it. When Nero is destroyed at the end of the film and the Enterprise is trying to escape the grip of the black hole, at the moment I just said to myself, "please, don't let them get sucked into a black hole therefore somehow negating everything that happened in this film." And they didn't. Spock's emotional journey in the film was also pretty wide-ranging; by the end of the film he's come to terms with being a child of two worlds, something that arguably didn't happen in original Trek until the last of the original cast movies. It takes everything that happened before, acknowledges it, doesn't try to tell you it didn't happen, but says, "we're gonna do things a little differently now." I understand why that won't work for everyone, but it worked for me.

 

[samneil]

I don't see how that release date stays with the cameras rolling that late on Star Trek 2. Unless they've been in pre-production for a good long while, I just don't see them making that release date.


Note: Link removed by mod

 

[Josh Steinberg]

The release date doesn't seem so unimaginable to me - they're supposed to shoot around November this year, right? Probably 2-3 months of shooting, a few months post, but the effects and stuff they'll start before shooting? I get what you're saying and it wouldn't shock me if it got moved a little.. but it wouldn't shock me if it didn't, either. With everything that's already scheduled for Summer 2012 it probably wouldn't be the worst thing in the world in terms of box office for it to get pushed to the Christmas season that year -- I just don't wanna wait that long if it can be avoided!

 

[Nelson Au]

Nice post Josh.
I'm trying to be more open to the JJ/Orci/Kurtzman Trek. I really wanted to like it, and as I said above it has a lot of positives. I might try to see it again this weekend if I have time.
By the way, another word on Engineering. I've seen the illustration done for the Engineering set in Star Trek The Art of the Film book. It would have been a massive set!

 

[TerryRL]

http://www.deadline.com/2011/05/can-star-trek-2-morph-from-70-page-outline-to-summer-tent-pole-in-13-months/

Paramount isn't confirming any of this, but I'm told that there soon should be good news and bad news on the Star Trek sequel front. The good news: With his film Super 8 set for release June 10, JJ Abrams is expected to announce shortly his return as director of Star Trek 2. The bad news: Even moving at warp speed, Abrams will be hard pressed to make the June 29, 2012 release date that the studio set for the film. I'm told that the move being considered right now is to push Trek back for a Holiday 2012 release. This comes after Paramount pushed back the other franchise film in its arsenal that has Chris Pine as its star. Pine's also playing Jack Ryan in the reboot of the Tom Clancy-created series. Pine was expected to shoot that film first, but the script wasn't ready. Paramount hired David Koepp to rewrite Adam Cozad's script. Koepp just began writing this week after completing his film Premium Rush.

Why is Star Trek in such precarious shape, just 13 months before its release date? The film has three top-flight writers in Roberto Orci, Alex Kurtzman and Damon Lindelof. Like Abrams, all of them have been busy on other films. Kurtzman directed Welcome to People. Orci has been busy on Cowboys & Aliens and in prepping the Gavin Hood-directed sci-fi epic Ender's Game. Lindelof has been busy working on Prometheus, the Ridley Scott film for Fox that was conceived as a 3D prequel until Lindelof came on to do a rewrite and changed the concept so much that they consider it an original. The result? It doesn't sound like they are close to having a script that will live up to the high quality of the first film that revived a dead franchise. On the Trekkie fan site Trekmovie.com, Orci confessed this week that they have a 70-page outline, and are waiting for Abrams to commit so that they can really get going. Well, that is hardly an enviable position to be in, exactly 13 months before the release of the film. Orci suggested in the interview they could prep the film from an outline. That is hard, particularly for a sophisticated, futuristic science fiction film. This is basically what happened on Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, and director Michael Bay has been open about the fact that the rush to make a release date with a script that wasn't ready hurt the film. The cost of a Vfx-heavy film rushing like this raises the budget considerably.

Don't be surprised if Paramount and Abrams push back six months at least. While Paramount doesn't have the Marvel movies anymore, the studio could slot its G.I. Joe sequel for that early-summer release (I've heard other studios are now eyeing that date, too). Unless Koepp does an amazing job quickly and gives the studio a Jack Ryan movie that's ready to go, Pine is still expected to shoot Star Trek first. According to the studio, nothing falls into place until Abrams declares his intention for the Trek sequel.---Nikki Finke

There has been talk that the Star Trek sequel would be pushed back for a while now. If this does happen, which is starting to look more and more likely, the best case scenario is (as the article says) the holiday season of 2012, while some are predicting that the movie will be pushed back as much as a year into the summer 2013 season.

 

[Nelson Au]

Yes, I saw this story on the trekmovie.com site. The first film would have been ready by the holidays, but Paramount wanted to hold it for the summer. This sequel appears it will miss this coming summer 2012.
A case of too much success for the Abrams "Committee". If I recall correctly, that's the jokey name the group gave themselves, Orci, Kurtzman, Lindelof, Abrams and someone else I think. They're so busy with so many projects, some fans are hoping the film would be later in release so they at least can do a decent job on the script.
One guy had a great comment on this in that forum. He hopes Abrams doesn't direct and another vision is involved that could give this film some soul and not just pander to the mainstream. Such as what The Empire Strikes Back did. A sentiment I agree with. So more time might allow this. But given the pressures Orci and Kurtzman are under, I think this next film could be doomed. The era of proper Star Trek with ideas may be over.
Perhaps they could get Nicolas Meyer but I suspect that's not in the cards.

 

[Sam Favate]

This film was already delayed. Remember that back in 2009, it was said the next one would be in the summer of 2011. Then it was pushed to June 2012. Now, it seems it could be pushed to Dec. 2012 or (more likely) summer 2013. That's a bad idea. The people involved will say the usual things: "This gives us more time to do a great job," "Our people were in such demand after the last one...," "It just feels right to take our time with this..."

The fact of the matter is that the longer the wait between the films (and four years is a long time), the more the general audience will lose interest. This summer would have been the best time to release it, especially given the huge franchise films up next summer. And playing in late 2012 would pit it against The Hobbit, which is also a bad idea. Everyone at Paramount should remember what happened when Nemesis opened five days before The Two Towers.

They should prep this and get rolling for next June. It's in the best interests of the longevity of the new movie series.

 

[cafink]

The biggest news to me in that deadline.com article is that they're finally moving ahead with an Ender's Game movie! Coincidentally, I began re-reading the novel a couple of weeks ago and am nearly finished it. There have been rumors of a movie adaptation for years, but I figured nothing would ever come of them.

Okay, tangent over.

 

[Rex Bachmann]

As far as Star Trek in the cinema is concerned, there has never been such an era. Star Trek's exploration and innovativeness have always been confined to the small screen.

 

[TravisR]

Am I the only one who thinks Rex's posts are jokes? It's like internet performance art with him acting as the Comic Book Guy.

 

[RickER]

Originally Posted by TravisR
Am I the only one who thinks Rex's posts are jokes? It's like internet performance art with him acting as the Comic Book Guy.

Who can tell, when he uses light green, or worse YELLOW on his quotes. So hard to read i just skip most.

I have little hope for the next Trek movie. For that matter, most movies. It seems to be luck when we get a good movie, od any kind.
But i do like to keep up to date with all things Trek, even when i do not like it.

 

[Claire Panke]

I suspect that summer 2012 date is impossible at this point, and 2012 holiday season is probably iffy too.

The "Committee" apaprently agrees, saying 2012 is not set in stone. Here's Orci quoted at treknation.com:

"The worst thing we could possibly do would be to put something into production to make a release date instead of a great movie.
“I care much more that it be good than it be ready. I’m obviously doing everything I can to make sure that schedules don’t get screwed up. But I don’t think anyone wants a movie on time that’s not worth your time.”

Commendable sentiment. I thought ST 2001 was hugely entertaining, and if the next installment is anywhere near that, I'll be content. (BTW, I'm a TOS fan, saw the first one first air date way back when.) I doubt we'll see many big, commercial SF that are "ideas" movies - too much risk. Most idea driven SF will come from smaller, more personal films. It seems like Ender has been in pre-production hell for 20 years. It would be truly exciing if that project ever gets made right.

 

[Sam Favate]

It sure seems like they are doing everything they can to push it off. Holiday 2012 likely won't happen, as it is already too crowded a season (the Hobbit, Bond 23, Superman), and the holiday season usually can only accommodate fewer blockbusters than the summer. I think that is a shame, because four years between films is a long time, and they risk losing the general audience.

 

[TerryRL]

Paramount is already looking at making the 'G.I. Joe' sequel/reboot their big summer 2012 tentpole film.

Disney's "The Lone Ranger" has also been added to the Holiday 2012 schedule and I think the more time goes by the more likely it seems that the Star Trek flick will be a summer 2013 release.

The Holiday 2012 season is just too packed right now, here is the current November-December 2012 schedule...

NOVEMBER
2nd
-“Reboot Ralph” (Pixar/Disney)
-9th
-Bond 23 (MGM/Sony)
-“Ouija” (Universal)
16th
-“The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part II” (Summit)
21st (Wednesday)
-“47 Ronin” (Universal)
-“Rise of the Guardians” (DreamWorks/Paramount)

DECEMBER
14th
-“The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey” (WB)
21st
-“Hunter-Killer”(Relativity)
-“Life of Pi” (Fox)
-“The Lone Ranger” (Disney)
-Untitled Jud Apatow Film (Universal)
25th (Christmas Day- Tuesday)
-“Man of Steel” (WB) (rumored release)

I think Paramount should lay claim to the July 4th holiday weekend slot for 2013.