Back in January 2015, months before production began onStar Trek Beyond, it was announced thatSimon Pegg, who plays Scotty inStar Trek,Star Trek Into Darknessand this upcoming sequel, had come aboard toco-write the scriptwithDoug Jung. Before they took over, there were rumors that the previous script wasn’t received well by the studio, and many fans were overjoyed whenSimon Peggbecame the man responsible for the story. Last week, the actor-writer appeared at CinemaCon to present the Showman of the Year award toJ.J. Abrams, where he revealed some interesting details toComingSoon.netabout how a group of fans helped him craft the story.
“We had the entirety ofStar Trek historyat our disposal and it’s always there online. There’s an amazing Wikipedia online called Memory Alpha. It becameDoug [Jung]and my resource and the place that we’d turn to whenever we wanted to know, ‘What kind of weapons does an NX vessel carry?’ Memory Alpha has it. We actually wrote to the Memory Alpha guys and got them to name a certain device in the movie. I sent them a letter saying, ‘Can you come up with this for me?’ In two hours, they came back with an entire etymological history of what the thing was. It’s beautiful. It’s fantastic to have that support network.”
Unfortunately,Simon Peggwouldn’t confirm whether or not the NX ship will be featured inStar Trek Beyond, but concept art that surfaced earlier this year portrayed a ship that did resemble the NX-01 Enterprise ship from the originalStar TrekTV series. The current crew are travelling through space on the NCC-1701 ship, and we saw in poster artwork from CinemaCon that this vessel has taken on quite a bit of damage. It’s worth noting that this year marks the 50th Anniversary of the original series, so perhaps the Enterprise crew could be transitioning from the NCC-1701 to the NX-01.Star Trek Into Darknessdrew several parallels from the the 1982 movieStar Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, butSimon Peggrevealed thatStar Trek Beyondwon’t be similar to the movie that followedThe Wrath of Khan, 1984’sStar Trek III: The Search for Spock.
“No, although we were obviously aware of the coincidence of those two films. That might be a little nod for fans perhaps, but it’s certainly not something that the film depends upon or has any relationship to the plot of the previousStar Trek 3.”
It was also recently confirmed thatStar Trekwill be returning to the small screen as well, with a new TV series developed byHannibalcreatorBryan Fuller. The series is slated to debut with a special preview on CBS in early 2017, before the series debuts on the network’s new streaming platform, CBS All Access. When asked if there will be any connections betweenStar Trek Beyondand this new series,Simon Peggsaid that they are not related at all.
“Absolutely not!Star Trekhas existed for 50 years in very different iterations. There are so many different points from the history of the Federation, from the very beginnings inEnterpriseto much later on withVoyagerandNext Generation. This is a story that will go on and on. It’s a continuing mission. It must have life on television as well as film. It started out as a TV show. It’s home was television. I’m overjoyed at that news and I can’t wait to see what they do.”
Simon Peggwill be joined in the cast byStar TrekandStar Trek Into DarknessstarsChris Pine,Zachary Quinto,Karl Urban,Zoe Saldana,Jon ChoandAnton Yelchin, along with new cast membersIdris Elba,Sofia Boutella,Lydia WilsonandJoe Taslim.Justin Linis directing this new adventure, which hits theaters nationwide on July 22, going up againstIce Age: Collision CourseandLights Out. Stay tuned for more onStar Trek Beyondas we get closer to this highly-anticipated summer release.
