April 1st Guest Post Number 04, JJ Abrams

Guest commentary from the "desk" of JJ Abrams

XWL, has kindly allowed me this space where I can reveal details about the upcoming Star Trek XI project with which I'm involved.

As I'm sensitive to the community of Trek fans, and not all of them want to be exposed to details, the rest shall be in "inviso-text".


Star Trex XI will indeed follow the exploits and first meeting of a young James Kirk (Lt. Commander in the film), a young Spock (already a XO) and Bones (already a cranky old man).

A lot of speculation has swirled around the casting, I'm here to tell you that it won't be Matt Damon as Kirk. I want this to be a new Kirk, but I still want some Shatnerness to the portrayal, and I don't think Matt Damon has enough Shatnerness to pull this off.

In thinking long and hard on this, I've come up with a short list of 3 actors for the part, 1st Jack Black (though he may be a bit old), he embodies much that is Shatner, and in the screen test, had the absolute best pauses (one clocked in at 45 seconds). OK, I ain't gonna lie, Jack Black is the only person for the role, I just claim there are other actors up for the part to drive down his price, this film needs to come in on a budget.

For the Spock role, we were happy to find out that Sacha Ben Cohen was interested in the role. He's perfect, and will work well with Jack Black.

Finally for the 3rd principle, there can only be one Bones, and that's Gary Sinise. In this case the rumors are absolutely true.

The plot revolves around two main issues, Kirk's romantic entanglement with an Andorian (played by Evangeline Lily, she looks smoking hot in blue, by the way) double agent who is in Starfleet but is secretly working with an Andorian supremicist group that is still angry with the Vulcans. Needless to say, there will be reveals, and twists, and double-twists, cause I can't help myself, that's what I do. I haven't actually plotted them all out yet, and the great thing about these kind of plots is that the bigger the plot holes, the more convincing the shadow conspiracy behind the events appears. I mean, it's not like I had any idea where I was going with the whole Dharma initiative crap on Lost, and look how far I've taken it. But anyway, I included an Andorian, just cause I figured Evangeline would look smoking in blue, and I was right.

The "B" plot will be Kirk and Spock meeting and finally catching up and exposing the Andorian terrorists. Spock will quickly focus rightly on Spock's blue hottie, but Kirk will resist. Initially Kirk and Spock will detest each other, but as Spock uncovers Evangeline's connection to the plot, Kirk will be exposing Vulcan complicity in the terrorist activity (Vulcan loyalist don't trust Andoria's inclusion in the Federation and are willing to help Andorian terrorists in Vulcan to help their expulsion happen).

This is my twistiest, turniest script yet. I kick soooo much ass, it's not even funny. (anyway, inviso-text off)

So that's that. I hope those spoilers don't ruin the movie for you. It will be the big movie of 2008, of that I'm sure. And you can trust me cause I'm JJ Abrams, and I always know what I'm doing (even when I don't).