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The cover story for tomorrow's Star Trek centered Entertainment Weekly is already on the site, and we've collected the highlights and important tidbits from the interviews with the cast, writers, producers and director J.J. Abrams. So find out what's different on the new "Apple Store" bridge and how Abrams put his love for Star Wars to work on Trek. Plot spoilers ahead.
We all know because Abrams has said it time and time again that he did not make this movie for fans. But he says he fell in love with both Spock and Kirk during the making of the film, which is comforting — but not as comforting as the power house group of Trek fans and non-fans he brought together to create this movie including: Lost co-creator Damon Lindelof, M:I-3 and Transformers screenwriters Bob Orci and Alex Kurtzman, and producer Bryan Burk. But always being a Star Wars fan at heart Abrams applied what he loved about that epic to his Trek movie:
''All my smart friends liked Star Trek,'' he says. ''I preferred a more visceral experience.'' Which is exactly why he accepted Paramount's offer in 2005 to develop a new Trek flick; creatively, he was engaged by the possibility of a Star Trek movie ''that grabbed me the way Star Wars did.'' That meant a bigger budget and better special effects than any previous Trek film, plus freedom to reinvent the mythos as needed. ''We have worldwide aspirations and we need to broaden [Trek's] appeal,'' says Weston [Brad Weston, Paramount's president of production] ''Doing the half-assed version of this thing wasn't going to work.''
In the article are tales of how Zachary Quinto painstakingly banded his fingers together to prepare for his Spock audition, how Chris Pine almost lost the title role and finally a great synopsis of what will await us in the theaters.
First Real Synopsis of Star Trek:
Star Trek's time-travel plot is set in motion when a Federation starship, the USS Kelvin, is attacked by a vicious Romulan (Eric Bana) desperately seeking one of the film's heroes. From there, the film then brings Kirk and Spock center stage and tracks the origins of their friendship and how they became officers aboard the Enterprise. In fact, the movie shows how the whole original series crew came together: McCoy (Karl Urban), Uhura (Zoë Saldana), Scotty (Simon Pegg), Sulu (John Cho), and Chekov (Anton Yelchin). The adventure stretches from Earth to Vulcan, and yes, it does find a way to have Nimoy appearing in scenes with at least one of the actors on our cover — and maybe both. The storytelling is newbie-friendly, but it slyly assimilates a wide range of Trek arcana, from doomed Captain Pike (Bruce Greenwood) to Sulu's swordsmanship to classic lines like, ''I have been, and always shall be, your friend.'' More ambitiously, the movie subversively plays with Trek lore — and those who know it. The opening sequence, for example, is an emotionally wrenching passage that culminates with a mythic climax sure to leave zealots howling ''Heresy!'' But revisionism anxiety is the point. ''The movie,'' Lindelof says, ''is about the act of changing what you know.''
Other spoilers: In one scene, Kirk (still a cadet) goes undercover on a Romulan warship along with Spock, only to see the mission turn into a raging phaser fight against "bald, blue-tatted alien brawlers." But Kirk's newfangled phaser doesn't work, with its spring-trigger barrel that revolves between "stun" and "kill." (Not sure if this is a plot point or a prop malfunction. Sounds like the latter.)
Many, many, many people have been spouting off about the Bridge's make over, and according to Abrams it's correlation to the Apple store has been made before, but the updates including handlebar access for turbulence were implemented to reduce the cheese factor form the late show.
"People would joke, 'Where's the Genius Bar?''' says Abrams, somewhat defensively. ''To me, the bridge is so cool, it makes the Apple Store look uncool.''
But most importantly it seemed like both cast and crew (from Leonard Nimoy on down) were happy to bring the optimism of Star Trek to the people of today.
''In a world where a movie as incredibly produced as The Dark Knight is raking in gazillions of dollars, Star Trek stands in stark contrast,'' Abrams says. ''It was important to me that optimism be cool again.''
Read the entire article at Entertainment Weekly and check out the high res cover below.
Send an email to Meredith, the author of this post, at meredith@io9.com.
Original material is licensed under a Creative Commons License permitting non-commercial sharing with attribution.
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