Entertainment Weekly’s 8-page on J.J. Abrams‘ “Star Trek” cover story is now online including a very detailed look at the synopsis of the upcoming film.
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 highlights include J.J. Abrams informing audiences that they’re not ”making a movie for fans of Star Trek,” but instead are “making a movie for fans of movies”.
”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.”
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