By TrekMovie has obtained reports of three different, equally spoileriffic reveals for next year’s Star Trek sequel from J.J. Abrams and company. The biggest headline, obviously, is the identity of the mystery villain Benedict Cumberbatch plays in the film. These are unconfirmed at present, so take everything after the jump with a grain of salt. I’ll start off with the two less-spoilery items first, so you can click through to see some things that, in the scheme of things, won’t ruin the surprise too deeply.
So again, SPOILER goggles on after the jump!
[Via TrekMovie]First off, as corroborated by Ain’t it Cool, Leonard Nimoy will be returning as the so-called Spock Prime, the refugee from the original Star Trek timeline we all recognize and, in the case of my mother, occasionally lust after. There’s no real description of his role, but I’d imagine that it will be a smaller role along the lines of his largely-expository role in the first one. That, or he’ll wind up dying heroically saving NuSpock in a scene mirroring that of Wrath of Khan.
Secondly, and this shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise, but we will finally see some Klingons. Remember, they were supposed to show up in the first film, but their scene was cut. You can see it on the DVD or Blu-ray if you’re interested in a little tease. This evidently won’t be a throwaway role, like the scene cut from Star Trek, so I’d imagine we’ll be seeing a lot of those head-ridged li’l fellas.
Finally, TrekMovie’s sources confirm that Benedict Cumberbatch will be playing, as rumored so long ago and occasionally refuted, the infamous Trek villain Khan Noonien Singh, chief villain in classic episode “Space Seed” and the titular haver-of-wrath in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.
Here’s where I’m at with all this, and I actually had to have a ten minute conversation with a fellow Trekkie colleague at the office. I always hoped that the fact that the Abrams movies were in their own completely different timeline and universe would mean that Abrams wouldn’t feel the need to trot out the old iconic villains for sequels. Sure, we have to see what the Klingons are like in the new timeline, and it’d be cool to occasionally see, I dunno, Harry Mudd or early Cardassian-Bajoran tensions, but do we really need another movie where Khan is rolling around fucking things up for Kirk, which we’ve seen already in both the TV show and in a movie?
I’ve got a lot of faith in Benedict Cumberbatch’s ability as an actor, as well as J.J. Abrams’s ability to craft an interesting Star Trek movie, so if this does turn out to be true, we’ll be in for an interesting picture. That said, I really, really wish they’d gone with someone other than the single most iconic villain in Trek history.