The news yesterday that actor Chris Pine has decided to take the offer of the role of Captain Kirk in the “Star Trek re-boot” movie means that primary casting is finally complete. The blogger over at Slashfilm, Peter Sciretta, helps us visualize the new cast with this bit of Photoshopping and a brief paragraph about each of the actors along with a side-by-side photo comparison with the original actors.
Most of the cast aren’t particularly well-known, though they all have some major film or TV credits. That’s a wise move. Seems like every bad TV series remake film has suffered most from trying to squeeze a Big Name Star into someone else’s iconic role. And because this movie is supposedly a pre-quel story of the original characters and not a continuation of the existing meta-narrative of Trek, you have to consider this to be more in the vein of those other TV remakes and not part of the Star Trek I-IX series.
Meanwhile, Slashfilm also has a rather heated denial from William Shatner about his participation in the movie. The rumor mill says that Shatner was annoyed not to have been invited in the first place, while Leonard Nimoy was, and now he’s being a diva about it (gee, big surprise there).
Shatner or no Shatner, my one and only fervent desire is that this movie DOES NOT SUCK. I don’t know if that’s even remotely possible, but a boy can dream, can’t he? Filming begins next month. Look for a theatrical release next Christmas.
