When asked for the progress report for "Star Trek 2," J.J. Abrams replied:
"In going forward, the fun of this movie series is that we will have the opportunity given its kind of alternate timeline to cross paths with you know, any of the experiences, places, characters that existed in the original series," Abrams said. "You've got to be really careful, obviously, doing that. I don't want to do something that is so inside that once again only die-hard fans will appreciate. But I guarantee, whatever the story – and we're just now working on the script, we're just beginning the process of story breaking – whatever the final movie ends up being, I know it will be something that will ... work on its own terms and be something that you don't need to know and study Star Trek to get. But if you are a fan, there will be hopefully sort of gift after gift of connections, references, characteristic things that you hopefully as a fan hold near and dear."
At least the team is staying sensitive to the fans of the original series. They are paying their respects which is better then ignoring where the franchise originated.
Abrams goes on to explain the method of his madness:
"Something like this, and maybe even especially something that involves some weird sort of alternate-reality time travel thing, is you don't want to not explain it, but you don't want to explain everything," Abrams said. "I mean the fun of any movie, I think you have as much fun with the missing pieces as you do with the pieces you get. And so for me, not knowing every detail allows me to get inside of the story and to start to fill in the blanks. But if everything is spoon-fed, typically I feel like you're being pandered to or it's too expositional. So I think its always a balance."
I agree, let's just not make it so unbelievable that the parts you have to fill in by yourself lose clout because you can't fathom that those details actually happened.
Will Star Trek 2 revolve around torture or some far fetched political agenda? Orci States:
"The torture thing was just a for instance," Orci explained. "Someone said, 'A modern-day issue like torture?' It's like, 'Yeah sure. Modern-day issues.' ... We're not doing a story about Gitmo, as I read on some site, that its going to be about Guantanamo Bay. But now that we've established the characters, we can have a more philosophical allegory where what's happening in the future represents our world. Like the best versions of it in the '60s did, represented racial equality, progressive issues."
I for one can't wait for more news about ""Star Trek 2." "Star Trek" was the best movie in 2009. It will be nice for J.J. Abrams and team to be able to up the ante in the sequel.