STAR TREK 3 Updates: Simon Pegg on Revised Script; Idris Elba in Early Talks for Sequel's Villian Role • TrekCore.com

Actor Simon Pegg was revealed to be one of the two new co-writers of 2016’s Star Trek 3 back in January — replacing former writers Patrick McKay and JD Payne — and now we’re finally hearing some more details on his involvement with the upcoming film.

In an interview with Collider for his new movie Kill Me Three Times, Pegg spoke about the status of the script-writing process and his thoughts on the next step in the film franchise.

It’s scary! Also, the timeframe we’re working in is extremely tight. It means we’re having to come up with the goods. We can’t be lazy about it. We can’t procrastinate.

We have to come up with the stuff because the production is hammering on the door saying, “When can we build this? What are we gonna we build? Who is in it?” I don’t know! Let’s right it and we’ll find out.

Me and Bryan Burk, who’s one of the producers at Bad Robot, have worked together on a bunch of stuff. We were sitting around, talking about the direction the next film was gonna go in. They were thinking, “Maybe we should go back to the drawing board, a little bit, with the screenplay.”

Bryan and I would just sit around and talk, and we’d get excited. And then, Bryan was like, “Do you want to write it then?” It was a difficult decision. I hemmed and hawed about it, a little bit, because it felt like a big responsibility.

On taking the lead on a big Trek project:

I’m walking into a realm that doesn’t belong to me, and I have to treat it with a degree of respect. Obviously, I always treat things with respect, by I have to abide by certain rules and do right by the original series, and not be too post-modern with it and not be too aware of itself.

I have to try to take on the spirit of the show, rather than fill it with stuff that people will just go, “Oh, yeah, that’s from episode something or other.” It’s more than that.

Pegg also revealed that he expects to have the film’s new script completed by June 2015.

elba

British actor Idris Elba — currently seen in the BBC’s Luther and Marvel Studio’s Thor films — is in early talks to take on a bad-guy role in the 2016 film, according to a new Variety report.

While there’s no specifics to the role for which Elba is being considered, BadassDigest’s Devin Feraci speculates that we could be seeing a large Klingon presence in the next movie — but until there’s more revealed about Simon Pegg’s in-progress script, we won’t know anything for sure.