Star Trek - Casting for the JJ Abrams Remake
 

So, I know there are more than a few old school Trek fans on this board. What do you all think of the recent cast announcements for JJ Abrams re-imagining of the Star Trek: TOS? Honestly, I'm.... just not sure.

Kirk - Chris Pine - I've never heard of this guy or seen him in anything. I was hoping for someone else. (Truth be told, I was hoping for Jensen Ackles).

Spock - Zachary Quinto ("Heroes") - I can sort of see this one.

McCoy - Karl Urban ("Lord of the Rings", "Xena") - I'm flabbergasted here. I like Karl Urban, and have ever since his days playing Cupid on "Xena", but I just don't see him as Bones.

Scotty - Simon Pegg ("Shaun of the Dead", "Hot Fuzz") - I'm ambivalent. Sounds fine, really, but would have preferred an actual Scot.

Sulu - John Cho ("Harold and Kumar") - works for me.

Chekov - Anton Yelchin - I've only ever seen him as a guest star on "Criminal Minds", and he played a high school student. But I guess Chekov always was the youngest of the lot, and I'm generally fine with this.

Uhura - Zoe Saldana - I like her. So I'm ok with this, but to me Uhura was always the picture of class and grace and elegance, and Zoe is a bit more of a brassy, saucy chick, so I have some doubts.

I also have no opinion about Eric Bana being cast as the villain. He's a good actor, but I'm far more concerned about the regular casting.

Judging by his picture, he looks more like a young Christopher Pike than a young James Kirk.

I thought this was a perfect choice.

She has the smokin' hot part down perfectly at least. So as long as there's fan dancing...

As for the rest, I'm not that familiar with any of them, though I agree that Karl Urban seems like a not-terribly-good choice.

I'd be more interested, but I'm sure this will be another 'reimagining of a classic TV series' and it'll suck, so I'm not spending much time on it. If it doesn't suck, well, I'll be pleasantly surprised. :)

I'm just curious to see Zachary Quinto play the "good guy".

And for once, Karl Urban isn't playing "stud boy".

I've seen Chris Pine in Just My Luck and The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Wedding (or whatever it was called). I was bored one day, so I went through my sister-in-laws DVD collection -- that's my excuse and I am sticking to it. Anyway, I couldn't really judge as those parts weren't much, but he played pretty boy well?

I am not a fan of Simon Pegg, so I don't care for that. I liked it better when it was rumoured to be James McAvoy, but that is because I adore McAvoy so very, very much.

I'm very protective of Bones. I realize this is a relatively unpopular fan opinion, but Dr. McCoy was my favorite character when I was a kid and watching the show for the first time. More than Spock, more than Kirk, more than any other character. (Although I really enjoyed the McCoy-Spock dynamic).

I hope this doesn't suck, but I'm prepared for it to do so.

Karl Urban is a perfectly good actor, but I'd agree that I can't imagine him playing someone who grows into the Bones of the original series.

They introduced the guy who's going to play Spock at Comic-Con, but they wouldn't say who they had cast for the other roles, so thanks for that.

I'm trying to picture these people in the roles, and with the exception of Simon Pegg, Chris Pine and Karl Urban, I have no idea who you're talking about. As for Eric Bana, eh. Not a huge fan over here.

I hope this is a successful movie; it's been a while since we've had a decent Trek movie. My only concern is that the audience won't be able to accept anyone else but the original actors in these roles, and it will "flop" there by putting the final nail in the ST Movie Franchise Coffin.

I just Google Image searched all these guys because I didn't know any of them except for Spock. The only ones I can't really see are Pine for Kirk and Saldana for Uhura. I think Urban as the older, brittle Bones will work.

Pine just looks so young. I realize Kirk was younger than Bones and Spock in the original, but this guy looks like a baby. How would he be old enough to captain a ship?

Saldana just seems too young and too sexy as well. But maybe hair and makeup will tone her down a bit.

Okay, after thinking about this, a couple of observations.

1. Zoe Saldana is not too sexy. (She is very sexy, though) Nichelle Nichols was plenty sexy back in the day. She rocked the red mini. I don't know if we'll get the upswept 'do, but hey, I don't know that we'll get the full on velour treatment for any of them. And I'm going to give Ms. Saldana the benefit of the doubt on playing dignified.

2. Karl Urban --- Me thinks this is an indicator of a more action oriented movie. Karl Urban's Bones, you would think, would be a bad ass Bones in terms of action, as I've never seen Urban in a subdued role. Then again, maybe Bones wasn't always a doctor, and there's a reason he's always protesting that he's a doctor. ......or at least one could hope. I'm just dubious about Karl Urban.

3. Chris Pine...don't know who that is. If he can ham up the screen, we'll see.

4. Quinto -- I'm curious to see him in something where he's likable. Spock has a dry wit about him, and I'm interested to see if Quinto can pull it off.

Zachary Quinto is spot on. I can totally see it. Karl Urban I'm sure will be fine.

I loved Bones! Apart from Uhura, he was my favourite character! Kinda had a little crush on him as well.

Have no real opinion on any of the others, apart from Pegg. Never been terribly impressed with him - but at least they haven't cast Ricky Gervais. The day he makes it into space is the day I whip out my uzi.:9mm:

I think Syler would make for a good Spock.

I find Karl Urban as Bones to be rather odd, but maybe there's a reason why he's called Bones that lends itself to a more action-y presence.

All in all, I'm not to thrilled with the whole concept of ST: The Wonder Years, I'll probably wait for it to come to DVD.

I guess I need some information b/c I alwas new that Spock as a Vulcan was a lot older than Kirk (and even Bones) so I guess I'm wondering how they all ended up at the Acedemy together or even on the Enterprise (from the start).

I think that's the plot of the movie right there. Sulu, Uhuru, and Chekhov would all be younger than Kirk. Bones and Spock are older. I think the only possible contemporary to Kirk in terms of his Academy days would be Scotty, but Simon Pegg is skewing much older than Chris Pine.So the question is how do they get together? Thus, our story.

Bert! Don't even joke about Gervais in, well, anything -- it's asking for somethiing bad!

I'm anxious to see how Anton Yelchin does in the Chekov role. I think I'm only one of seven people who saw him in House of D, but I thought he did an awesome job and shows a lot of potential. Of course, he was a boy playing a boy in that role so he was supposed to look young. We'll see how it works in Star Trek.

Umm...

Chekov in the series is - what? Early twenties? While I guess Kirk is late thirties?

If this is Kirk in the academy (18, 20 years earlier?) Chekov would be... four?