Star Trek XI due Christmas 2008

JJ Abrams, mastermind of the WB classic “Felicity,” is officially on board for the next Star Trek movie as director, and Paramount has announced that it will shoot this fall for a Christmas Day 2008 release. Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman (Alias, The Island, Transformers) will write the screenplay. You can see the full press release here.

So thats the official line. What of the rumor mill? Cinematical has some reports on casting that sound kind of… suspect. When the word first went around of a series reboot, we heard stuff like Kirk & Spock in the Academy and young Star Trek. A prequel, like Muppet Babies. Now some names are flying around and depending on who you ask, they’re close to signing or already cast. But some of these actors are a bit older, so maybe the prequel thing is out the window. So who is who?

• Matt Damon as James T Kirk. I just watched The Departed last night looking for Kirk and I think he can do it. Damon is one of the best, and the only thing he’ll do that Shatner didn’t is give a performance without camp.
• Adrien Brody as Mister Spock. Another great actor, an Academy Award winner at that. The hardest part about Vulcans is taking them seriously with those ears, especially for someone so well known already.
• Danel Dae Kim as Hikaru Sulu. He’s best known as Jin Kwon on LOST, but also has some experience on Trek. He played Corporal Chang in 3 episodes of Enterprise!
• Gary Sinise as Dr Leonard McCoy. I can think of few others more suited toward the role as the incredulous ship’s doctor. He comes on board much older than the rest of the crew, and certainly older than Deforest Kelly in the original series.

It remains to be seen how this will pan out, but Star Trek definitely needs some help now or this franchise will die.