15 Things You Never Knew About 'Star Trek' on its 10th Anniversary
It's now been ten years since Paramount Pictures rebooted one of the greatest sci-fi franchises of all time and gave us a brand new "Star Trek." This film helped reinvigorate the franchise and made stars out of the likes of Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto and Zoe Saldana. While we continue the wait for a a fourth movie that may never happen, enjoy this fun trivia about the making of this epic reboot.
1. The origins of the reboot can be traced as far back as 1968, when "Star Trek" creator Gene Roddenberry announced at a fan convention his plans to create a movie prequel detailing the formation of the Enterprise crew.
2. Before this film materialized, Paramount was developing a different reboot called "Star Trek: The Beginning." This version would have been set during the Earth-Romulan War and centered around Kirk's ancestor Tiberius Chase.
3. The crew relied on an abandoned Budweiser plant factories to depict the cluttered engine rooms of the Enterprise.
4.John Cho was initially reluctant to play the role of Hikaru Sulu, as Cho is Korean American and Sulu is Japanese American. However, original Sulu actor George Takei encouraged Cho to take the part.
5. In certain scenes, the special effects team had to completely reanimate Eric Bana and Leonard Nimoy's mouths. That's because Bana severely injured his teeth and Nimoy's dialogue was changed during the older Spock's first encounter with Kirk.
6. Kirk is shown eating an apple during the Kobayashi Maru training sequence. This mirrors a scene from "Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan" where an older Kirk eats an apple while recounting the story of that infamous scandal. According to director J.J. Abrams, this homage was completely accidental.
7. Winona Ryder was cast as Spock's mother Amanda, despite being only six years older than Zachary Quinto. This is because the film was originally supposed to include an early scene of Amanda giving birth to her son.
8. "Star Trek: The Next Generation" star Wil Wheaton provided voiceover dialogue for many of the Romulans on Nero's ship.
9.Karl Urban's Dr. McCoy mentions joining Starfleet after going through a nasty divorce. This pays homage to an unused story from writer D.C. Fontana, which was originally written for Season 3 of the TV series.
10. There's a reason Nero is MIA for so long in between traveling into the past and battling the Enterprise crew. A deleted subplot reveals that Nero and his crew were captured by Klingons and imprisoned for several decades.
11. IDW Publishing released several tie-in comic books that flesh out the events surrounding the film. 2009's "Star Trek: Countdown" explores the events that led to Nero's journey into the past and features Captain Picard as a major character. 2010's "Star Trek: Nero" expands on the movie's deleted Klingon subplot.
12. This turned out to be the final "Star Trek" film Majel Roddenberry worked on. Barrett provided the voice of Starfleet's computers dating back to the original TV series. She passed way in December 2008, two weeks after completing her dialogue for the reboot.
13. A lucky few fans were given a surprise early screening in April 2019. The Alamo Drafthouse advertised a screening of "The Wrath of Khan" with a special 10-minute preview of the reboot. Instead, Nimoy and the film's writers interrupted the film and asked attendees if they'd rather watch the new "Star Trek" instead.
14. Paramount initially planned for a fourth film in the reboot series to follow 2016's "Star Trek Beyond," one which would bring back Chris Hemsworth as George Kirk. However, the film was canceled in January 2019 after negotiations broke down with Pine and Hemsworth.
15. "Star Trek" may be getting rebooted all over again. Quentin Tarantino has pitched his idea for a movie and has voiced an interest in directing after completing work on "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood."
