December 25, 2008 will not be the release date for “Star Trek,” the next film in the famous franchise.
In a totally surprise move Paramount has decided to move the release of the J.J. Abrams film until May 8, 2009. This comes as good news to the director as he was hoping to launch his first venture into the Trek universe as a big summer hit vrs a holiday fare.
Paramount cites schedule reshuffling as the cause for the push back. It’s a move that will see many more of their scheduled films for 2008 shift from their proposed release dates including Ben Stiller’s “Tropic Thunder” going from July 11th to August 15th for the DreamWorks arm of Paramount and the Leonardo DiCaprio vehicle, “Shutter Island” to Oct 2009. According to Variety Eddie Murphy’s family pic “Nowhereland” is moving from September 26, 2008, to June 12, 2009 and the highly anticipated Renee Zellweger horror-thriller “Case 39” will be rescheduled from August 22, 2008, to April 10, 2009.
Paramount Studio wanted to ensure that “Star Trek” would enter theaters without any competition to speak of and this move to May 2009 will make that possible. The December slot was proving to turn troublesome with some big openers set for the week of and week before December 25. Abrams and Paramount want Trek to have a big successful opening so that future films for the franchise can be made with some assurance of recouping their investment of time, money and talent. The only real competitor will be “X-Men Orgins: Wolverine,” but it opens one week after Trek’s premiere, giving the space opera a full week of SF revenue before the Jackman film.
Since Paramount isn’t the only studio taking these measures with most of their films slated for late 2008, many are convinced it has more to do with readjustment after the writer’s strike than with finding optimum dates.
Since the writer’s strike, I expected something like this to happen. My big issue was will the movie be worth the wait until Christmas. I wasn’t too sure. Now, I have to say, I don’t believe it’s going to be worth waiting five more months for. I’m feeling like this is the end for one of Science Fiction’s biggest icons.
I will wait for it as long as it will take Khan to chase Kirk ’round the moons of Nibia, and ’round the Antares maelstrom … bound for the obscuring clouds of the Mutara Nebula……in other words, as long as it takes!
I’d rather they push out the release date and give Abrams more time to polish it up than rush it to a crowded holiday release. As mediocre as “Nemesis” was, the release date contributed heavily to its disappointing box office.
Agreed. Look at X-Men 3. It really wasn’t a bad movie per se, but you could tell it was a rush-job. If they’d had the extar 6 months they could’ve polished the story and the special effects, but Fox wanted to get it out ahead of Superman Returns, and the movie clearly suffered for it.
calling Nemesis “mediocre” is giving it far too much credit. Especially since we know the TNG crew can do so much more. Nemesis was the death of ST movies, hopefully this movie will be a resurection. On the other hand I’m really really tired of time travel stories. I’d love to see a new franchise about space travel that’s a bit more realistic.
Skiznot, a franchise about space travel that’s a bit more realistic? What, you want years passing between episodes? How boring would that be?
Time Travel is realistic in the 23-25th Century. 😉
Why do you people (scifi dude) have to always be doomsayers to anything relating to a neew Star Trek endeavour? I think some of you out there would rather go see a Star Trek movie starring the Remains of the original cast rather than let ANY new blood be pumped into the franchise. I for one look forward to a New Trek movie and so what if I have to wait a few more months. BTW scifidude how does waiting 5 more months doom Star Trek?
Robert,
Just picture Comic Book Guy from The Simpsons in your head then read his post in that voice to yourself. Makes a lot more sense that way 🙂
Hi Indiana Jim,
This gets off topic. In my mind there’s room for star trek and so much more. I guess by realistic I meant I wanted to see stories that are closer to doable and exploration of the local solar system. You don’t have to have years passing between episodes, but why not? Orson Scott Card and Alastair Reynolds tell stories that take into account the reletivistic effects of space travel. The thing to remember is the faster you travel the slower your clock runs. If you were able to travel .9999 the speed of light you would experience a 4 light year trip as less than a month. Back on earth 4 years go by but to the traveler it’s just been 20 days. Now there’s plenty of stories to tell there. Of course there has to be jumps in sci-fi and I really appreciate all the work the ST tv shows put into creating their on physics and trying to keep it consistent. It seemed to me ST used time travel more and more as a plot device (the backward kind) and it has the potential to become gimmiky. But in the end the story and characters is what matters most. The new Terminator show is all about time travel but I like it because it has heart. Here’s to hoping the new Star Trek movie has heart. 😉
Robert:
Actually, my point is I think Star Trek needs to move forward, not backwards. Especially when you consider most people think Enterprise was a dismal failure. However long we have to wait for the movie won’t make a difference.
BTW–I’ll see the movie because it is Star Trek. And I’m curious. I really hope I’m wrong and it will be a positive thing for the Star Trek franchise.