Remember a month or so ago, when Roberto Orci basically said “Not so fast!” when discussing the third film in the rebooted Star Trek franchise? He said that there wasn’t even a script yet, and that- until then- we should hold our horses. Well, Orci has now gone ahead and confirmed that the first draft of the script is, indeed, done.
Ever the Trekkie, Orci sometimes lurks in the comments sections of TrekMovie, and has been known to post in them in the past. On Saturday, he posted this little revelation:
“boborci:
p & m & I wrote, “fade out” yesterday on first draft. things are moving.”
And, in order to be certain that he was talking about the third Trek and not one of the Universal Pictures monster movies he’s looking to produce- which is what the article he was commenting on was about- TrekMovie sought clarification that this was the first draft of Trek. “First draft is done,” he replied.
The “p & m” he referred to in the initial comment, of course, are JD Payne and Patrick McKay- who were hired to work on it with him shortly after it was officially announced that J.J. Abrams was exiting the director’s chair to head to Star Wars: Episode VII.
Star Trek III is expected to get a 2016 release date, and Orci has said he expects to start filming next Spring. The strength of this first draft will, obviously, help determine all that.
SOURCE: TrekMovie