Star Trek is out on DVD and Blu Ray now so you can marvel at the reinvention of the legend and pick apart the Easter eggs. Of course, one more chance to hear director J.J. Abrams talk about it is always welcome to. Abrams gave a press conference to support the home video release, in case there was anything Star Trek he hasn’t talked about yet, and whatever he won’t say about Star Trek 2 yet.

Q: You said that you wanted the hardcore fans to still like your take on Star Trek. How did they react to the film? Did they give you a lot of feedback?

J.J. Abrams: The hardcore fans? I think that luckily, because they didn’t kill us, the hardcore fans I think for the most part were okay with the movie. They are very vocal, passionate. I was warned time and again by many people, “You’ve got to be really careful. You must be terrified doing Star Trek.” It was a little nerve-wracking, mostly because people kept warning me about the fans but they seemed to really embrace it and I give complete credit to the cast that managed to take over these roles that were iconic roles even for people who didn’t know Star Trek well. Everyone sort of knew you had Kirk and Spock. Chris Pine, Zachary, Simon, John, Anton, Karl, the whole group just I think embodied these people in a way that made it safe for not just new viewers and new audiences but also existing fans to embrace those characters. And finally, because Leonard Nimoy was in the film in a meaningful way, he really provided the bridge between the existing Star Trek and what is now. We could never have made the movie without him.

Q: When you were making the film, how early were you planning the DVD content?

J.J. Abrams: I’m always thinking about the DVD part of it because I’m a fan of the DVD, so I want to make sure that we’re doing stuff that is going to be beneficial. If it’s about getting video crews in as early as possible to document moments that might seem insanely mundane or unimportant, but in a context of how things got made, the crew of a movie like this, and especially this crew worked so hard and they did such incredible work. So what I love about the special features is people like Michael Kaplan or Scott Chambliss or Roger Guyett or Michael Giacchino or any of these people get to take the stage and talk about and have documented the amazing work that they do, and often get credit for but don’t get screen time. So it’s a really nice thing to see them front and center.

Q: Since you did a prequel and got to wipe the slate clean, do you have any intention of using some of the old creatures, monsters or races in the sequel, or do you plan to just bring in a whole new thing?

J.J. Abrams: One of the deleted scenes on the DVD and Blu-Ray is a sequence where you actually see Klingons. But, in going forward, we’re just now working on the script and just beginning the process of story breaking.  

Q: How far ahead do you envision your involvement with the franchise? Is it a movie-by-movie basis for you, or do you see yourself involved with it for the foreseeable future?

J.J. Abrams: That’s a wonderfully optimistic question and I appreciate that, but the answer is that I cannot presume it’s going to be a series that goes beyond those. Do we have ideas for a few movies and have we discussed them?  Of course. You can’t help but go, “Oh, it would be really cool, if we could do this, or if we can set that up there?” You throw those things around. But, we can’t presume it’s going to be anything more than now another film that we’re lucky enough to do.

Q: Can you talk about the DVD/Blu-Ray feature “The Shatner Conundrum”? And, are you thinking about putting him in the next movie at all?

J.J. Abrams: The Shatner thing comes up quite a bit. As someone who was a William Shatner fan, in a huge way, just because of The Twilight Zone episodes he did, and then completely appreciating what he did in Star Trek, but not really becoming a fan until I started working on this movie, it was a foregone conclusion that we wanted Shatner in the movie. The problem was that his character died, on screen, in one of the Trek films, and because we decided, very early on, that we wanted to adhere to Trek canon, as best we could, which was a huge challenge, because even the original series, in many ways, didn’t always adhere to Trek canon, the required machinations to get Shatner into the movie would have been very difficult to do, given the story we wanted to tell, and also to give him the kind of part that he would be happy with. It was this thing where it would have felt like a gimmick, in order to get Shatner in the movie, which would have honestly, to me, been distracting. I will say that The Shatner Conundrum, which you’ll see on the DVD, talks to this. Having said that, would it have been fun to have him in the movie? Of course. Would it be great to work with him? No doubt. I was as excited to work with him, as I was Mr. Nimoy, who we luckily did have in the film. In terms of moving forward, I am open to anything. I would love to figure out something, given the challenge of introducing these new characters and given the burden of having to cast these people. We speak. We actually have a lunch date planned. I’m a fan. I’m a friend of his. Or, he’s at least a friend of mine. He may say otherwise on his blog today. I have no idea. But, I really couldn’t like him more and would love to work with him.

Q: What are your plans for Mr. Nimoy on Fringe?

 
J.J. Abrams: In terms of his role as William Bell, none of us could believe our luck that we convinced him to say yes to being on the show. He is wonderful on the show. And, I will say that this is not the last you will see of his character. I don’t want to give anything away, but this is not the last you’ll see of him. He is so good and so wonderful to work with that I wouldn’t limit the possibilities of what he’ll get to do.