2 months to filming and still....no....Kirk?

[Quark's Lobe]

Not to get all doom & gloom, because I absolutely want this film to be awesome, and I expect it will be, but is anybody else getting a little worried that filming is supposedly to begin as early as 8 weeks from now, and they apparently still don't have a young Kirk cast? As Spock-oriented as the story seems to be, Kirk must surely still be the heart and soul of this movie. I really expected them to trot out their Kirk along with Quinto at Comic-Con, and felt sure that when that didn't happen, it would only be a matter of days before they announced their Kirk. Now here I am, weeks later and checking AICN each morning for word of the new Kirk, and nada.

To me, the difficulty they are obviously having in casting this role is a credit to Shatner. He put such a wonderful stamp on the character that Abrams is having difficulty finding a young actor with enough charisma to come close to living up to Shatner's Kirk. But the closer November gets, the more concerned I get that they're just going to have to plug somebody into the role simply because they've run out of time and filming is about to begin. Here's hoping that they can stick to their guns and find their ideal Kirk rather than be forced to insert an unworthy actor at the last minute. C'mon J.J., the ideal young Kirk is out there... Go find him!

 

[number6]

I suspect a great deal of things will remain "under wraps" until they are good and ready to tell us something"official." The sky is not falling.

 

[Saul]

Nobody said the sky was falling, they just wondered when will Kirk get cast. It will probably go right down to the line. I'm sure they are in the full process of finding the right Kirk.

 

[gastrof]

Quark’s Lobe said:
2 months to filming and still....no....Kirk?

They're waiting for Shatner to come down on his price and agree to an extensive weightloss program prior to filming.

This is why he's not in the film like Nimoy is (so far). It's because they wanted him to play Kirk in both eras, and it hasn't all been worked out yet.

With the right makeup, I'm sure it'll work. Why recast the lead when the original is still available?

 

[Quark's Lobe]

^^ That would rock. But in all seriousness, I just don't think they could keep something as big as Kirk's casting under wraps for more than a couple of days. Quinto's official announcement came as no surprise to anyone - everyone already knew. Similarly, I suspect Kirk's casting will be known to the public well before the 'official' announcement.

 

[Kokomo]

I will admit that I am on the edge of my seat about all this, but I have faith that the announcement will come soon and we will all be put to ease. Quinto is the perfect person to play a younger Spock, so I suspect that Abrams and crew are doing everything they can to find the perfect Kirk as well.

 

[Who_Trek]

I'm still available

Seriously, I'm sure we'll here something soon. I'm more interested in McCoy to be honest.

 

[Skywalker]

Is there any big media convention or anything between now and the beginning of filming? If so, I wouldn't expect any Kirk news until then.

 

[Woulfe]

Shatner's not in it, nor will he ever be. Why ? Because I think it'd be nice if he was in it.

Unfortunaly Hollywood doesn't give a rat's @$$ what I want anymore, so he won't be in it for that reason.

In other words, no matter how much you wish for it to happen it just isn't going to happen because TPTB have made thier choices already and it's clear that this isn't in the cards.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Quark’s Lobe said:
Not to get all doom & gloom, because I absolutely want this film to be awesome, and I expect it will be, but is anybody else getting a little worried that filming is supposedly to begin as early as 8 weeks from now, and they apparently still don't have a young Kirk cast?

No, and I can't think of a reason to be concerned. As long as they cast the character in time for costume fittings, there's no problem.

 

[DeafPoet]

The only thing I sometimes think about as November nears and there's no Kirk announcement is 'Just how Spock-centric is this thing?'

But then I remember I need to suppress the little knee-jerk reactionary in me. You guys know what I'm talking about. We're Trek fans after all

 

[23skidoo]

It's not unusual for 11th hour casting to happen. Filming of the Bond film "The Living Daylights" actually began before Timothy Dalton had been cast, and similarly shooting of Casino Royale was already well under way before the female lead in the picture had been chosen.

There's probably some method to this madness. No matter who is chosen there will be a hue and cry from the Trekkie fanbase and there will be the eruption of "XYZ-is-Not-Kirk" websites (the odds are even money on that). If they announce their new Kirk as filming begins, then it doesn't give the masses time to mount any sort of negative campaign, unlike the CraigNotBond forces who had a few weeks to rally their troops when he was cast as Bond, which led to some negative publicity that was distressing to the actor, although all turned out well in the end.

Cheers

Alex

 

[Lord Garth]

I'm pretty sure this is how it's going to go:

October __, 2007 -- Kirk is cast out of the blue during a day people were thinking about it the absolute least.

First week after said date -- _____NotKirk will appear, similar to CraigNotBond. 3-5 threads will be started regarding the subject. All but one will end up closed by me and at least a few warnings to both sides will be issued.

November -- Filming has begun. There will be no leaked footage. Plenty of threads wondering about the footage.

December -- Entertainment Tonight does a segment on Star Trek. Traffic explodes. We get our first look at the Enterprise. Reaction will be louder than the reaction to the NX-01 from a relative handful but the reaction to the Enterprise will not be as bad as the reaction to the NX-01 overall.

January 2008 -- By now I'll have an idea of how the forum will look in the long run.

December 2008 & January 2009 -- Huge spike. Still not as bad as the ENT forum in its heyday but a heavier deal than the NEM forum was.

February or March 2009 -- Forum dissolved.

 

[Warp Coil]

I don't expect to hear any Kirk casting news until just before filming. We still haven't received confirmation on any other casting (McCoy, Uhura, Scotty, Sulu) and I expect Kirk to be the last name announced.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Lord Garth said:3-5 threads will be started regarding the subject. All but one will end up closed by me and at least a few warnings to both sides will be issued.

That much is certain.

 

[Balthier the Great]

I think we may have a Kirk, but they want the "leak" to happen much much later. My best guess is that this guy is a brand-name actor, someone the public already knows -- and they're waiting because they want to make a splash with the announcement in the NonTrek Press.

Besides which, the longer a XXX-NotKirk site stays up, the harder it will be to make nontrekkies want to see the film.

 

[number6]

Non Trekkies aren't really going to care about any of this _____notkirk stuff any more than Non-Bond fans cared about the Bond in Casino Royale.

 

[JBElliott]

If the plot ideas we've seen on AICN are even close to being correct, Shatner won't be needed for much filming at all. But he'll be there for his few scenes that will end the movie.

 

[DeafPoet]

JBElliott said:
If the plot ideas we've seen on AICN are even close to being correct, Shatner won't be needed for much filming at all. But he'll be there for his few scenes that will end the movie.

Alternatively, he's not in it

 

[C.E. Evans]

I really don't think we won't officially know who the new Kirk will be until November myself, but I believe "they" already have an actor on their shortlist...