Simon Pegg wants Star Trek 3 to have ‘spirit of the TV show’

There’s been a bit of a flux in the Star Trek universe in the past year. The announced Star Trek 3 has shifted directors, losing J.J. Abrams (who helmed the first two in the reboot franchise), before being replaced by Roberto Orci, who had also written those movies. Of course, he dropped out of the project altogether: cue Justin Lin, known for his work on the Fast & Furious franchise, who will now officially direct. Simon Pegg – who plays Scotty in the movies – has also stepped up to write Star Trek 3, along with Doug Jung (who’s known mostly for his work writing for TV). Idris Elba is also heavily rumoured to be playing the as-yet unnamed villain.

This is, of course, great news: Simon Pegg is known as a geek prince in Hollywood, star of Shaun of the Dead and pop culture-rifled Paul among others. He’s recently spoken to Spinoff Online, stating his hopes for the movie and where he wants to take the franchise next.

‘But I think we just want to take it forward with the spirit of the TV show. And it’s a story about frontierism and adventure and optimism and fun, and that’s where we want to take it, you know. Where no man has gone before – where no one has gone before, sensibly corrected for a slighter more enlightened generation. But yeah, that’s the mood at the moment.’

With the disdain that Star Trek Into Darkness – the franchise’s last outing – was met with, it sounds like Pegg is the perfect person to get the series back on track. The spirit of the TV show is exactly where it needs to go next, and words like ‘adventure,’ ‘optimism’ and ‘frontierism’ are exactly what we need.

Star Trek 3 is released in the US July 8, 2016.