Sci-Fi

Cloverfield = Monster Hit

Cloverfield, the monster movie produced by Star Trek producer/director JJ Abrams and Star Trek exec. producer Bryan Burk, scared up over $40 Million in its opening weekend (domestically). This makes it the biggest January opening of all time. The film is also playing strongly in the handful of foreign markets where it has opened so far. All in all the low-budget film has grossed over $50 Million (which means it has already in the black…very rare for an opening weekend).


Abrams On Shatner and Star Trek Audience

JJ Abrams called into the the Adam Carolla Show on Thursday morning to talk Cloverfield and Star Trek. In the interview Abrams joked you might need Dramamine to deal with Cloverfield’s shaky cam style. He also talked about the origin of the film title. Regarding Trek he discussed why Shatner has not been cast and how he is approaching the new Star Trek film. Details and audio below.




Cloverfield TV Spots

In just 17 days the JJ Abrams-produced monster movie Cloverfield (along with the teaser for some Star Trek movie) hits the big screen. The buzz on the film is heading to fever pitch and Paramount has released a whole mess of TV spots for the movie (7 in total).Check them out below.


Cloverfield Director Talks Star Trek Trailer

Matt Reeves is the director for the JJ Abrams produced monster movie Cloverfield…and one of the few people who has seen the teaser trailer for Star Trek (which debuts with Cloverfield). He certainly is the only one talking about it on the record, saying “it’s a teaser trailer. But still, I was like ‘Wow!’ Just the scope of it, the scale of it, you just look at it and it’s so elegantly done.”


USA Cancels 2 Shows From Trek Vets

The USA Network has given the axe to two genre shows co-created by Star Trek veterans: The 4400 and The Dead Zone. The 4400 was created by Scott Peters and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine writer and producer Rene Echevarria. The Dead Zone was created for television by Deep Space Nine & Voyager co-creator Michael Piller with his son, Shawn Piller (who wrote for TNG and VOY). Both shows also featured a number of Trek vets both in front of and behind the camera.



Striking Sci-Fi Showrunners Offer Fan Prizes For Support

Well the WGA strike continues, and it looks like some of the initial optimism from last weeks renewed talks has turned to pessimism. As reported before, one of the things writers are doing to ask for fan support is join in the Pencils2MediaMoguls campaign where you buy $1 boxes of pencils and send them to studio executives in the name of your favorite show. Now showrunners from Battlestar Galactica, Eureka, Lost, and Smallville are offering up prizes to fans who send in the boxes.


Star Trek Teaser Coming With Cloverfield

Earlier this month TrekMovie.com reported that the first teaser trailer for the Star Trek movie was in the works and it could possibly end up in front of the J.J. Abrams-produced monster movie Cloverfield in January. Earlier today Screenrant cited a source saying that the trailer will indeed be seen with Cloverfield and TrekMovie.com has just confirmed this report.


Cloverfield’s Slusho Appears On Heroes – Takei Takes A Sip

The connections to NBC’s Heroes and Star Trek (past and present) are numerous, but now it looks like there is also a link to JJ Abrams monster movie Cloverfield. One of the ‘viral’ sites for Cloverfield is Slusho.jp, a fictional Japanese frozen drink company. Slusho drinks have shown up in the last two episodes of Heroes. Here is a clip from last night:


Ron Moore Blogs About Time Writing For Trek

Two weeks ago TNG and DS9 writer (and Battlestar Galactica co creator) Ronald D. Moore set up his own blog mostly focusing on issues related to the WGA strike. However, yesterday Moore delved into his time as a cub writer for TNG in a post titled “The Trek Journals — One in an Occasional Series.” Moore recalls a particularly amusing anecdote about how the writers would spy on meetings between executive producer Rick Berman and show runner Michael Piller:



Strike May Cut Heroes Season In Half + Lost and BSG Also Affected

TrekMovie.com recently reported that the new Star Trek movie should not be impacted by the WGA strike scheduled to start on Monday, but it appears that many TV shows are not so lucky. Heroes, the hit show featuring the new Spock (Zachary Quinto) along with recurring guest spots for a number of of other Trek veterans (Nichelle Nichols, George Takei and Dominic Keating) may only get 11 episodes this season. TV Guide is reporting that the Heroes production has shot an alternative ending to the show schedule to air on December 3rd which will allow it to act as a ‘season 2 finale’ instead of just the planned ‘volume 2 finale’ (Heroes’ 2nd season was originally planned to have 2 ‘volumes’).


1-18-08/Cloverfield Trailer (and title) Coming Soon

Remember that monster movie J.J. Abrams is producing codenamed ‘Cloverfield’ coming out on 1-18-08? It is the one the teaser site (1-18-08.com) with just random photographs and viral sites like slusho.jp and various MySpace pages for the films characters. Well Paramount will be releasing the first full trailer for the mysterious film in front of Beowulf on November 16th. The trailer will reveal the final name for the film, which has been the subject of much debate. Now CHUD.com reveals that they have seen a draft of the trailer…click for details. But it looks like in the end the title will actually be…Cloverfield. TrekMovie will put up the trailer when it becomes available.


Rumor: Mike Vogel As Kirk?

A new name is now linked to be in the running for Kirk. IESB.net reports that  28-year-old actor Mike Vogel (Poseidon) is " the front runner" to take on the role of James T. Kirk in J.J. Abrams new Star Trek film. IESB cites ‘two studio insiders,’ but acknowledge no confirmation. TrekMovie.com cannot confirm or deny anything except that has no Kirk deal has been done. Sources have recently told TrekMovie.com that Abrams and his casting team have found the task of picking a new Kirk quite challenging. Vogel does have a connection to the Trek team as one of the stars of next January’s untitled monster movie (aka ‘Cloverfield’, aka ‘1-18-08’) being produced by J.J. Abrams and fellow Trek producer Bryan Burk.


JJ Abrams Speaks About 1-18-08 – Movie Sites Have Yet To Be Found!

It seems that JJ Abrams is frustrated that people haven’t found the hidden websites for the monster movie he is producing. He tells AICN that all this ethanhaas stuff is actually not his movie. This is a bit strange because it was Paramount that was taking down videos from that site posted on YouTube…so I guess they are for some other new mysterious Paramount movie. JJ’s message… Regarding the online stuff you posted: yeah, we’re doing some fun stuff on the web. But, obviously, if the movie doesn’t kick some massive ASS, who gives a rat’s about what’s online? So as you can imagine, we’re focusing mostly on THAT. For what it’s worth, the only site of ours that people have even FOUND is the 1-18-08.com site. The others (like the Ethan Haas sites) have nothing to do with us. OK TrekMovie.com readers…I want you to go out there and find those website and send them in via the tipline…your country needs you!



‘Cloverfield’ Viral Campaign Video + More Details On The Movie

It is now confirmed that the ethanhaaswasright.com game site (and blog) is definately part of the Paramount marketing campaign for the new J.J. Abrams horror/monster movie (code named ‘Cloverfield’). Community member Markus has been playing the game and has collected some of the payoff videos (unfortunately Paramount have taken some down but there are still two up).[UPDDATE: OK we were wrong….the EthanHaas site is not part of the movie, but we still cannot figure why Paramount were removing videos from it off YouTube]



Cloverfield Teaser Update

We have another follow-up on the rumors of a JJ Abrams teaser trailer running with Transformers (opening wide July 2). It is confirmed that there is a trailer, but it is definately not for his new Star Trek movie. In actuality it is for the mysterious JJ Abrams horror/monster movie project called ‘Cloverfield’ (possibly just a codename) which we reported on in February. People at Paramount still will not talk on the record but sources tell TrekMovie.com that the buzz about the film is all part of a kind of viral marketing push. Cloverfieldmovie.com was redirecting to Paramount, but now it is not anymore (the domain was purchased earlier this year shortly before word of the project was first leaked). [UPDATE: Abrams will produce the film along with Bryan Burk. Drew Goddard (Buffy, Angel, Alias, Lost) is writing and Matt Reeves (Felicity) is directing).] Here is a description of the trailer[UPDATE plus a link to a leaked version]:


There Is NOT A ‘Star Trek’ Teaser Showing With Transformers

There is another one of those rumors on the internets that there is a ‘Star Trek’ teaser trailer attached to the Transformers film, premiering next week. I can categorically say that this is 100% not true. There is however a possible kernal of JJ Abrams truth to the rumor. Apparently there is a teaser trailer for the JJ Abrams produced horror movie ‘Cloverfield’ that is out there and apparently will be shown with Transformers [see previous story]. Although it has been confirmed by sources that Cloverfield is a real JJ Abrams project, Paramount are still not even acknowledging that the film exists and apparently this whole hubbub is all by design (it is still not even certain if ‘Cloverfield’ is a real titled). It seems they are trying to build some sort of buzz for this ‘secret’ project. Anyway…no more need to send in any more tips about this ‘JJ Abrams’ trailer…mystery solved. Once the film is officially released next week we will hopefully have more information on the trailer and the project. The first ‘Star Trek’ teaser’ is a long way off.   MORE: Click for ALL Cloverfield coverage


Orci & Kurtzman Working On New TV Pilot w/ Abrams + ‘Cowboys & Aliens’ Movie + New Info on Abrams ‘Cloverfield’

At a writers workshop held in Santa Monica on Thursday, Star Trek co-writer Alex Kurtzman said that he and writing partner Roberto Orci are writing on a new TV pilot with JJ Abrams. The three worked together in TV before on the show Alias and it would be the writers first time back on TV since that show ended. Abrams has a multi-million dollar TV production deal with Warner Brothers, but so far has only announced one show for HBO (a medical drama). After the event Roberto Orci told TrekMovie that it was not a Star Trek show and that they still don’t know if the show is for network TV, HBO or cable. He did say it will probably have some sci-fi/genre elements (kind of like Lost and Alias have some genre elements but are not ‘spaceship scifi’), but they are still working out the details. If the show follows the usual pilot season schedule then it wouldn’t really kick into production until Spring of 2008, which would be after Star Trek enters its post production phase.


More Rumors: Abrams To Direct Dark Tower Adaptation? [UPDATED: Rumor somewhat confirmed]

The ‘Abrams is going to direct another movie’ rumors keep flying. Now IGN is reporting that Abrams will direct an adaptation of the Stephen King series "The Dark Tower." IGN claim their sources indicate an announcement is forthcoming, but are not sure if the project is for TV or film. Dark Tower is a popular 7 book series that mixes elements of sci-fi, fantasy and westerns. IGN speculate that the Dark Tower project may related to the previously reported mysterious "Cloverfield" project. TrekMovie.com has recently confirmed that Abrams does have multiple projects in the works (including one called Cloverfield) and that he is still considering directing Trek XI. Sources close to the production indicate that Trek XI news should also be forthcoming. Hopefully soon all the various Abrams projects and his involvement will be clarified. Even if Abrams does not direct Trek XI, all indications are that he will still produce and that the project is still moving forward (but is yet to get the official ‘green light’). UPDATE: Hollywood Repoter confirms talks between King and Abrams


Abrams & Trek XI Update

This has been a busy week for JJ Abrams and Trek XI rumors, here is what we know. The decision on the green light for Trek XI is still pending, but things look good for it to start pre-production in the coming weeks. Multiple sources close to the production tell TrekMovie.com that Abrams is still involved in Trek XI as well as other projects at Paramount as part of his multi picture deal. We have learned that one of these other projects is a horror film called "Cloverfield", but (contrary to rumors) it should have not impact Star Trek XI. We can also confirm that it is not related to a ghost story script called "The Battle for Cloverfield" which was to be made by Columbia before going dormant in 2003. Many of the preparations for Star Trek XI are already underway with inquiries on availability going out to various crew people. The art department is slated to start going in March, with set construction probably starting in late Spring. We have also been told that as many as 5 stages have been set aside for Star Trek XI, all of which have been used for Trek TV and film projects in the past. There is no word yet on Abrams directing, but that decision should be made soon. Again this is Hollywood so things can change, but that is the status as of now.


Abrams Still On For Star Trek XI – May Still Direct

Again with the rumors. Latino Review (who pushed last week’s debunked rumor that Abrams has left the project) have now morphed their rumor into saying that Abrams will not direct Star Trek XI, but will direct a different film called "Cloverfield" for Paramount. TrekMovie.com have been told by a source close to the production that this rumor is "so totally wrong". Abrams is still attached to the project as producer, the film is still going forward, and preperation are being made (including a number of stages being set aside). No decision or deal (either way) has yet been made regarding if Abrams will be directing the film. In addition Abrams confirmed to AICN that he is ‘not off Trek’.Some of this confusion may be due to the fact that Abrams has a multi-picture deal with Paramount; in fact Greg Grunberg recently told IGN Abrams had 3 projects going at the studio right now. As we have been reporting, this month may be where many of the big decisions on Trek are made so expect more rumors and more fact checking here at TrekMovie.com. And of course, things change so take it all in with the usual grains of salt.