From one director to another, "Star Trek Beyond" helmer Justin Lin is showing his respect to previous helmer J.J. Abrams (who is now handling 'Star Wars: The Force Awakens') by paying tribute to his work "Star Trek: Into Darkness."
"(Co-writers) Simon (Pegg) and Doug (Jung) and I have spent some time on that," he laughingly shared with Birth Movies Death. "'Star Trek' has been around for 50 years, and every filmmaker that comes on has a different point of view, and it's a universe that can support many points of view and journeys and adventures. I embraced what JJ has brought - without him this whole group wouldn't be together - so I'm definitely very appreciative of him."
Abrams' movie revolutionized the sci-fi franchise with inter-planet beaming so there will be no more need for spaceships. At the same time, they discovered that the blood of Khan has magical healing properties. When asked if he acknowledged it in "Star Trek Beyond," Lin gave an ambiguous answer.
"At the same time, do we address it? No, but we don't discount it. We don't sit there and say it doesn't exist, it's part of this universe now," he said.
Lin then tackled when "Star Trek Beyond" will open, and where audiences will find the characters.
"We pick the crew up about two and a half years after 'Into Darkness.' There were many iterations where we did go and explore (Carol Marcus, who shares a relationship with Captain Kirk), but we figured it was two and a half years..." he shared. "It was something we talked about and worked on, but in the presentation of this film it didn't quite fit in. It's there with the transporter and everything."
As for the relationship between Spock and Uhura, Lin somewhat revealed that the two have cooled things off in "Star Trek Beyond."
"What we're doing is appropriate to the two and a half years. It's a continuation in a way, and I don't want to ignore things and act as if they don't exist, so there's an acknowledgement and I think their relationship is consistent to the way it was before," he said.
The sci-fi franchise continuation will feature a stellar cast including Chris Pine, Idris Elba, Zachary Quinto, Zoe Saldana, Karl Urban, Simon Pegg, and many others.
"Star Trek Beyond" will make its way to cinemas on July 22, 2016.
