TREK 2017 Will Go In a “Different Direction,” Says Meyer

March 1, 2016

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In a brief new interview with Den of Geek today, returning Star Trek favorite Nicholas Meyer spoke a bit about the upcoming 2017 Trek series, to which he will be joining showrunner Bryan Fuller as a writer and contributing producer.

About his role in the new show:

I can’t tell you anything! I know things. But if I told you, I’d have to kill you.

If I’m lucky, I’ll get to write episodes. If I’m less lucky, I’ll just get to sit in that room with all those other clever people…. I’m waiting for them to tell me [when to go to work]!

I’m hoping the reason I was invited to do this was connected to — presumably — something I would have to offer. Whether that is the case, or whether it’s recognized when it happens remains to be seen. I’m not a silver bullet.

On the nature of the new series’ story opportunities:

I think it’s going to be a different ‘Star Trek.’ It will go in a different direction. And I think that is probably good.

Because the thing that mainly troubles me about ‘Star Trek’ is the fear of it being maybe re-treads of itself. And to the degree that I had any influence on the [franchise] at all was that at least while I was there, we were fooling around. And if you’re not fooling around, then things can become stale.

I think that Bryan [Fuller] — who is a very clever fellow — has ideas — some of which I’ve heard—that are innovative and different. Different is what got me interested.

Meyer did have one cryptic thing to say about the “taking-off point” of the new show’s narrative, but he cautious about any specifics:

The one thing I can relate to you is that ‘The Undiscovered Country’ — according to Bryan — is a real sort of taking off point, or touchstone for how I guess he’s thinking about the direction of the new show. I don’t want to be misquoted and I don’t want to misquote him, but he’s fond of that film. Let’s put it that way.

Of course, that last statement will surely set off an explosion of speculation and assumptions about the direction the new series may take — anything from filling in the sixty years between Star Trek VI and the launch of the Enteprise-D in “Encounter at Farpoint” — but Meyer was obviously being careful to stay ambiguous before anything solid has been set in place.