Star Trek Hits DVD and Blu-ray

J.J. Abrams’ Star Trek reboot is, hands down, one of the best films of 2009. It’s funny, there’s a ton of action and it makes Star Trek accessible to general audiences for the first time in a long time. I’m not an obsessive Star Trek fan (although I do own the original series and the first six movies on DVD), but I saw this film twice in theaters and have since watched it twice at home. I’ll still probably watch it at least once more before Thanksgiving rolls around. Yes, a Star Wars geek is fawning over Star Trek. Deal with it.

Since I haven’t made that jump to Blu-ray just yet (reminder: Christmas is next month), I picked up the two-disc DVD set on Tuesday, and I’m surprised how well this movie holds up on repeat viewings. And while surely not as in-depth as the Blu-ray, I dig the DVD special features, which include a few making-of featurettes and deleted scenes. My favorite sequence that didn’t make the cut? When the film’s Romulan villain Nero (Eric Bana) is captured by Klingons. Abrams and crew will probably revisit the Klingons in the sequels, and I can live with that.

Speaking of sequels, SCI FI Wire reports that we will likely be seeing the next installment in the revamped Trek franchise in 2012. At the November 16 DVD/Blu-ray launch party, Abrams and his crew also let loose with some minor spoilers. According to producer/writer Damon Lindelof, the sequel might feature some time shifting.

“One of the things we like to do as storytellers is drop you in the middle of something,” Lindelof said. “And the question that you're asking yourself is: Where am I in relation to the last time I left these guys? Could this be something that predated even, perhaps, some of the adventures that they had in the first movie? Does it happen five years later? Is it happening two seconds later? Who knows? So we’re not going to tell you.”

Abrams also hinted that the film will deepen the romance between Spock (Zachary Quinto) and Uhura (Zoe Saldana), and successfully dodged a question regarding the possibility of revisiting iconic Trek baddie Khan Noonien Singh.

“We’re not even at that stage yet, but the fun of where we are on the sequel is we could use some of what was done before in a new way,” Abrams said, to which co-writer Roberto Orci added, “That’ll be kind of a groupthink decision.”