On the red carpet for Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol, MTV spoke to J.J. Abrams (producer of Mission: Impossible and director of Star Trek) about the Star Trek sequel planned to start filming next month for its May 17, 2013 release date. As usual, Abrams kept it vague, but he did let us know a couple new things:

“We’re shooting on film, 2-D, and then we’ll do a good high-end conversion like the ‘Harry Potter’ movie and all that. Luckily, with our release date now we have the months needed to do it right because if you rush it, it never looks good. We were talking about [shooting in IMAX] and I would love to do it. IMAX is my favorite format; I’m a huge fan.” [MTV]

Meanwhile, there’s a rumor going around that none of the original Star Trek TV show cast members will have cameos in the sequel:

The report about classic cast members being out of the running for inclusion in the sequel is less directly sourced. That comes from Roger Friedman, who quotes “sources close the next film” saying that no original Star Trek cast member has been invited to participate in the sequel. [/film]

Awww, I guess we’ll only get to see the Kirks arm wrestle the one time then.

In other news, we got our hands on some rare, totally real footage from another Abrams project. Oh man, I could totally see a group of red shirts doing this same scene in Star Trek 2.

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Someday, we’ll be mature enough to feature an article about George Takei that doesn’t have him running around sweaty and shirtless. Today is not that day.

Anyway, we recently brought you news that William Shatner and Carrie Fisher were having a not-entirely-serious feud on YouTube, which included at least two horrible images of William Shatner, one of which involves him wearing a T-shirt that seems to want to give the impression that his torso has been smeared with raspberry jam.

Now that you’re back from your bout of nausea, we bring you what should be the conclusion of this particular string of ironic jokes, George Takei’s opinion that we need to set our differences aside and focus on what really matters: destroying “Twilight”.

Considering I saw the latest movie five times as part of an endurance test, I’m forced to agree. Video under the jump.
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We’re less than two weeks away from the release of William Shatner’s “Seeking Major Tom” album. He isn’t singing to any mountains in this one, but he will be collaborating with Zakk Wylde, Peter Frampton, Lyle Lovett, Johnny Winter, Brad Paisley, Steve Miller, Sheryl Crow, Wayne Kramer, Dave Davies, “and many others” who Amazon doesn’t mention because they’re just too awesome.

I don’t know exactly how to express the reaction I had to this video, particularly the part where the sound guy next to him started gesturing along, so I’ll let this picture explain my feelings:

Yep. Get the hose.

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I’m not going to lie, “Star Trek II” is my favorite movie, ever, and the whole “KHAN!” meme can be kind of annoying. For a lot of people, it’s shorthand for “Ha ha, it’s a cheesy Star Trek movie! See how cheesy it is!” Which is unfair, since it’s a superb movie (and arguably the best naval thriller ever made) and it also really undercuts a great moment in the film. “Soylent Green” got the same treatment, although it was arguably worse since Heston never did the whole over-the-top “SOYLENT GREEN IS MADE OF PEOPLE!” that was the entire basis of that retarded SNL sketch in the first place. This is one of many reasons “Saturday Night Live” is bad and anybody still supporting it should feel bad.

Anyway, recently Shatner, being Shatner, had some fun at Comic-Con. While he was busy promoting “The Captains”, the documentary where he interviews anybody who’s played a Star Trek captain people actually care about (sorry, Bruce Greenwood), he actually got the entire crowd to roar “KHAAAAN!” at the same time.

Which, old meme or not, is pretty damn amusing. Video of this khan on the next slide.

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Remember that photo of William Shatner and Chris Pine arm-wrestling we ran the other day? Well, that was part of a documentary called The Captains, where William Shatner interviews all the actors that’ve played lead Captains on Star Trek. The trailer’s out for it and if you’ve ever wanted to watch William Shatner talk to Patrick Stewart, Avery Brooks, Kate Mulgrew, Scott Bakula and Chris Pine about…William Shatner, then this is the documentary for you.

The Captains will premiere on July 21 as part of EPIX network’s Shatnerpalooza, a 48-hour marathon of The Shat’s works, including all 6 Star Trek films and his appearances on other film and tv shows like Big Bad Mama, The Outer Limits and even his turn as host on the short-lived first Iron Chef America. (We’re betting you’re like us and have never even heard of EPIX before, but apparently it’s a network that’s a joint venture between Viacom, MGM and Lionsgate.)

We’re also betting nobody’s felt the need to sit down and watch two days of  William Shatner. Well, apart from Shatner himself.

Trailer after the jump!

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At first I thought the picture above (tweeted by EpixHD) was too awesome to be real, but then Slashfilm tipped me off to a documentary premiering on EPIX on July 21st 2011.  It’s called The Captains and follows William Shatner as he interviews other actors who have played the lesser Captain Kirks to his One True Kirk.  He talks with Patrick Stewart (The Next Generation), Avery Brooks (Deep Space Nine), Kate Mulgrew (Voyager), Scott Bakula (Enterprise), and Chris Pine.   So why did the interview with Pine involve an arm wrestling match?  Because he’s Shatner, of course, but we’ll let him explain it himself:

“He’s shy,” Shatner says of the 30-year-old actor who took over the role of James T. Kirk in 2009′s Star Trek prequel/reboot. “So the way I started the interview, I put out a table and chairs outside the Paramount gates, and arm-wrestled with him. That was the beginning of my interview with him. I think it broke the ice, that’s for sure.” [Canoe via /film]

No word on who won the match (we didn’t get a chance to check Shatner’s mood by the color of his shat afterwards), but we can’t discount the possibility Shatner won despite the age difference.  He’s not above stealing Nimoy’s bike or crafting a Gorn cannon on the fly.  He’s dash cunning.