Geek hero Simon Pegg got himself in some trouble this week. After blasting geek culture for playing a role in the “dumbing down” of society and then having to explain himself (again) when the Internet rose up against him (again), he took on the topic of trying to make Star Trek Beyond “less Trek-y”. And that didn’t really make Things better for poor Pegg.

It seems the first Star Trek Beyond script, ran a bit too close to the source for Paramount. So Pegg is co-writing a new version and trying to make the movie more accessible — for geeks and non-geeks alike. In an interview with Radio Times Magazine, Pegg said, “People don’t see [Star Trek] being a fun, brightly colored, Saturday night entertainment like the Avengers.” So he wants to “make a western or a thriller or a heist movie, then populate that with Star Trek characters so it’s more inclusive…”

Wait, what?

Trek expert Devin Faraci writes, “Simon Pegg says stuff that could be freaking people out for no reason.” Pegg has a (seemingly) masochistic habit of doing that pretty much all the time, but if he’s on target about what the studio wants from the next Star Trek script, people are freaking themselves out for no reason.

As Faraci points out, “They just want to make it like the original Star Trek TV show. A show that was pitched as Wagon Train To The Stars, a space western. A show that had episodes where Kirk and Spock found themselves on a planet ruled by 1930s mafioso, a show where the spirit of Jack the Ripper took over Scotty and a show where one of the greatest episodes is a submarine battle story.”

Now, I’m a big fan of Simon Pegg despite some of his online antics. But he got it wrong (again) when he said Paramount is trying to make the next movie “less Trek-y.” Any true Trekkie can plainly see that they’re trying to make the next movie more Trek-y than the last.

Live long and prosper. See you next week,
Bobby