STAR TREK 2 putting story and characters ahead of release date says J.J. Abrams

The idea of having Star Trek 2 in theaters by this next summer is not looking likely, and I think that is great news. As much as I would love to see a sequel today, I would much rather have a kick-ass story and characters to back it up.  J.J. Abrams is hard at work with his writers, Roberto Orci, Alex Kurtzman and Damon Lindelof, to flesh out characters and story elements before heading into pre-production, casting, scheduling and shooting the film.

Collider spoke with Abrams who was at the Television Critics Asscoiation to promote Person of Interest. Of course you can expect that the onversation got around to the Star Trek sequel - “Are you back focused on Star Trek 2 now?”

Yeah. There have been a lot of things that we’ve been working on, a lot of important elements that we just know we need to really nail down and solve. Once you say, “We’re ready to go, but we don’t have a finished script yet,” or “I’m directing the thing and here’s the release date, but we don’t have a finished script,” what starts to happen – and I’ve seen this happen with a lot of friends of mine – is that you’re suddenly in production on a movie that they’re thinking, “Oh my god, we weren’t really ready. We thought we’d get it done in time, but we didn’t.” So, while we have a moment to say, “Let’s get the important things figured out,” then all the pre-production stuff will come. But, I just want to make sure that we’re putting the story and the characters, the cast and the crew, and most importantly the audience, first before we start talking about exactly which locations we’re going to be shooting at and what the wardrobe and visual effects budgets are. It just seems important that we get the important stuff right first.

I loved the first film, but many die hard fans were not pleased. Hopefully this news will win them over. I am very excited for this film, What are your thoughts on this news?