We’ve been talking all week about EW’s most recent cover story, which featured Star Trek XI stars Zachary Quinto and Chris Pine as Spock and Kirk.

The full cover story is now online (8 pages!) at EW and it’s definitely worth a full read. It contains several tidbits about the film, as well as a few spoilers, some of which we’ve covered already, but below are a few more items we’ve yet to mention.

Also, new images from the upcoming J.J. Abrams Trek prequel were also released, some of which we were able to snag some hi-res versions (all new images are here below).

• The film’s budget was confirmed as $150 million, which allowed for better special effects than previous Trek films.
• The first full theatrical trailer will run ahead showings of the new James Bond movie Quantum of Solace beginning November 14.
• Abrams: “I think a movie that shows people of various races working together and surviving hundreds of years from now is not a bad message to put out right now.”
• The USS Enterprise still has a saucer front section and pronged rear engines; the bridge is still oval with the giant view screen and captain’s chair and has plenty of nods the one from the original television series, but was given a bright Apple Store-like glass design and handrails for the crew to grab during turbulence.
• Abrams: ‘We weren’t making a movie for fans of Star Trek … We were making a movie for fans of movies.”
• Phasers will be “sleek silver gizmos with spring-triggered barrels that revolve and glow in the transition from ’stun’ to ‘kill.’”
• We’ll get to see how the most popular members of the USS Enterprise crew — Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Uhura, Sulu, Scotty, and Chekov — came together and explores the origin of Kirk and Spock’s friendship.
• The plot involves time-travel, which is how Leonard Nimoy will be able to reprise his iconic role as Spock. Nimoy’s Spock will meet up with either young Kirk (Chris Pine) or young Spock (Zachary Quinto), perhaps both of them.
• Zachary Quinto campaigned for the part of young Spock and was approved by Leonard Nimoy; Chris Pine was one of three candidates to play the young James Kirk.
• Kirk will mainly be dressed in black, which are space-cadet colors in Abrams’ Trek universe.
• The story will take us to Earth, a harsh ice planet, and Spock’s home world of Vulcan.
• The filmmakers were given “the freedom to reinvent the [Star Trek] mythos as needed.”

SPOILERS

• The story will incorporate a wide range of Trek lore with the inclusion of former Enterprise captain Christopher Pike (Bruce Greenwood, as well as Sulu’s swordplay and classic lines such as “I have been, and always shall be, your friend.”
• Kirk and Spock infiltrate a Romulan warcraft, but their mission explodes into a raging phaser fight.
• The open sequence involves a Romulan attack led by new villain Nero (Eric Bana) on the Federation starship USS Kelvin, which is what sets the events of the movie in motion. This opening is said to be “an emotionally wrenching passage that culminates with a mythic climax sure to leave zealots howling ‘Heresy!’ According to producer Damon Lindelof, “The movie is about the act of changing what you know.”

Star Trek XI is scheduled to open in theaters on May 8, 2009.

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