Simon Pegg plays Starfleet engineer Montgomery Scott in the rebooted Star Trek film franchise, but it now appears that he’ll also be doing some engineering behind the camera on the next installment of the series.
Deadline reports that Pegg will co-write the script for the sequel to Star Trek Into Darkness with Doug Jung, creator of the TNT television series Dark Blue. Pegg landed the gig after Roberto Orci vacated both the director’s chair and writing duties on the project in a highly publicized departure late in 2014. Fast & Furious franchise director Justin Lin was quickly named as the new director of the film, which is pegged for a 2016 premiere.
Fans should take heart that Pegg’s writing duties likely won’t take away from his role as Scott in the revamped franchise, and might actually end up with the somewhat under-used character getting a bit more time to give the U.S.S. Enterprise all she’s got.
While the Shaun of the Dead star is probably better known for his work in front of the camera, he’s co-written many of the films for director Edgar Wright that he also starred in, including the aforementioned Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz, and The World’s End. He also co-wrote the comedies Paul and Run, Fatboy, Run in recent years.
The still-untitled third installment of the rebooted Star Trek franchise is scheduled to hit theaters July 8, 2016.
