If you don't know who director J.J. Abrams is, you've probably been living in a fallout shelter since 1965. This is the guy who created Alias and Lost, produced Cloverfield, and directed the best of the Mission: Impossible series, Mission: Impossible 3. This week, he takes Star Trek and the future Gene Roddenberry imagined in 1966 back to where it all began with Kirk, Spock, and McCoy at Starfleet -- and then into space for their first mission together. Origin stories aren't always cool, but this one is (and that's coming from a lifelong Trek fan). I sat down with J.J. recently to talk about his latest coup.

Cole Haddon: In trying to reinvent something that people obviously love so much -- some scarily so -- was there ever a moment where you thought, "Oh, my God, what the hell am I doing?"

J.J. Abrams: Yeah, there honestly were a few moments where I was looking at what we were doing from the outside in, and just started sweating, and was just terrified. You get so inside of it that you're talking about these characters and these issues, and Romulans and Klingons, and the starship. And then every once in a while, you're on the set, and you look at it from the outside, and you're like, "This is ridiculous!" I had to literally psych myself back into the moment and say, "This must be what Peter Jackson and George Lucas have gone through," and I'd get focused again. But because the script was so strong, because the characters were so good, and because the actors were so good, I felt like the risk of playing with something that is precious to many people was, to me, such a worthy risk. I felt like the result, if we did our job, could be a really fun movie and could introduce to so many people who had never seen it or thought it wasn't for them or had never even heard of it, these characters who are so wonderful.

CH: Casting such iconic roles must have been a nightmare. Was there ever a point where you worried you'd never find the right actors?

JJA: Casting the movie was a huge challenge, and we were incredibly lucky to find these actors. I've never had to cast something that had something that pre-existed it, where the actors have to take over these iconic roles. The key to each of these actors, and the one or two similarities, is that beyond just being incredibly talented, they're all funny. They all have a great sense of humor, and that was incredibly important because I knew Star Trek had been parodied so many times that it had to be funny from the inside out.

CH: It's impressive how the cast managed to capture the essence of the characters without doing caricatures.

JJA: All you needed to do was give these actors, who were young actors that were eerily accomplished and naturally wonderful, direction that was fairly clear because the characters were written so clearly. What was cool was that it didn't take much machination, even in the writing of the script, because the characters live. You read the script and you go, "Oh, these are those characters." As someone who was not a big fan, of course I did my homework before directing, and when I read the script, it's not like these are scenes and moments cut from other episodes or movies, but you felt them live and they were recognizable. You could read a line and go, "Oh, that's Bones." You'd just know it was Bones. It really speaks to the great paradigm that Roddenberry created in '66. These characters were so strong. They were archetypes, but they were also very specific. So that was great. And I said to all the actors, "Please do not do impersonations of any of these actors. This is all about you owning it, and the only way it's going to work is if you are free to do your thing." But the perimeters were so clearly defined in Alex [Kurtzman] and Bob [Orci]'s script that it wasn't like you had to push them to be more like those actors. We just did what was on the page.

CH: Today's vision of the future differs from the original series' vision quite a bit. What moments did you decide to keep, and how did you decide to update it?

JJA: It was a weird conundrum to do a movie with a vision of the future from today, based on a vision of the future from 50 years ago. But there were certain things that we all decided we wanted to maintain. As someone who was not a huge Trek fan to begin with, I had my instincts about things that I thought were important. But really Bob, Alex, [and the producers] Bryan Burk, and Damon Lindelof were much bigger Star Trek fans than I was, and they knew that there were things that needed to be maintained and details I never would have even been able to speak to. I just knew that the shape and silhouette of the Enterprise needed to be maintained. You don't want to change everything. If you're a fan, you go, "Oh, wow, it's different," but the casual fan or the non-fan will just say, "Oh, wow, it's a cool design." That was important. The prism through which everything had to be seen through was, "How do you take the spirit of what was created nearly half a century ago, whether it's character, prop design, ship design, the world of it or anything, and make it feel relevant for today?" and that was just a billion small decisions.

CH: There was a lot of debate about why William Shatner didn't wind up with a part in the movie since Leonard Nimoy was involved. Can you talk about that?

JJA: Nothing would have made us happier than to have William Shatner in this movie. His character died on-screen in one of the films. When we tried to figure out a way to put him in, every time we did it, it was a gimmick. Every time we figured out a way that we thought it could work, it ended up being a gimmick unless the whole story was about bringing him back, and that would have changed the entire story that we wanted to tell. So it was either change everything, or do it without him. But we definitely love Mr. Shatner. Working with him is something that we would obviously be thrilled to do, and wanted to do. It just literally didn't work for our story, and he didn't want to just do a cameo. We could have done a flashback, but he didn't want to do that. And if we had reinvented everything, it would have just been crazy.

CH: Talk about ending the movie with the original theme music and the dedication to creator Gene Roddenberry and his wife Majel.

JJA: From the very beginning I felt like the Alexander Courage theme music was something that was so celebratory that it just felt like the movie finally earns it, at the end. Until the family is the family, you can't really play that music. If it worked, you'd forget about that and you wouldn't be thinking about it. And then when the family comes together and the ship begins the five-year mission, it felt like the perfect icing on the cake. And the dedication was always intended for Gene because none of us would be here doing any of this, if it weren't for what he created. Sadly, when Majel passed away, we added her name to the card. We already had the card for Gene, so we added her name as well.

CH: And finally, everyone's already talking sequel. Alex and Bob were hired to write one. What can you tell me about it?

JJA: Obviously, it was a dream to work with these guys and the whole cast and crew, and it would be incredible fun to get to do it again. It is also insanely presumptuous to assume that it will work when it's out there, that people will like it, and that there will be a need for another one. If there is, the good news is that there's a deal for the writers and a deal for the actors. It's in place. We have not had one meeting. We have not had one discussion. There's no outline. There's no script. There's nothing. We're fishing for ideas.

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