'Star Trek 2' Villain Watch: Benicio Del Toro's Khan Connection, Peter Weller Joins Cast

[NelsonG]

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"[url="http://www.mtv.com/movies/movie/423423/moviemain.jhtml"]Star Trek 2[/url]" news is starting to heat up with shooting set to commence in a little over a month, and most of the recent talk has centered on the sci-fi sequel's villains. We know [url="http://moviesblog.mtv.com/2011/11/07/benicio-del-toro-jj-abrams-star-trek-2-villain/"]Benicio del Toro is in talks[/url] for one of the key villain roles, but there's another bad guy reportedly in the mix as well.

Some new updates on the "Star Trek" nemesis front emerged over the weekend, including conflicting reports on who BDT is signing up for, as well as the enrollment of RoboCop. Get all that and more after the jump!

[b]»[/b] Late Friday (December 2) night, [url="http://www.latinoreview.com/news/exclusive-we-know-who-benicio-del-toro-is-playin-in-star-trek-2-15528"]Latino Review's El Mayimbe[/url] posted a scoop that Del Toro's character is none other than Khan Noonien Singh, the fan-favorite "Trek" villain played famously by Ricardo Montalban. Nothing official yet, of course, but El Mayimbe has an excellent track record for these kinds of scoops, including posting the first word on [url="http://www.latinoreview.com/news/exclusive-scoop-we-know-who-the-joker-is-ha-ha-736"]Heath Ledger's casting as The Joker in "Dark Knight."[/url]

[b]»[/b] However, El Mayime's scoop faces one serious detractor: none other than J.J. Abrams himself. The "Star Trek" director told [url="http://www.hitfix.com/blogs/motion-captured/posts/is-benecio-del-toro-playing-khan-in-star-trek-2-or-not"]HitFix[/url] that reports of BDT playing Khan are "not true." Nothing more, nothing less. It behooves a director to protect his film's secrets, of course, but that's a pretty firm denial from a man who is most certainly in the know. Consider this mystery unsolved as before.

[b]»[/b] In less murky news, [url="http://www.deadline.com/2011/12/original-robocop-peter-weller-adds-to-scifi-resume-with-star-trek-sequel/"]Deadline[/url] reports that "RoboCop" and "Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai" actor Peter Weller is joining the cast of "Star Trek 2" in an unknown capacity. But it's already known that there's a second, older villain in the "Trek 2" mix other than BDT—could Weller have landed that nefarious role? We certainly hope so!

[i]Tell us what you think of the latest "Star Trek" casting news in the comments section and on [url="http://twitter.com/mtvmoviesblog/"]Twitter[/url]![/i]



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