Is Joe Cornish Still In Contention To Direct STAR TREK 3?

At the end of last week came news that Paramount had hired neophyte writers J.D. Payne and Patrick McKay to work with Roberto Orci on the screenplay for the studio’s third Star Trek film. Part of that story was the fact that JJ Abrams, who had successfully rebooted the franchise, would be unavailable to direct the third film as he would be busy with his duties on reviving the Star Wars franchise for Disney. But what seems to be not so clear is who will be directing the film.

Some sources, such as the Hollywood Reporter, stated that Attack The Block director would probably be the man behind the camera as he was “high on the wish list” of the studio.

But Variety reported that something different, that Cornish is no longer involved.

So what is the case? Both have decent sources, to the point where I am not really able to rank one of them over the other in terms of veracity. I think that we have to look at how quickly each outlet got their post online. The Reporter had it up exactly at 4 pm Pacific time on Friday while Variety had it 49 minutes later. Did Variety‘s reporter take the extra time to check on Cornish’s standing with the project? Perhaps. And with that slightly later publication time I suppose we can take Cornish’s non-involvement with the film as the current state of affairs. Which is a shame.

Paramount is hoping to get Star Trek 3 into theaters for the franchise’s 50th anniversary in 2016.