STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS The Star Trek cast reacts to hearing the phrase Star Trek Into Darkness.
  • STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS The cast of Star Trek reacts to the phrase "Star Trek Into Darkness."

Okay, so:

Paramount Pictures has firmed up the title Star Trek Into Darkness for the J.J. Abrams sequel that brings back Chris Pine and the rest of his Trek cast. The Paramount/Skydance film will be released May 17, 2013. (Via.)

Paramount reportedly wanted to avoid having either a number or a colon in the title, so I guess turning the "trek" in Star Trek from a noun into a verb is... yes. It is certainly something one could do. (Note that—because Hollywood is terrible and this is how they think—the whole "into darkness" part is probably because of the success of The Dark Knight and the The Dark Knight Rises, which, as we all know, were successful because their titles contained the word "dark." As was Transformers: Dark of the Moon, and as will be next year's Thor: The Dark World. ANYWAY.) Space is dark, because it is space, so I guess this title will be factually true, if not tonally true? It'd be weird if this Star Trek was all mopey, seeing as how what made Abrams' first Trek so solid was how much fun it was.

ANYWAY AGAIN: The fact that the title now sounds like an instruction leaves me with a dilemma: When I'm at hip bars chatting with beautiful ladies, how do I say Star Trek Into Darkness? Like a sentence? Do I put a colon in there even though Paramount doesn't want me to? Please help me in the poll below, as the last thing I want to do—especially at a hip bar, especially in front of a beautiful lady—is to say Star Trek Into Darkness in a way that might make me sound uncool.

BONUS! A CONTEST! Whoever comes up with the best title for Star Trek 3 in the comments will win an ever-so-gently used hardcover edition of the acclaimed novel Star Trek: The Next Generation: Q-Squared! (Yes. This is the second time I have tried to give it away.) The only rule in this contest is that the first two words of the title must be "Star Trek," you have to use "trek" as a verb, and there can be NO COLONS and NO NUMBERS. Four hundred and thirty-four pages of Q-Squared goodness await the winner! To help inspire you, here is this image from Q-Squared's jacket.