Idris Elba talks about his "groundbreaking" STAR TREK BEYOND villain

And from one story about Idris Elba not landing a groundbreaking role, to another where the British actor apparently will indeed be breaking some ground. That description’s according to the Luther star himself, as he spoke to MTV about his upcoming role as the main villain in Star Trek Beyond.

Much like his predecessor JJ Abrams, new franchise director Justin Lin (Fast & Furious 3 – 6) has kept a very tight lid on his production – hell, it took a random charity video of him breakdancing for us to even receive confirmation that Elba was actually in the movie – so at this point we know absolutely nothing about his character. And while Elba isn’t sharing any specifics, he did say that this will be something new for him.

“Simon [Pegg] and the team have written a very interesting, complex journey for my character. You’ve never seen me play a character like this.”

Since Elba’s played everything from a guy who cancelled the apocalypse to a guy who cancelled apartheid, him doing something new is quite intriguing. Of course there were rumours initially that he would in fact be having an old familiar face and playing a member of classic Star Trek villain race, the Klingons. Co-star/writer Simon Pegg quickly shot down that speculation though, and Elba now confirms that his character is a completely original creation that will put a new spin on franchise tropes.

“I think ’Star Trek’ has prided themselves as being quite classic when it comes to villains, like ’he’s a guy who wants to end the world,’ there’s no doubt about that. But in this version of the film, there’s a slightly different twist to that. It’s quite an interesting journey, which I think is groundbreaking for the franchise. But, it still keeps with the ’classic bad guy is a classic bad guy’ tone.”

Huh. Well that doesn’t clarify anything at all! On top of that, it seems though that Elba’s mysterious villain has some serious screen time as the actor has been burning the midnight oil on set.

“It’s been hard work. I’ve been doing 18-hour days. It’s tough work, but I’m looking forward to people seeing this film.”

Star Trek Beyond – which right now is pretty much the only thing we know for sure about this movie – also stars Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, Zoe Saldana, Karl Urban, Anton Yelchin and Jon Cho. It’s scheduled for release on June 22, 2016.

Last Updated: September 30, 2015