Benicio Del Toro Abrams’ Villain for STAR TREK Sequel?

It looks like things are going to get rough for the crew of the Enterprise because if J.J. Abrams has his way, Benicio Del Toro could be beaming into the Star Trek universe to cause problems for Captain Kirk and Mr. Spock in Star Trek: The Second.

Abrams is back at the helm for the sequel to the film that successfully relaunched the Star Trek franchise and he’s determined to keep things moving in the right direction because his choice for the baddie that will be squaring off against Kirk and crew has considerable Hollywood clout. Variety brings word that Oscar-winner Benicio Del Toro (The Wolfman, Sin City) is the frontrunner for the role of Star Trek bad guy. Del Toro had met with Abrams in the past to discuss the project but no deals have been made at this time and no details are known about the role Del Toro might play. In order to keep a lid on things, not even Del Toro knows anything specific about the part.

While nothing is known about Del Toro’s potential involvement, there’s never any harm in guessing so I’m going to toss my idea out there to see what others think. 2009’s Star Trek introduced us to a new bad guy, which was kind of essential in order to get the whole time-travel reboot plot to work so I think it would be cool to bring in a villain we’ve seen before. Wouldn’t Del Toro make a kick-ass Khan? Sure, it might be awkward to have Khan as the bad guy in Star Trek: The Second since he was also the bad guy the first time around in Star Trek II but there’s no rule that says it couldn’t happen.

What do you think? Will Abrams bring back Khan or another blast from the past or will we see an entirely new villain?

Production on Star Trek: The Second is expected to get underway in early 2012.