Star Trek Beyond scribe Doug Jung is ready to warp from one sci-fi niche to another now that The Wrap brings word that the writer will pen Paramount and Bad Robot’s original sci-fi thriller, God Particle.
Drafted in to touch up the original screenplay pitched by Oren Uziel (Freaks of Nature, 22 Jump Street), the veteran TV writer became an instrumental part of Beyond following Roberto Orci’s exit. There, he worked in tandem with Simon Pegg to produce a story for the USS Enterprise’s next space-faring mission, though Jung’s next treatment will be decidedly darker than the fist-pumping adventures of Captain Kirk and his crew.
Sharing a name with the long sought-after and elusive Higgs boson – scientists identified the subatomic particle in 2012 – God Particle will revolve around a group of American astronauts who may have inadvertently decimated planet Earth by jump-starting a particle collider. In theory, the gargantuan machines accelerate particles close to the speed of light using electromagnetic currents, allowing scientists to measure gravitational effects and how the charged particles interact with one another.
Experimenting with mass within a small space could, potentially, pave the way for the creation of miniature black holes, and we imagine that Paramount and Bad Robot’s thriller is angling its story around a particle collision gone awry. Adrift and seemingly alone in the dark recesses of space, God Particle then finds the crew of astronauts come in contact with a foreign group of human explorers, and they make the ill-advised decision to bring them onboard.
Simmering in development for some time, last we heard Nigerian-born director Julius Onah was in contention to helm God Particle, though we await to hear any further update now that Doug Jung has been brought on board. Star Trek Beyond, meanwhile, will zip into theaters in time for July 22, 2016.