Who is actor Benedict Cumberbatch playing in Star Trek Into Darkness? What is the scope of his role? Is he Khan, or will he be playing the part of an entirely new villainous character in the upcoming film? Little specifics are known about the part Cumberbatch will be playing, but fans have spent plenty of time speculating since promotional photographs for the film began to trickle out onto the web. And although the actor has yet to reveal very much information about his role, he has given fans a bit of a clue. In a recent interview, Cumberbatch discusses where he drew his inspiration from when he was studying the part. According to the actor, the best inspiration was ripped from the headlines: to prepare for 'John Harrison' Cumberbatch looked at "real social history and present history for inspiration.
…Real social history and present history, everything that's going on: uprisings, people who are trying to spread democracy or fight their cause, not necessarily through political means ... he is a terrorist, and sadly, that's part of the fabric of our modern world. You don't need to look far to research that one.
Yes, I did look at certain terrorist groups and the way they operated. But it was important for me to ground him in a reality which was based more on his story than say a parallel in the real world, but certainly what should be chilling is the parallels that you by necessity draw because there are such strong ones with the modern world and this story.
While that doesn't give us much information in terms of the character's identity, it does give us a bit more insight into the general scope and direction of the film. Clearly, Cumberbatch's character is a terrorist and it will be interesting to see whether the character manages to inspire a sort of "uprising" against Captain Kirk in the upcoming movie. What do you think? Do you believe that the film's antagonist is an entirely new character to the Star Trek universe, or do you believe we've seen him before?
Source: MTV
