It's a Vulcan woman with pointy ears, how many contenders are there...?

There's a lot of pussy-footing going on today about Star Trek writer Roberto Orci's iPad slideshow, where he showed to assembled press pictures of various actresses likely to take up a role in the sequel to Star Trek (2009). And drew Vulcan ears on one of them.

Well, either Orci (and J.J. Abrams, if he was on it - he was certainly present) is having some fun with us all or we shall be seeing a return of Lt. Saavik to the franchise, as played by Kirstie Alley in Star Trek II: The Wrath Of Khan (1982) and - to a little less acclaim - Robin Curtis in Star Trek III: The Seach For Spock (1984).

It's good to ear, er, err on the side of caution, but I can't think of any other Vulcan female role of any note that could be reprised from the franchise since Winona Ryder fell down that chasm in Vulcan's last moments, in 2009's Star Trek.

And yes, Saavik would be rather young if Abrams were to stick to canon, but since he blew canon into space-dust in Star Trek...

So the novelty is either that it's Saavik returning, or that some huge actress is going to play another Vulcan, and I'm thinking the former choice is more likely.

For a long time, Saavik, a Vulcan starfleet officer who was semi-apprenticed to Mr. Spock in the 1980s Star Trek movies, was set to make a third appearance in the original-crew films of the 1980s/90s, and take the role of a traitorous Vulcan ultimately played by Kim Cattrall in Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country (1990). But a commentary track for that film reveals that it was felt too hard on a new and quite well-loved Star Trek character to paint her in so unkind a light.

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