AceShowbiz -

"Star Trek 2" may have found a suitable actor to tackle the villain role. Variety reported that Benicio Del Toro has been eyed by J.J. Abrams to take the part and the director will make a formal offer to the "21 Grams" actor "before the weekend is out."

Del Toro, who won an Oscar for playing Javier Rodriguezs in 2000's "Traffic", has met Abrams to discuss the role. However, the actor, who will soon be seen in Oliver Stone's "Savages", reportedly still doesn't know what exactly the role is. That was said to be an effort to keep the role a secret.

The untitled Star Trek sequel is expected to kick off the production in early 2012, but no new release date has been set. It was previously scheduled for a June 29, 2012 release in U.S. theaters, but Paramount Pictures has decided to push back the release date in order to give the writers, Roberto Orci, Alex Kurtzman and Damon Lindelof, enough time to polish the script.

Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto and Zoe Saldana are all set to reprise their roles as James T. Kirk, Spcok and Nyota Uhura respectively. They are joined by Simon Pegg as Scotty, Anton Yelchin as Pavel Chekov, Karl Urban as Bones, and John Cho as Hikaru Sulu.