The trades have finally gotten around to confirming the Uhura casting story broken by our friends over at TrekMovie two weeks ago. It’s official, Zoe Saldana is the new Uhura!

For JJ Abrams’s upcoming Star Trek prequel movie, Saldana steps into the Uhura role originated by the great Nichelle Nichols both in the first Star Trek television movie and the first six Trek movies. On the show, Uhura was often relegated to sitting in the corner and repeating messages, but she’s had her moments. Most notably she was one half of television’s first interracial kiss, making out with William Shatner in an episode of Trek. She was also responsible for one of the few good things in Star Trek V, a naked fan dance atop a sand dune. Saldana has her work cut out for her if she wants to fill Nichelle’s boots.

If you’re not familiar with Saldana’s work, you may still recognize her face. She had a small part in Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl as Anamaria and she’s been in movies like Drumline, Haven, and Guess Who where she co-starred as Ashton Kutcher’s love interest. She’s also one of the lead’s in James Cameron’s upcoming mega-blockbuster Avatar. In Steven Spielberg’s The Terminal, she even played a Trekkie. More importantly, she seems capable of pulling off a naked fan dance. Whether or not she can handle kissing the Shatner remains to be seen.