If you were surprised to hear last month that the most recent big-screen crew of the Starship Enterprise were finally going to get a fourth movie, you weren’t alone. In fact, the crew itself was in the dark about the film too. They apparently found out about it when the announcement of the new Star Trek movie was made by Paramount.
That’s what Chris Pine — aka the current Captain Kirk — told Indiewire. “What’s going on with ‘Star Trek’ is frankly, I don’t know” he revealed, and noted that he “didn’t know” that Paramount was going to announce the movie when they did. “I don’t think anybody did,” he added.
“I know there’s a script out there somewhere and I’m waiting to see it,” Pine also said. He did note, however, that he’s met the film’s current director, WandaVision’s Matt Shakman, and thinks he’s “a super-cool guy, very smart” and that he is “happy to go to work” on a new Star Trek with a group of actors and a world that he “loves.”
Pine’s most recent Star Trek movie, Star Trek Beyond opened in theaters in the summer of 2016. Since then, Paramount has developed numerous different Star Trek 4 projects, all of which failed to coalesce into a full-fledged production. Paramount first announced a sequel uniting Pine’s Kirk with his father, played by Chris Hemsworth. That movie never happened, and neither did subsequent potential films, including one that Quentin Tarantino wanted to direct, and another that was overseen by Fargo creator Noah Hawley. Word of Shakman’s involvement in the sequel first leaked last summer.
Pine’s first Star Trek opened in theaters in the summer of 2009, which feels like about four lifetimes ago. To put that in perspective, it was ten years between the cancelation of the original Star Trek TV series and the premiere of Star Trek: The Motion Picture. It’s already been 12 years since the first Pine Star Trek. So they’re not the young crew just getting their first taste of life on the final frontier anymore.
Star Trek 4 is currently scheduled to open in theaters on December 22, 2023.
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