Depending on the week, “Star Trek 4” is either definitely happening or not happening at all. If the wind blows one way, the film is directed by Quentin Tarantino and will be R-rated. Then the gust of air changes and it’s directed by Noah Hawley and may not even have the current film cast involved. Or maybe it’s never going to happen, as previous attempts have stalled since 2016’s “Star Trek Beyond.” And according to one of the cast members, Simon Pegg, the time may be over for ‘Star Trek’ on the big screen.
Speaking to GamesRadar, Pegg was asked about the current state of the ‘Star Trek’ big-screen franchise. As we’ve seen in the past, the actor (who co-wrote the previous film) is always open and honest about the difficulty of making a fourth ‘Trek.’ And it appears that his hope for a new film, at least with the current cast, is waning.
“The fact is, ‘Star Trek’ movies don’t make Marvel money,” Pegg said. “They make maybe $500m at the most, and to make one now, on the scale they’ve set themselves, is $200m. You have to make three times that to make a profit.”
He added, “I don’t feel like the last one… They didn’t really take advantage of the 50th anniversary. The regimen at the time dropped the ball on the promo of the film. And we’ve lost momentum. I think losing Anton [Yelchin] was a huge blow to our little family, and our enthusiasm to do another one might have been affected by that. So I don’t know.”
Now, it might be tough to hear a “Star Trek” actor saying things like the franchise has “lost momentum,” but you can’t sue the guy for slander. He’s pretty spot-on with his assessment of the current big-screen situation. Though the franchise seems to be doing well on the CBS All Access streaming service, with multiple ‘Trek’ series in production (though fan opinion on those might be a whole other story), the film series is struggling and Pegg is aware.
Even dating back to when the promo for ‘Beyond’ was happening, as Pegg points out, Paramount hardly tied the film into the franchise’s 50th anniversary. The film felt like another sequel and not some celebration of one of sci-fi’s greatest creations. It’s a shame because ‘Beyond’ is a pretty good film (much better than ‘Into Darkness,’ at the very least).
But we also can’t forget that “Star Trek” is one of the most recognizable film/TV franchises today. The idea that Paramount wouldn’t make another ‘Trek’ film is absurd. It’s just a question of what that film might look like. At the very least, it does appear that the days of Chris Pine’s Kirk leading the crew that we’ve seen in the first three films are numbered.