After keeping fans waiting, Star Trek 4 is finally happening and will arrive in 2023.
In February 2022, JJ Abrams confirmed that work on the next Star Trek film was in progress. Instead of being another reboot, it will also bring back the likes of Chris Pine and Zachary Quinto to officially make it Star Trek 4.
“We’re excited to say that we’re hard at work on a new Star Trek movie set to shoot at the end of the year. it will feature our original cast and some new characters that I think will be really fun and exciting,” Abraham said.
“We’re excited about this film, we have a lot of other stories we’re talking about that we think will be really interesting, so I can’t wait to see what we’re making. But until then, live long and prosper.”
It has not been an easy road to the film with several delays, cancellations and conflicting reports of new films taking place, such as one from Star Trek: Discovery’s Kalinda Vazquez.
This Abrams-confirmed special is directed by WandaVision director Matt Shakman and was written by Josh Friedman and Cameron Squires, based on earlier drafts by Lindsey Beer and Geneva Robertson.
Before Star Trek 4 was finally confirmed in February 2022, there was talk that the new Star Trek movie had been “discontinued”, before it was officially put back on track with Fargo creator Noah Hawley and the cast rebooted and then delayed again.
Here’s everything we know about Star Trek 4.
Star Trek 4 Release Date
Star Trek 4 will be released on December 22, 2023, assuming there are no further delays.
It was originally set for release on June 9, 2023 but was delayed to November 2021 as Paramount shuffled through the upcoming releases. Now we also know that this is a continuation of the Kelvin trilogy with the same cast, so we were more than happy to wait for a bit more.
In early 2020, Simon Pegg had criticized the new film by saying that he thought the series was “losing momentum” after the tragic death of Anton Yelchin and the poor performance of Star Trek Beyond.
It was reported in August 2020 that the Hawley film was no longer a priority at Paramount, apparently it was due to the virus.
Despite all the skepticism over a fourth film, star John Cho was always confident it would be made: “To be honest, I mean it’s not happening right now as far as I’m concerned, but I just thought it would. Somebody at some point will all get on the same page, and we’ll do it.”
According to Abrams, Star Trek 4 will begin shooting in late 2022, but we don’t have a specific date yet.
In addition to the potential films we’ve already mentioned, there’s also been discussion of a spin-off of Quentin Tarantino’s spin-off. That’s “probably” still happening according to Tarantino, but he won’t direct it anymore.
Star Trek 4 Cast: Who’s In It?
Not 100% confirmed, but talks are ongoing for a new film to bring back Chris Pine (Kirk), Zachary Quinto (Spock), Zoe Saldaña (Uhura), Karl Urban (Bones), John Cho (Sulu) and Simon Pegg (Scotty) .
Hopefully Paramount won’t have too much trouble bringing them back, but there have been difficulties in the past when it comes to bringing back former cast members.
The original plan for the fourth film was to have a timey-wimey adventure featuring Chris Pine’s James T Kirk joining forces with his long-dead father played by Chris Hemsworth.
Even before the film was in talks, it was reported that both Chris Pine and Chris Hemsworth had left negotiations to star in the JJ Abrams-produced blockbuster because the studio wanted them to take a pay cut.
Hemsworth opened up in May 2019 about why he’s stayed away from the film, saying: “I don’t feel like we landed on an excuse to revisit it. I don’t want to be let down by what I’m about to bring to the table.”
It’s unclear if this new version of Star Trek 4 plans to bring Hemsworth back or if it’s going in a completely new direction, so we’ll have to wait to get more casting news in the upcoming months.
We also don’t know if the new film will bring back Pavel Chekov, following the tragic death of Anton Yelchin in 2016.
Star Trek 4 Trailer
Unfortunately, until now paramount has not released an official trailer for Star Trek 4. We’d love to get all timey-wimey ourselves and show you a trailer for Star Trek 4 from the future, but we’re stuck in the Mirror Universe.
