While the Star Trek franchise is currently represented on screen by CBS All Access' Star Trek: Discovery, the film franchise is currently on pause. Following the release of Star Trek Beyond in July of 2016, the original plan was to move forward with a more straightforward Star Trek follow-up. However, last December, famed director Quentin Tarantino pitched his idea for a Star Trek movie, and now a script based on that pitch is being worked on with the intention of Tarantino helming this project. We still have no idea what this Star Trek movie is even about, but William Shatner, a.k.a Captain James T. Kirk, is open to starring in it, provided that the story is to his liking. As the Star Trek legend responded when someone asked if he'd want to appear in the movie:
Depends on the script but if it was good then absolutely. Why not?
Quentin Tarantino had expressed interest for years in making a Star Trek movie, and now it looks like he'll finally fulfill that dream, though Paramount has yet to officially greenlight it. But if this project does move forward, and if Tarantino and screenwriter Mark L. Smith have an effective way to fit the original Captain Kirk into the story, then the proverbial ball will be in William Shatner's court about if he stars in the movie or not. Shatner is the third actor from the gigantic Star Trek franchise who has expressed interest in appearing in Tarantino's tale, following John Cho, who succeeded George Takei as Hikaru Sulu, and Patrick Stewart, who played Jean-Luc Picard.
After playing James T. Kirk in The Original Series and six movies, William Shatner made his final Star Trek appearance in the 1994 movie Star Trek Generations, where Kirk died helping Jean-Luc Picard stop Tolian Soran from trying to re-enter the Nexus, which would have destroyed a planet in the process. Back when the 2009 Star Trek reboot was being developed, a cameo was written for Shatner, where his Kirk would have been seen as a recorded message that Leonard Nimoy's Spock, a.k.a. Spock Prime, kept with him. However, Shatner felt this cameo lacked substance, so he turned down the opportunity to reprise the character. Maybe things will pan out differently with Quentin Tarantino's Star Trek movie; it does bode well that the actor said he was open to the idea on his Twitter page.
The original plan for the fourth Star Trek reboot movie was to have Chris Pine's James Kirk meet his father, George (played by Chris Hemsworth), who died in the line of duty mere minutes after James was born in the Kelvin timeline. However, it appears that this idea has been set aside in favor of hashing out what Quentin Tarantino has thought up. While no plot details have been revealed yet, unlike previous Star Trek movies, this one will be R-rated, fitting comfortably with the rest of Tarantino's filmography.
Keep checking in with CinemaBlend for more news on how Quentin Tarantino's Star Trek movie is coming along. In the meantime, you can learn what this year's most highly-anticipated releases are by checking our our 2018 premiere guide.
