It’s time once again to check in on one of the actors expected to return for the next Star Trek feature film, this time star Chris Pine, who’s still waiting for a script but is ready to keep playing Kirk.
Pine ready for more (and more) Kirk
In an interview with the Happy, Sad, Confused podcast (that appears to have been recorded before news broke about director Matt Shakman exiting the project), Chris Pine again talked about how he and his Star Trek co-stars are in the dark about what’s going on but ready to return for a fourth film:
I think reporters think that we know more than we’re saying. And when I say that I honestly—none of us know anything. I haven’t seen a script. All I heard was that they said we’re making a film. I am so stoked for that idea and possibility as we all are, but it’s so premature to say anything because there’s no date, no nothing. But I’m pretty positive we’d all come back. I don’t see why not.
Chris Pine was 28 when first cast to play James T. Kirk in the 2009 Star Trek movie, which was his first major role. Now 42, he is considered one of the “Hollywood Chrises.” He last played Kirk in 2016’s Star Trek Beyond; on the podcast, the actor talked more about the idea of getting to return to the role throughout his career:
It’s super cool. I love the idea. It’s very rare to get a chance to play one character over the entire essentially course of your career. If I had the chance to do that, I think it would be so cool. So, so cool. So hopefully we get to do it.
Chris Pine as James T. Kirk in Star Trek Beyond
For now, Pine will have to wait as Paramount looks for a new director to helm the project, which is still on their calendar for release on December 22, 2023—the film will almost certainly get a new date as soon as Paramount and producer J.J. Abrams get the project going again.
Pine becomes a meme at Venice Film Festival
Chris Pine has been trending this week, with a stream of photos and videos coming out of the Venice Film Festival where he is promoting his upcoming film Don’t Worry Darling. This clip is an example of some of the fun people have been having with him.
Chris Pine’s soul leaves his body as he listens to Harry Styles explain concept of movies
pic.twitter.com/5Z9q3WDJzp— billboard pop ➐ (@bilIboardpop) September 5, 2022
Photos of Pine looking distracted during a press conference really lit up Twitter, turning Pine into a meme. TrekMovie even got in on the fun.
Exclusive preview of #StarTrek4 which tells the harrowing story of Captain Kirk negotiating the treaty with the Sheliak #ChrisPine pic.twitter.com/4l4lbufdi5
— TrekMovie.com (@TrekMovie) September 6, 2022
There was also some controversy over a moment during the movie premiere when it appeared that co-star Harry Styles may have spit on Pine, which blew up so much it had to get an official response from Styles’ camp, who gave a statement to Variety calling it “a ridiculous story.” Chris Pine’s rep backed this up with the Hollywood Reporter. This spit story was so big went beyond the entertainment media, getting coverage from both CNN and the BBC.
"Spit Gate" is no more.
Chris Pine's rep denies that Harry Styles spat on his #DontWorryDarling co-star at the Venice premiere of their movie https://t.co/aroPQbaNuE pic.twitter.com/BIMFnODK0D
— The Hollywood Reporter (@THR) September 6, 2022
Keep up with all the news on Star Trek 4 and upcoming Trek films at TrekMovie.com.
c’mon Trek 4, c’mon damnit! *hits chest* its gone into some damned arrest.. hiyah! *more chest hits*
He tried desperately to save it. He didn’t know its anatomy.
LOL!! Nice!
The Don’t Worry, Darling BTS drama is clearly so much more entertaining than the actual film.
It looks that way.
I thought he was fine as Kirk, but my respect for Pine really grew after seeing “Hell Or High Water.” Fantastic film, and I thought he was great in it. Ben Foster and Jeff Bridges were fantastic as well. Highly recommended.
Agree, Hell or High Water is a fantastic film.
Agreed. That was a terrific film. I really enjoyed it quite a bit.
I completely agree with this. Pine in particular turned out to be a revelation, projecting tangible gravitas and strength — and unexpectedly managing to hold his own against Jeff Bridges, no less. He’s matured into a very fine actor.
The director Taylor Sheridan seems to be good at getting that kind of serious performance from his cast. I recommend his film “Wind River” too. “Yellowstone” is also pretty good (we’ve only had the first two seasons so far here in the UK, so no spoilers please ;)).
Yawnnnn, kill the movie series off already
I’m pretty much feeling this way.
I wonder if Matt Shakman ever got to see the script?
I think we all know the answer to that question is no.
I’d also ask, what happened to all those posters earlier in the year who absolutely, positively, bet the farm and their lives guaranteed this project was alive and well because their second cousin’s best friends’ little brother was hired and working the movie?
I think that was Lorna Dune. She has gone quiet lately.
There was another poster named His Name is Rios who told me not once but three times he knew someone working directly on the next movie and was already hired so the movie was definitely a go.
Another poster named Tom Riker was convinced that new leadership with the then new President, Emma Watts was definitely going to make a movie and it would be announced sooner than later. He was convinced she was going to shake things up in a big way and that both the Tarantino and Hemsworth movie was going to happen after all because she said so in a statement. Less than a year later she was gone lol. And so was that guy. Both projects left in the dust.
I only bring up their names because they both stopped posting here long ago. And what’s funny about it was how arrogant they came off as if they just got out of a meeting with these people or something and telling the rest of us we’re being idiots for doubting any of it. Now they are nowhere to be found of course.
I think its time people stop telling the rest of us a movie will ‘definitely’ happen because who they supposedly know at Paramount or when some new regime has shown up promising big things about the franchise. It’s the same thing repeated time and time again. We keep hearing this stuff and years later we’re not any closer to a movie happening.
From this point on, I will only believe a movie is happening until the actors are firmly signed on with a script complete and a shooting date. And I won’t truly believe it until they are actually shooting; which I’m guessing most people feel the same at this point.
I’ve always thought Lorna Dunne is the alt of His Name is Rios. I could be wrong, but their posts a very similar.
Wow didn’t think about that until now. You could be right. I have no issues with Lorma Dunne and get along well, but yeah their posts are similar.
I remember another poster here who I really like and respect was convinced the movie was definitely going to happen once Matt Shakman was on board. They didn’t pretend to have inside information or anything but they were making the point because Paramount got someone who became so in demand after making such a huge hit with WandaVision it was all but guaranteed the movie was going to happen. I was still (surprise surprise) in doubt just because you hired a director doesn’t mean a movie was going to happen. We been down that road several times before as well. But he was so persuasive he convinced me the movie was probably a done deal and that THIS time they were serious.
A year later, Shakman is now gone lol. And of course I understood why he felt that way at the time. But that’s the thing, we have had multiple people here telling us over and over with various projects the movie was happening and to stop being so cynical about it because Paramount was really really serious this time. Um….
Another great example was the Tarantino project. I used to get into a debate with a former poster here who kept telling me it was ridiculous to even doubt the project was happening. To him, it was all a done deal because how do you NOT get someone like Quentin Tarantino onboard from day one when he tells you he wants to make a Star Trek movie? And frankly a LOT of people were adamant about it as he was. And that died in no time lol. Paramount had already hired another director before Tarantino even said he wanted to do it or not. So the writing was on the wall.
If this movie is cancelled like the others, it wouldn’t surprise me at this point. And frankly it shouldn’t surprise ANYONE anymore. All the people who keep saying a movie is FINALLY happening has to just admit to themselves at least that none of this is etched in stone. It’s been six years now, the longest we have gone without a movie being in production since TMP and there is still NO movie happening. It can frankly could be another six years until Paramount gets its #$@% together.
I really thought Shakman, somewhat like Robert Wise, would be the fulcrum upon which the whole movie could pivot into reality. But now, I really don’t understand this last year at all, unless there is somebody at Paramount (sort of like the 70s with Barry Diller) who just keeps spiking the project.
I haven’t ever interviewed Shakman (in fact was a little PO’d that didn’t happen on WANDAVISION, I did a helluva good story on how it was shot for ICG, plus an in-depth Q&A with the show’s production designer), but the few things I’ve seen of his, MAD MEN, HOUSE, BOSTON LEGAL, HOUSE, THE BOYS, FARGO and GoT were all winners, which is pretty rare. (for example, the only TOS director I can say the same about is Ralph Senensky — I rank even the least of his shows as very fun to rewatch.
This next movie really is on the verge of turning into the TOS-to-TMP gap, even in regard to the actor ages.
I could be wrong, but I think three of the actors are now in their 50s but they are all in their 40s at least. Which is fine, if 80 year old Patrick Stewart can star in a Trek show, nearly everyone else is safe lol.
I didn’t know anything about Shakman before and out of all the shows you just cited, I’ve only seen GOT prior to WandaVision and I still don’t know which of those he directed. I thought he did great on WandaVision and obviously why he hired to work on a big film. But yeah he has a large resume. One poster goes on and on about how much he hated WandaVision but the point is the guy had a large pedigree before he made that show and had no problem handling any genre. Going from Fargo to GOT is like going from The Ozarks to Star Wars!
I was at least curious to see how well he will handle a Star Trek movie…I guess now we’ll see how well he’ll do with a Fantasic Four film. Unlike Star Trek 4, there is no doubt that won’t get made. ;)
And lastly, Paramount doesn’t seem to be in a hurry to replace him with someone new for a film STILL listed to be out by December 2023. Gee, wonder why?
Maybe par is looking for a new promotable (and potentially cheap) angle, like having a trek actor from the films (or some past or current series) direct?
Just because Styles’ and Pine’s camps say Styles didn’t spit on Pine it doesn’t mean he didn’t. What else are they going to say, yes he spat on him? Just looking at Styles in that pic it’s clear the man was in a different reality… People need to stop believing the BS that comes out of these PR people’s mouths…
And it’s clear Paramount has no financing for ST4. That press conference with the investors they did with J.J. mouthing off about how excited they were… They were just looking for money and clearly they didn’t get any. I guess the investors saw through J.J. and Paramount’s BS. The more they say how excited they are in a press release, the more you know it’s BS.
The point of Investor Days is just to show off, it wasn’t necessarily to actually get new investors. Paramount already has co-financing deals in place for its films and has always had the option to go it alone on any of them, it’s a $58 billion company with over $22 billion in equity. Bringing JJ on and announcing Star Trek 4 was not a plea for anyone to invest in the film. There isn’t even a report that a script is ready yet to hang a budget on and haggle about! Whatever issues ST4 is having, financing isn’t one of them.
You could very well be correct, but why even make a press conference for investors then? Why show off and more than a year later have nothing to show for it? From what was said at the conference (from a Trekmovie article), it sounded like typical marketing hype. That says one thing; give us money. If that’s not the issue, what’s the problem then? We keep hearing from Paramount that the movie is coming, like they want to keep it in people’s minds, but nothing is happening. There is obviously a problem.
I think the boat has sailed on fans believing ANYTHING that Paramount has to say about ST4. Fans have lost faith in that fairytale.
I was there before this one was “announced.”
I’m long past interest in the hype around a movie. People here and even TrekMovie (who are usually pretty cautious) kept saying this was different because the studio had announced a release date.
Well, I guess not.
My business sense told me that premature announcement was likely made to comply with some contractual term.
Putting on a legal hat, one would hope that whatever clause in the Bad Robot contractual arrangements allows Paramount to exit and work with someone else has finally, belated crystallized.
Like I said, most fans have quit believing in the ST4 fairytale. It doesn’t matter when or why Paramount chose to make the announcement. They made it and have been jerking fans around ever since. Yes, I have become very cynical and disillusioned as far as Paramount making another Star trek movie and by
the time Paramount does decide, I may no longer be a fan.
Yeah in full agreement here. It is obviously money that is the big issue. None of the actors have been signed on. Why? My obvious guess is because they are not ready to offer them a financial offer. Why else would they not be signed up if you ALREADY said you were making a movie and a freakin release date on top of that?? What is the holdup then? And the scheduling thing doesn’t work as an excuse because none of them has even been called to discuss it. Pine, Quinto and Urban all said the same thing in the last few months, they have not talked to anyone or knows what is going on. And if the scheduling was an issue, why did these morons announce a date or even a movie AT ALL before they talked to any of them about it???
To me it seem like they are still trying to figure out a story and do it within a certain budget. I don’t think the ‘story’ is the issue, more like how much its costing them. For both Mission Impossible 5 AND 6, they green lit both films without a complete story. I think MI 5 had most of the story down when they started but not the third act. With MI 6, they only had a basic outline and McQuarrie was writing it as they went which sounds nuts for a movie that had so many locations and action scenes to figure out. I mean that’s insane when we see just how ambitious Fall Out ended up being and it was the costliest MI movie to date. But Paramount had full faith in those movies, so they didn’t care, they trusted the team and knew it was going to make $$$ if it was just Cruise jumping off stuff and running for 2 hours.
They clearly don’t have nearly same faith in the next Trek movie. They can’t even keep their director whose been waiting around an entire year for something to happen. If he was working on Mission Impossible, that guy would’ve been super busy the whole time, ;)
Does anyone know why film budgets have gotten so crazy anyway? i was looking up what JJ made Force Awakens for, and Rise of Skywalker and my jaw hit the floor. 245 million, and 275 million. So, there is no way he is making a Star Trek film produced or otherwise for under 200 million. So, it just won’t get made they are pulling our legs.
The only thing I can think of is the bulk of the budget with movies like Star Wars and comic book films is all the CGI they pump into these movies today. Which is ironic considering when they started making the sequel trilogy they kept pushing the idea of how ‘practical’ it will be to get away from the prequel hate at the time. But then it was revealed TFA had more than any prequel film ever did. And TROS more so.
Movies require more and more ‘spectacle’ to the point of exhaustion at times. That sounded like the reason Beyond got so expensive, was adding all the CGI in that movie too. And that could be the issue with the next movie, they still probably want to compete with the big boys but something that requires less explosions and CGI to keep down the price and probably easier said than done.
It really just is to get shareholders excited and to compete with other studios doing the same thing. The only investors they’re really courting are people who might buy stock and then whomever might be taking note on bringing their business to Paramount in general (who knows, maybe it was a factor in Walmart making that deal for Paramount+ in the end?). They feel they have to be seen saying positive things about Paramount+ and the movie studio primarily (streaming is such a big deal, you could argue bringing on JJ was a nod to not only the idea of another possible familiar blockbuster at the box office, but one to feed the content machine at Paramount+ later), hence the dog and pony show. I agree it’s dumb and I even have a friend at Paramount who worked on media for the Investor Days – they waste so much money on the events alone and the last one actually had the exact opposite effect on the share price this year. Stock tumbled the next day.
Look everything you said could be right, but what’s the point??? If you’re trying excite the shareholders, wouldn’t you do that by actually just making the movie? If you’re trying to feed more content for Paramount+ (which frankly a big reason they are even discussing a movie now), then why not make the movie for that then?
I think a lot of us are confused because OTHER than money, what else could be holding them back to actually green light a movie? You probably read my post already but I don’t think scheduling or story had anything to do with it. You can still sign on the actors and work out the schedule later. Marvel does it all the time. Hell, they gotten so good at it, they don’t even need to shoot all the same actors in the same scene anymore if they are too busy with other things like ironically with Patrick Stewart and Doctor Strange. He was too busy shooting Picard to be there on the days they shot those scenes for that movie.
But if its not trying to get more money, what do you think is stopping them from going forward to the point they lost a director over it?
If I were an actor, sure, I’d love to have a long term paying gig. It certainly gave Shatner some spending money in his later years.
Unfortunately, this isn’t it.
This just tells you how far the movie side has gone versus the TV side. Kate Mulgrew recently said they are talking to her about doing another live action TV show as she is already part of Prodigy. It may not happen but it shows just how full steam the TV side is happening when they are discussing putting a legacy actor/character in two Star Trek shows.
Meanwhile, Pine and the other actors didn’t even get so much a courtesy call from anyone from Paramount about being in another movie before they announced it to the world back in February. That alone was a big hint none of this should’ve been taken very seriously. And now here we are nearly 7 months later they are still in the dark about the next one and now without a director.
I actually watched that entire interview on Youtube a week ago. It’s about forty minutes long and actually interesting if you care about Pine’s acting career beyond Star Trek, which he only spends maybe ten minutes discussing. The other funny thing he mentioned was that he’s never seen ANY of the scripts of the cancelled movies, including the one with Hemsworth which seems to be the only one they were at least serious about since they tried to sign them up for it; but we know what happened there.
Maybe we will get another movie in 2024, but I’m not holding my breath on that anymore or it will be with this cast whenever another one does happen. Paramount just doesn’t seem motivated to make a movie or they would be making the movie since these geniuses announced one with a release date and everything. Sigh
I mean if they were truly serious, wouldn’t they want to make sure their primary actors are available? Even if they don’t have a script to show them yet, “hey we expect to have a script by X date, and begin principal photography on XY date, please make sure you’re available during the anticipated shooting time.”
Definitely agree. It really makes no sense and why I even questioned that the Kelvin cast was coming back. Because my kooky logic (for Paramount I guess) was if you are making another Trek film and you already set up the release date, then clearly the Kelvin cast isn’t in it because you would secure the actors first before announcing a date. But that’s what this brain trust actually didn’t do lol.
Again, just more proof they were never completely committed to the movie from the beginning. When we found out that they didn’t tell the Kelvin actors until after announcing the movie, many thought it would now be a big pay day for the cast because now they can demand almost anything they want. Now I realize that’s not true at all because Paramount simply won’t make the movie if they demand too much, so that was never a real issue. Sure for fans who wants a movie but the studio is probably trying to make this as cheap as possible (within reason) and would not make it if the cast salaries were too high. So it would have the opposite effect. But the fact they haven’t negotiated with anyone 6 months later makes it more clear they are not anywhere close to making this thing.
I’m not saying a movie won’t happen at all, but it’s probably another 2-3 years off at this point now. It’s depressing but about right the way this franchise has been handled since Beyond. If we don’t hear any movement in the next 6 months, I’m guessing 2025 will be the next date.
I feel like we are being trolled at this point. No new Star Trek film is being made. We are in the same place we were in after Beyond flopped, in an anniversary year. Fans didn’t show up. There was a complete lack of fan engagement, no buzz, nothing. And it was poorly advertised. To say they dropped the ball is an understatement.
I liked Star Trek Beyond. Story wise it just felt more like Trek to me than its predecessor, but I gave it a rewatch recently, and I thought about how the studio did astonishingly little promotion for it DURING an anniversary year, as you pointed out. I wonder if too many of the higher ups just watched it and went “Hmm this is just Fast and the Furious in space” and that influenced them to not promote?
It all got messed up bc of JJ switching to SW and the studio jettisoning Orci’s script which was like a natural progression/conclusion? of the alternate universe saga .bc they felt it was ‘too star trek’
Once that happened the studio was like ‘hey Pegg you like star trek right. you wanna quickly write something?’. ‘And who to direct? everyone online saying Frakes and the Rise of the Apes guy, but what about the Fast&Furious guy?’
After all that the anniversary was like an afterthought
JJ directing is the only way this is going to get made at this stage and he will have to do on a lower budget!
I don’t think that remotely matters. They had a director for literally a year and Pine still didn’t know anything. How would that change anything? And Abrams has been involved from the beginning and producing the film. That hasn’t done anything either.
And the irony is someone cited in this thread Abrams Star Wars films were $245 million for TFA and $275 million for ROS. Yeah, not someone who seems to know how to work on a modest budget these days. But I guess with SW, you don’t really need to.
We’ll see
We’ll see what? That only one director can get a movie project going? Again, I don’t think it has zip to do with the director, but bigger issues like money and faith in the project by the higher ups.
If JJ returns I could see him dusting off the Hemsworth George Kirk story as he was enthusiastically announcing that as the next film when Beyond was released, also he’s like a student of Spielberg and most of his movies are about fathers/absent father drama..(which is of course a theme in most of JJs movies). and Hemsworth would most likely come back if JJ was doing it
And Phil is proven right once again.
Now that they’re older I think its time to get the Kelvin crew into the Monster Maroons.
They need to go into those revealing pyjama onesies first!
Chris Pine in a skant. Make it so….
At least he’s honest that he doesn’t know anything. Nobody else does either, but some (ahem, rhymes with Limon Begg) keep offering opinions on whether it’s happening and when (when asked in interviews).
Yeah Pegg is always trying his best to spin everything in the positive. Nothing wrong with that, but it’s obvious the guy doesn’t really know anything either. He made it sound like it was just a a scheduling issue a few months ago when he left out the part no one has actually been signed on yet or the story itself still hasn’t been approved. And now they are without a director. This movie is still nowhere close to getting made and probably why Shakman left.
“It would be so cool to get a guaranteed regular paycheck”
What else is he going to say?