Paramount Tease Yet Another Star Trek Reboot

Star Trek may be heading back to the big screen without Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, Simon Pegg, and pals.

Variety is reporting that, apart from all the other shake-ups happening downstream of the merger between Skydance Media and Paramount Global, a generally bad idea all ’round for reasons too numerous to dig into here, Paramount are hoping to put a brand spankin’ new Star Trek on the big screen sooner rather than later. And by “brand spankin’ new” they mean without Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto and the rest of the gang from the so-called Kelvinverse spawned by J.J. Abrams’ Star Trek reboot back in 2009. They have, to quote, “moved on”.

This nugget comes as part of a fascinating overview of new Paramount head David Ellison’s first hundred days in the big chair, and it’s worth clicking though on. Whatever your political persuasion, it’s an insightful look at how a major media conglomerate is navigating the political and cultural landscape of Trump 2.0. It’s largely ugly and weird in a weirdly dispiriting way – Ellison is a Trump loyalist with an “alpha male” agenda for Paramount and the IQ of a shoe – but there are some bright spots here and there. They’re actively developing sequels to Top Gun and Days Of Thunder with Tom Cruise, for example.

But it’s hard to square how Star Trek, a staunchly progressive and well-established franchise, could fit into such an agenda. Even putting politics aside, Star Trek has always struggled a bit on the big screen. At a time when theatrical audiences are showing up for spectacle more than material, it’s a more cerebral property than Star Wars or the Marvel Cinematic Universe, even when it’s being incredibly dumb. It does well on TV, its natural home, but I can’t see Star Trek as a tentpole theatrical franchise in the current market.

But it sucks that we won’t get to see Chris Pine age into Old Kirk. Guy woulda nailed it.