The most recent cinematic Star Trek outing, 2016’s Star Trek: Beyond, may not have done as well as hoped for at the box office, but that is not stopping studio Paramount from developing further big screen adventures of the crew of the starship Enterprise. Speaking at CinemaCon yesterday in Las Vegas, Paramount chairman Jim Gianopulos disclosed that the studio currently has two Star Trek films in development.
Gianopulos remained tight-lipped on the details, but presumably one of those two Trek projects is the one that indie favorite writer/director Quentin Tarantino pitched to the studio late last year. That pitch was developed in a writers’ room before The Revenant screenwriter Mark L Smith was given the screenwriting assignment.
The other project is most like a straight sequel to Star Trek: Beyond. One mooted storyline would see some time travel shenanigans leading to Captain Kirk (Chris Pine) meeting his father George Kirk (Chris Hemsworth), who had died on the same day that Jim Kirk was born. This iteration was reportedly being written by Star Trek: Beyond’s original writing team of J D Payne and Patrick McKay. There is another possible story being developed by Doug Jung and Simon Pegg, who had provided the final polishes to the Star Trek: Beyond shooting draft.
Gianopulos also gave no indication as to when we could expect a new Star Trek film from the studio, no matter which project they’re developing gets made first.