Star Trek 4: Original Cast Set To Return

Star Trek 4: Original Cast Set To Return with Chris Pine, Zoe Saldana, Zachary Quinto, Simon Pegg, Karl Urban & John Cho

A fourth ‘Star Trek’ movie is moving forward with the original cast from the 2009 movie. The six original members, Chris Pine, Zoe Saldana, Zachary Quinto, Simon Pegg, Karl Urban and John Cho, are all about to enter negotiations with Paramount to return for a fourth time aboard the Enterprise. 

The announcement was made by J.J. Abrams during the Paramount Investors Day Presentation. He said “We are thrilled to say that we are hard at work on a new ‘Star Trek’ film… that will be featuring our original cast and some new characters”. 

Abrams will be producing the upcoming film, which is directed by Matt Shakman (WandaVision). The screenplay is written by Josh Friedman (Avatar 2) and Cameron Squires (WandaVision), based on an earlier draft by Lindsey Beer (Sierra Burgess Is a Loser) and Geneva Robertson-Dworet (Captain Marvel).

Abrams also mentioned that the project aims to start filming by the end of this year. 

The six actors make up the iconic characters: Kirk (Pine), Spock (Quinto), Uhura (Saldana), Bones (Urban), Sulu (Cho), and Scotty (Pegg). 2009’s Star Trek was directed by Abrams and reset the timeline, allowing for the reboot to exist altering the hundreds of hours Star Trek content that had come before. The actors returned in two sequels, Star Trek Into Darkness and Star Trek Beyond, directed by Justin Lin.

Quentin Tarantino’s separate “Star Trek”  project he was pursuing with The Revenant screenwriter Mark L. Smith, has gone quiet. In 2019, “Fargo” scribe, Noah Hawley, was attached to write and direct a movie that Hawley planned to feature new actors playing new characters. But when Emma Watts became president of the Paramount Motion Picture Group a few months later, she reportedly paused all Star Trek projects moving forward. 

Sources from Variety say bringing the 2009 cast back has been a priority for Paramount. It’s been a big challenge due to everyone’s busy schedule since Beyond. Pine joined the Wonder Woman franchise and will also appear in the Thriller Don’t Worry Darling and the black-ops film Violence of Action. Quinto starred in the AMC series NOS4A2, and appeared in the Broadway revival of The Boys in the Band and its 2020 film adaptation.

Saldana continued her run as Gamora in numerous Marvel films, including Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 and Avengers: Infinity War. Saldana will also star in Avatar 2 this year and in Guardians Vol. 3 in 2023. Urban appeared in Thor: Ragnarok and he’ll continue his performance as Billy Butcher on Season 3 of Amazon’s The Boys. Cho starred in acclaimed indie Searching, and Netflix’s live-action adaption of Cowboy Bebop. Pegg has since starred in Mission Impossible: Fallout and Truth Seekers, he’ll also reprise his role as Benji in Mission: Impossible 7 & 8.

One member of the original cast will sadly not join the six. Anton Yelchin, who played Chekov, died in an accident in 2016, a month before Beyond was released. At that film’s premiere at San Diego Comic-Con, the cast, filmmakers and invited guests observed a minute of silence as a tribute to the young actor.