Chris Hemsworth on why he dropped out of Star Trek 4

In a new interview, Chris Hemsworth sheds some light on why he decided to drop out of Star Trek 4, and it’s not why you think.

It was all systems go for Star Trek 4.

Star Trek Beyond, the second sequel to the mega successful 2009 Star Trek reboot, had just opened in theaters. In anticipation of solid box office numbers and glowing reviews, Paramount announced that a fourth entry in the Kelvin Timeline was already a go.

The film would see the return of George Kirk, played by a then unknown Chris Hemsworth in Star Trek in a team up with his son James Kirk. Most assumed some form of time travel would be involved and since the last Star Trek movie that used the science fiction staple was The Voyage Home, hopes were high. S.J. Clarkson was hired to direct and would be the first woman to helm a Star Trek feature film.

Then the bottom fell out.

Star Trek Beyond disappointed at the box office, only making $343 million worldwide against a budget of $185 million. Additionally the film was met with a collective “meh” from both critics and Star Trek fandom.

As a result, Paramount decided that in order to keep the budget for Star Trek 4 under control, they would try to rework the budgets of some of the principle actors, including Chris Pine and Hemsworth. Negotiations did not go well and Pine walked off the project all together.

The final nail in the coffin came back in January when Paramount announced that Star Trek 4 was shelved indefinitely. Which, in layman’s terms, means that the movie has been cancelled altogether.

Now Hemsworth, who has been silent on the matter since the cancellation of the film, has touched on why he decided to leave the project.

In a new interview with Variety covering Hemsworth’s impressive career, he briefly talked about Star Trek 4 and why he dropped out. And it seems it didn’t have as much to do with money and contracts as it did with the script.

"“I didn’t feel like we landed on a reason to revisit that yet. I didn’t want to be underwhelmed by what I was going to bring to the table.”"

It would appear that the problems with Star Trek 4 went a lot deeper than anyone knew.

Ironically, it sounds like Hemsworth isn’t completely opposed to donning a Starfleet uniform again in the future. Hopefully at some point, if the Kelvin Timeline films aren’t discontinued, we could still see George and James Kirk together on the big screen for the first time.