4 reasons why Star Trek 4 won’t boldly go any further

Why did Star Trek 4 get pulled from Paramount’s schedule?

Star Trek 4 has been yanked from the schedule at Paramount, but why? That seems to be the prevailing question. The film was originally launched with such enthusiasm, announcing the return of the cast from the three previous films…despite never having talked to the cast about returning.

That auspicious start was only a sign of things to come. The film was given a late-2022 production start date and as September turns into October, the folks at Paramount knew they weren’t going to be ready to start making the film by the previously mentioned release date.

But why? What were the overwhelming reasons that Star Trek 4’s production fell apart after looking so good?

Four reasons why it made sense to pull Star Trek 4 from the schedule

Announced prematurely

The first reason this film fell apart is that it was announced before contracts were signed. That’s a rookie move and if you’re Paramount, you’re looking at firing whatever executive greenlit the announcement without ever actually having anything official.

Cast was never fully on board

Going hand in hand with the premature nature of the announcement, came the fact that most of the cast were caught off guard by the announcement. By all accounts, despite everyone wanting to do a fourth film, only Chris Pine was ever truly brought into the fold. Karl Urban was set to film The Boys at the end of the year, so clearly, no one from Paramount even talked to him about doing the film, and the rest of the cast pretty much just said, “Hey, let us know what’s up, cus we want to do this!” Someone is getting axed over this mess.

There was never a script

There was a pitch from Noah Hawley that seemed to be the closest to completion, but as it was written before 2020, and allegedly centered around a galaxy-wise outbreak, that script was thrown out. Even Pine flat out said he hadn’t read a script, only that it was “out there”. I’m not sure about you, but I don’t announce a film unless I have a script.

Losing the director

The upcoming director of Fantastic Four, Matt Shakman, had been brought on to film the fourth Kelvin Star Trek film. Yet, his departure was truly the beginning of the end. When he left the project, it should have been obvious the film wasn’t going to hit its production start date. We even said as much, and now it’s come to fruition. Losing Shakman wasn’t a loss by any means, he can be easily replaced. The problem is that he left due, most likely, due to the project’s mismanagement and the lack of script. So finding a replacement on a quick turnaround, without a script, was never going to happen. The fourth film may still happen but its future is anyone’s guess.