Matt Shakman addresses Star Trek 4: ‘It changed dramatically’
Before he exited the project in August 2022 to focus on The Fantastic Four: First Steps, director Matt Shakman found the fourth Star Trek movie had "changed dramatically".
Director Matt Shakman has revealed the fourth Star Trek movie had “changed dramatically” before he exited the project in August 2022.
The 49-year-old filmmaker was due to helm the next instalment in the Star Trek franchise, though had left the movie by the summer of 2022 due to scheduling conflicts with The Fantastic Four: First Steps.
Now, Shakman has revealed that his Star Trek movie was already in pre-production before he parted ways with the project.
He explained to Variety: “We had stages, we had crew, we were moving ahead.”
However, Shakman admitted that plans for the fourth Star Trek movie had shifted significantly: the crew were let go, the stages were removed and the film “didn’t have a start date anymore”.
Meanwhile, good progress on The Fantastic Four: First Steps was being made, and so Shakman dropped out of Star Trek to focus on the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) blockbuster.
While the director refused to give any details on what his Star Trek movie would have looked like, Shakman teased the main concept of the film hadn’t been changed to his knowledge.
He said: “The core idea, I think, remains the same. I really hope they get a chance to make that movie.”
Shakman was announced as the director for the fourth Star Trek film back in 2021, and the movie would have seen the return of Chris Pine’s Captain Kirk and Zachary Quinto’s Spock.
While updates on the next Star Trek movie have been slow, Paramount Pictures has confirmed the project is still in development, though has not announced a release date for the film yet.
Despite its development difficulties, the cast is still keen to return for another Star Trek movie.
Zoe Saldana - who portrayed Nyota Uhura from 2009’s Star Trek to 2016’s Star Trek Beyond - said she would be “grateful” if she were given the chance to make another Star Trek film.
The 47-year-old actress told ComicBook.com: “I just heard they're gearing up to do a new one with a younger, sort of, take on it ... I don't know if it's from the before or the after, but that they really still hope to grab all of us veterans and bring us back for one last round.
“Listen, I know it's a lot to wrangle a whole bunch of people with busy schedules. But working with [director] J.J. Abrams, and for J.J. Abrams at Bad Robot, was always just a wonderful and beautiful experience for me. So, if I get to do that one last time, I would be so grateful.”
Meanwhile, Simon Pegg - who played Scotty in the Star Trek trilogy - said he would want to appear in a fourth Star Trek movie, though insisted the film would be “forever tainted” by the untimely death of Pavel Chekov actor Anton Yelchin, who passed away at the age of 27 in June 2016 following a car accident.
Appearing on Katee Sackhoff’s podcast The Sackhoff Show, the Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning star said: “I’d love to do more. Obviously it’s been forever tainted because we lost Anton, and that was a really hard thing for everyone involved, and for the real world, let alone anything else.
“If we do come back, if there is another opportunity to come back, then I’d love to. Because as we were saying earlier on, it’s a group of guys that I dearly, dearly love and don’t get to see very often. It would be good to get back together with them.”
