Although it wasn't a box-office bomb, STAR TREK BEYOND didn't fare quite as well as expected, and although Paramount initially seemed keen on a fourth installment of J.J. Abrams' rebooted Star Trek franchise, the studio has been rethinking their approach. Late last year, word emerged that Quentin Tarantino had come up with a "great idea" for a STAR TREK movie which he had shared with J.J. Abrams. Excited by the pitch, Abrams put together a writer's room and Mark L. Smith (THE REVENANT) was chosen to move forward with an R-rated script while Tarantino works on ONCE UPON A TIME IN HOLLYWOOD.
While speaking with Geek Exchange, Simon Pegg notes that there are several scripts for STAR TREK 4 in play, but admits that it might take Quentin Tarantino to successfully restart the franchise.
There’s also the story of Quentin Tarantino coming and chatting with J.J. about an idea that he’s had for a long time. That idea is going into the writer’s room to be looked at. I think it might take something like him to restart it. It’s an interesting proposition, although I don’t know if that means everybody will be blowing each other’s heads off with phasers and calling Klingons mother f*****s, but, who knows, that could be fun.
Simon Pegg has previously said that he doesn't think the script will be R-rated, but at this point, anything could happen. The actor also commented on the disappointing box-office of STAR TREK BEYOND, which he believes was due to how the studio marketed the film. "If you look at a film like Suicide Squad, that was around for such a long time before it finally came out and people were so aware of it," Pegg said. "Whereas with Star Trek Beyond, it was left too late before they started their marketing push. It still did great business, but it was disappointing compared to Into Darkness." Pegg also said that the first trailer, which played up the action aspects of the film as well as making use of Sabotage by the Beastie Boys, got things off on the wrong foot.
I was really angry about that because it used ‘Sabotage,’ which was our surprise moment in the end. It was supposed to be a very fun and heightened twist, and something that was a big surprise and they blew it in the first trailer, which really annoyed me. They also made the film look like a boneheaded action film. And they were scared, I think, of mentioning the 50th Anniversary. It was fumbled as a thing; they didn’t know what to do with it and it’s a real shame. But I came away from it really, really happy and very proud of it.
Would the involvement of Quentin Tarantino get the Star Trek franchise back on track?