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It’s been nearly a decade since the release of Star Trek Beyond, i.e. the last cinematic outing of Zoe Saldaña’s Nyota Uhura and the rest of the USS Enterprise crew from the Kelvin timeline. Since then, the sci-fi franchise has experienced a resurgence on TV thanks to the various shows that are available to stream with a Paramount+ subscription (plus Prodigy moving to Netflix), and Celia Rose Gooding is playing a younger version of the main timeline’s Uhurua in Star Trek: Strange New Worlds. However, attempts to get Star Trek 4 off the ground keep being met with complications, and Saldaña shared her honest thoughts about the project’s long development.
As the actress, who also has major franchise cred from playing Gamora in the Marvel Cinematic Universe and Neytiri in the Avatar movies, said while being interviewed by Deadline, she believes Star Trek 4 needs to get underway pretty soon before she and the other actors get too old to reprise their roles. As she specifically put it:
I wish we were able to do it sooner rather than later. I feel like a lot of us have a full head of gray hair, so we need to do this quickly, if this is the same cast that’s going to reprise it again.
Star Trek 4 was officially announced ahead of Beyond’s release, with the original plan being for Christ Pine’s James T. Kirk to meet his father, George, reprised by Chris Hemsworth. The project has since morphed into various other iterations, with directors like S.J. Clarkson, Noah Hawley and Matt Shakman all coming and going from it. And yet, as we’re about to enter 2025, it doesn’t appear Star Trek 4 is any closer to finally happening, and Zoe Saldaña feels like there’s a time limit on when the Kelvin gang can get back together. Her answer amusingly contrasts with Spock actor Zachary Quinto’s, as he believes there’s “no cutoff” for Star Trek 4 given that the cast of Star Trek: The Original Series did movies “well into their 50s, 60s.”
Speaking of Spock, Saldaña also mentioned that she’s especially hopeful Star Trek 4 will be made because she wants to continue exploring the relationship between Uhura and her Vulcan crewmate. Those two were romantically involved in the first two Star Trek reboot movies, but had broken up prior to Beyond. In her words:
It’s been a minute since I reconnected with Star Trek and all the characters’ journeys, but Uhura and Spock were always sort of drawn to each other, it just makes sense to see what is the next step in their relationship and their work relationship as well.
To be clear, Star Trek fans won’t be lacking in cinematic entertainment in the near future. The Paramount+-exclusive movie Section 31 will premiere at the end of January, and there’s also a Star Trek “origins” movie that’s supposed to be released sometime on the 2025 movies schedule. But there’s nothing to indicate that Star Trek 4 has made any significant progress lately, though I certainly share in Zoe Saldaña desire for the project to happen sooner rather than later considering how long we’ve already been waiting.
As for what the rest of the Star Trek landscape looks like, along with the aforementioned Section 31 coming soon, Strange New Worlds Season 3 is next up on the upcoming Star Trek TV shows slate, Starfleet Academy is currently shooting, though it remains to be seen if it will also premiere on the 2025 TV schedule or be saved for 2026.