This is pretty extraordinary. Earlier this week the incredible news broke that Quentin Tarantino was negotiating to possibly direct a new Star Trek film for Paramount and producer J.J. Abrams. It didn’t even seem real at the time because, despite Tarantino loving the franchise, it just wasn’t something we could imagine him doing, especially with his directing career so close to wrapping up. But there are real steps being taken now, and a big one is that Tarantino may have decided on a writer who can make his vision come true.
And of course, that vision will include Star Trek being R-rated. Expect more than the usual allotment of F-bombs from Starfleet if Tarantino’s movie gets off the ground. Mark L. Smith (The Revenant) has emerged as frontrunner to write it after a meeting with Tarantino that included writers Lindsey Beer (Chaos Walking) and Drew Pearce (Iron Man 3). It’s a little odd that Tarantino isn’t writing it himself, but he has work to do on his upcoming Manson era movie. Presumably he’ll do a rewrite on anything that gets to him, anyway.
There are a bunch of questions here, but I’ll start with this: Will Tarantino’s movie be part of the universe established by Abrams or perhaps a standalone? I could see it going either way. Will this count as Tarantino’s 10th movie and thus be his final one before retiring? Is he still planning to retire? And finally, what are the chances of Samuel L. Jackson playing the first black Captain Kirk? I put the odds at 50/50 right now.
Paramount is moving fast on this one, so hopefully more news will come soon. [Deadline]
