Simon Pegg Discusses the Future of STAR TREK Movies, Saying They "Don't Make Marvel Money"
Even though there’s a new Star Trek film currently being developed by Legion creator Noah Hawley, Simon Pegg seems to have his doubts that we’ll see another Star Trek movie get made. While talking to GamesRadar, Pegg explained that Paramount Pictures isn’t really in a rush to make another one because Star Trek movies don’t make Marvel Money.
“The fact is, Star Trek movies don’t make Marvel money. They make maybe $500 million at the most, and to make one now, on the scale they’ve set themselves, is $200 million. You have to make three times that to make a profit.”
He makes a good point there. 2009’s Star Trek, grossed $385.6 million. The follow-up, Star Trek Into Darkness made $467.3 million, and the third film, Star Trek Beyond, ended up pulling in $343.4 million. Those aren’t bad numbers, but they definitely aren’t Marvel movie numbers. Not a lot of films these days are pulling in Marvel movie box office numbers, though!
To make these future Star Trek movies more profitable, the budgets on them need to go down. I’m fine with that! Filmmakers will be forced to rely more on storytelling than special effects. Pegg went on to put some blame on the studio for not fully capturing the potential for revitalizing the franchise:
“I don’t feel like the last one… They didn’t really take advantage of the 50th anniversary. The regimen at the time dropped the ball on the promo of the film.”
Yeah, they did! He also went on to say that it will be difficult to get the cast and crew back to make another movie because of the tragic death of Anton Yelchin:
“And we’ve lost momentum. I think losing Anton [Yelchin] was a huge blow to our little family, and our enthusiasm to do another one might have been affected by that. So I don’t know.”
It’s something that has obviously affected Pegg. It makes sense that it would be hard to get the gang back together to make another movie without their co-star.
Star Trek is still a big and exciting property with a huge fanbase, and right now CBS is killing it with the shows they are making. The studio just needs to find a smart, new, and unique way of making any future films. Personally, I think they need to go back to the basics.
How do you think Paramount should move forward with the Star Trek film franchise?