Tarantino’s ‘Star Trek’ Film Is Moving Forward, Will Be Rated R, Sir Patrick Stewart Wants To Be In It

It looks like Quentin Tarantino’s Star Trek film is happening, and it’s happening fast. Accoridng to Deadline, the genius auteur locked himself in a writer’s room with a team that included The Good Place’s Megan Amram and Mark L. Smith, who is rumored to be the man in charge of the final script, based on Tarantino’s plot and the other writer’s input. There seems to be a desire to move ahead quickly and have a shooting script ready by the time Tarantino is wraps production on his Manson family film.

The most interesting thing from the Deadline report, whoever, is probably that Tarantino insisted on, and got, permission to make an R-Rated Star Trek film. This is great news because the Star Trek franchise really needs to do something that breaks out of the rut it’s been in and takes things in a new direction.

The Star Trek inspired Seth MacFarlane show The Orville has been a breakout hit with audiences, earning the earliest in-season renewal of any new show this season. It currently has a 93% audience rating on Rotten Tomatoes, despite it’s 21% splatty tomato from critics, compared to a 57% from audiences for the certified-fresh Star Trek: Discovery.

I mention this because with just a little deviation from the Star Trek formula, in this case the dynamic of a bickering divorced couple and a crew that banters and makes dick jokes, you can have a certified hit with an audience almost as big as flagship drama Empire. That’s what Tarantino brings to the table here. The most memorable aspect of Tarantino’s movies has always been the relationships between characters and the way his dialogue makes exposition seem interesting. A close second is his stylized violence; Tarantino has drawn from exploitation, chanbara, wuxia and westerns to create films that make horrifically gory seem gloriously beautiful.

I’m not the only person excited about what Tarantino brings to the Star Trek universe. Sir Patrick Stewart spoke with The Hollywood Reporter at the Dubai International Film Festival where he said that while he doesn’t see himself coming back to Star Trek, if Quentin Tarantino were the director, he’d make an exception.

“But one of my dreams is to work with Tarantino. I admire his work so much, and to be in a Tarantino film would give me so much satisfaction. So, if he is going to direct something to do with Star Trek and there was the possibility of dear old Jean-Luc showing up again and doing that for Mr Tarantino, I would embrace it.”

“The one thing that characterizes all of his movies is that frame by frame, it always challenges, always demands your attention, always demands a very kind of open and generous response to what he does,” he said. “I also love his sense of humor as a filmmaker. So yes, he would be my first choice.”

There’s an endorsement for you, anyone who doubts Tarantino can make a good Star Trek film. While the jokes about his films being all swear words and tracking shots of Uma Thurman barefoot are funny, Tarantino is a real genius who has made some of the best films of all time, and if anyone can breath life back into Star Trek, it’s him.