Star Trek’s new Mr. Spock was on NBC’s Today show this morning promoting his new film Aardvark, which premieres today at the Tribecca Film Festival. At the end of the segment, Al Roker threw Quinto a question asking if he had any “insight as to what is coming up” for the next Star Trek movie.

Like his co-star Chris Pine’s recent comments, Qunito too seems in the dark as to the current status, although he does indicate there had been work done on a script, saying:

I don’t know Al. We are waiting. I know they were working on a script for another one and we will see how that all plays out.

The actor then went on to talk about how it is nice to have time in between the “big tentpole” films so he can do other work he loves on stage and with independent films. But then he added this ominous note:

I’m hopeful that we will do another [Star Trek film], but there [are] no guarantees

You can watch the full segment from NBC here:

Star Trek Movie Limbo



While Quinto’s comment about no guarantees is a bit ominous, it is of course a truism in Hollywood that things change all the time. But remember, last summer Paramount did officially announce they would produce a fourth Trek film with J.J. Abrams, and just last month the CEO of Viacom (Paramount’s parent company) was talking about Star Trek being one of the key tent pole franchises for future releases.

That being said, the box office returns for Star Trek Beyond did not meet expectations, so it would be natural for the studio to want to take their time to plan out the next step for the franchise. And added to that is the recent ouster of Paramount CEO Brad Grey, with the new CEO only on the job for a few weeks.

With the current lack of movement and the busy schedules of the actors having a Trek film out by next year summer would be impossible and even the summer after that may not be in the cards. Of course a two-year gap between Trek features wasn’t expected. The previous J.J. Abrams-produced films had four and three-year gaps respectively. As of now Paramount has already lined up franchise tentpole summer releases for 2018 (Mission: Impossible 6, currently filming) and 2019 (another Transformers film). So they may feel they have some time to think when it comes to the next Star Trek.

Keep up with all the news on the next Star Trek feature film at TrekMovie.