(L to R) Anton Yelchin, Chris Pine, Simon Pegg, Karl Urban, John Cho and Zoe Saldana in 'Star Trek' (2009). Courtesy of Paramount Pictures.

(L to R) Anton Yelchin, Chris Pine, Simon Pegg, Karl Urban, John Cho and Zoe Saldana in 'Star Trek' (2009). Courtesy of Paramount Pictures.

Ever since ‘Star Trek Beyond’ failed to launch at the box office, the big screen flagship of the ‘Trek’ franchise has been lingering in Spacedock, unsure which course to chart. Now, though it appears that Paramount is ready to engage the warp engines again, with Chris Pine and the rest of the current crew busy making deals to return.

The news comes as part of Paramount’s Investors Day presentation, in which it unleashed enough news to choke the Doomsday Machine, including an early season 2 renewal for the ‘Halo’ TV series (which is only just about to debut), lots of future ‘SpongeBob’ movies and more ‘South Park’.

Yet word on a return for ‘Star Trek’ crew who first boarded the USS Enterprise in J.J. Abrams’ 2009 reboot of the franchise is perhaps the most exciting revelation.

It looked for a while as though Pine’s Captain Kirk, along with Zachary Quinto’s Spock, Zoe Saldana’s Uhura, Karl Urban’s Dr. McCoy, John Cho’s Sulu and Simon Pegg’s Scotty might never return to the final frontier, but Paramount is now going at full speed to put them on a new mission.

Abrams himself made the announcement. “We are thrilled to say that we are hard at work on a new ‘Star Trek’ film that will be shooting by the end of the year that will be featuring our original cast and some new characters that I think are going to be really fun and exciting and help take ‘Star Trek’ into areas that you’ve just never seen before,” he said. “We’re thrilled about this film, we have a bunch of other stories that we’re talking about that we think will be really exciting, so can’t wait for you to see what we’re cooking up. But until then, live long and prosper.”

(L to R) Zachary Quinto and Chris Pine in 'Star Trek' (2009). Courtesy of Paramount Pictures.

(L to R) Zachary Quinto and Chris Pine in 'Star Trek' (2009). Courtesy of Paramount Pictures.

Yet Abrams won’t – as with ‘Beyond’ – be directing (though he’ll produce via his Bad Robot Company). Instead, ‘WandaVision’s Matt Shakman has that job, and he’ll work from a script by ‘Avatar 2’s Josh Friedman and Shakman’s ‘WandaVision’ colleague Cameron Squires. Their screenplay will be based on an earlier draft by Lindsey Beer and Geneva Robertson-Dworet.

As for what’ll happen in the movie? That’s being kept behind the shields for now, though it’s unlikely to be the rumored time-travel concept that would have seen Kirk meet his dad, played (briefly) in Abrams’ original movie by Chris Hemsworth. Actors’ pay deals reportedly scuttled that idea, though it could be resurrected. (Does anyone have a Genesis device to hand?)

And while they appear to be drifting in a nebula for now, the planned expansions of the ‘Trek’ movie universe by ‘Fargo’s Noah Hawley and cult director Quentin Tarantino are still out there, waiting for their chance.

‘Star Trek’s fortunes have certainly turned around of late, with the TV side of things expanding exponentially, and now some positive forward movement on the theatrical end. Of course, any new movie will have to deal with the tragic loss of Anton Yelchin, who played Chekov in the previous three adventures, and hopefully the team will go the respectful route and have his character off on another mission rather than re-cast.

Still, with luck, a late 2022 shooting start means we could have a new ‘Star Trek’ movie beaming into theaters by the end of 2023. That’s news to even make Spock giggle.