Finally, Chris Pine’s Enterprise crew is getting back together for a fourth outing. The J.J. Abrams-reboot, which begun in 2009, follows James T. Kirk (Pine) and Spock (Zachary Quinto) in their early Starfleet years and takes place in an alternate reality, allowing the franchise to break from established continuity.

No casting deals on the new film have yet been confirmed, but Paramount will soon be entering negotiations for Pine, Quinto, Simon Pegg, Karl Urban, Zoe Saldana and John Cho to reprise their respective roles from the trilogy as Kirk, Spock, Scotty, Bones, Uhura and Sulu. This is a long-awaited breakthrough for this fourth big screen outing, following a number of stumbles involving talent in front of and behind the camera.

This time, it’s WandaVision director Matt Shakman who will direct, with Josh Friedman (Avatar 2) and Cameron Squires (WandaVision) rewriting a script from Lindsey Beer (Sierra Burgess Is a Loser) and Geneva Robertson-Dworet (Captain Marvel).

Abrams announced the news: “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. 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.”

The as yet untitled Star Trek instalment will land in cinemas December 22nd, 2023.