Another day, another news story about a Star Trek sequel. To be completely honest, when the stars were doing press junkets for Into Darkness, most of them seemed so lukewarm on continuing the franchise that I doubted we would ever see a Star Trek 4. Well, I was wrong, and I couldn’t be more glad for it. That being said, all we know about the latest installment is that it will involve James T. Kirk crossing paths with his father, George Kirk (played by a pre-Thor Chris Hemsworth). Everyone has been asking … how? Last we saw him he played chicken with the Narada and lost (his ship exploded quite gloriously). Here are some theories I cooked up on how we could get this fateful reunion.
Time Travel is Absolutely Involved
Time travel has to the reason for it, otherwise they’d never bring back Chris Hemsworth. If Kirk’s father were still alive and kicking it on Nimbus III he would at least be in his late 60s. It’s far too old to have Hemsworth reprising his role (as he is set to), and lets be honest. If you have Hemsworth on screen, you don’t want that man covered up in make-up.
Option 1: The Yesterday’s Enterprise Scenario
In this option, George Kirk, possibly during a mission as the second in command of the Kelvin encounters a temporal anomaly that shunts them into the path of the Enterprise crew. This may even create an alternate timeline in the same way the arrival of the Enterprise-C in the path of the Enterprise-D in the aforementioned The Next Generation episode creates a timeline where the Federation and Klingon Empire are locked in a state of perpetual war. Whether their arrival alters the present of not, it with certainly involve George learning his fate at the hands of Nero, and will make his sacrifice all the more meaningful, as he’d met his son and knew his importance to history.
Option 2: There Be Whales Here
This is the fourth Star Trek after all, which means we’ve got to travel back in time with our glued together Bird-of-Prey, uh *cough* I mean derelict Federation ship. I mean the first movie has some similarities with The Motion Picture, and Into Darkness was basically a remix of The Wrath of Khan. Beyond also seems to take several elements from The Search for Spock, so it would make sense that the trend is continued into the fourth installment.
That being said, the plot could follow something like this: On their way back to Earth the crew of the Enterprise receive a distress signal from the Federation. Earth has been destroyed … by the Narada. Instead of being destroyed the ship was actually sent forward through time, and with Starfleet deployed, the Narada was able to complete it’s mission. The only way to stop it? Send the Franklin back through time and stop the Narada in the past.
I think this option would be interesting, not least of which would be the whale jokes. Mainly, because it would give them an opportunity to reset the Kelvin timeline by saving Kirk’s father. This could effectively reboot NuTrek back into classic Trek.
Option 3: Mirror, Mirror Kirks!
We’ve yet to see the Mirror Universe on the big screen, and now would be a perfect time for it. Imagine seeing a battle hardened George Kirk, who killed his captain to take control of his ship, but who had to live with the loss of his ship and son at the hands of the rebel slave Nero. Now he leads the new flagship of the Terran Empire, the Enterprise, on a scouting mission into the newly discovered mirror universe only to be faced with the son he never met.
It would be super fun to see not only the mirror universe done right on the big screen, but also to see a villainous Chris Hemsworth taking center stage.
Option 4: George Kirk Prime
This is similar to option 1, but instead of this being a Kelvin timeline George Kirk, this could be the prime universe GK who has managed to find his way into this alternate dimension. This would allow for a man who has a functioning father-son relationship to actually share what that’s like to the broken, perpetually embroiled in daddy issues James T. Kirk we have in the Kelvin timeline.
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I’d like to see Alexander Marcus, either as a Jr Officer or as Captain, recruiting the young Christopher Pike. Either way, he’s a talented officer with a dark side. His story arc: Breaking Bad.