There was a plan for William Shatner to return to the role of Captain James T. Kirk in Star Trek: Enterprise series, but was ultimately scrapped. Kirk would be a villain in the series and, during a recent interview, showrunner of Star Trek: Enterprise Manny Coto shared details about how Kirk’s arc would play out.
Kirk was killed in 1994 Star Trek: Generationsbut Shatner, along with the writers Judith AND Garfield Reeves-Stevenshad the idea to resurrect an evil version of Captain Kirk to fight Captain Jonathan Archer and the crew of the NX-01 Enterprise.
Coto revealed the following information in Star Trek oral history book, The Middle Place: 55 Years of Star Trek by Peter Holmstrom. He explained:
“The idea was that it was a Mirror Universe-themed episode. In the original ‘Mirror, Mirror,’ the evil Kirk had a device called the Tantalus field, where at the press of a button his enemies vanished. Now, it was implied there, in that episode, that they were just dead, but what the Reeves-Stevene were saying [was]’What if what this field did was transport everyone who opposed it into this pocket universe?'”
“So, everyone on this planet survived. At the end of that episode, it’s implied that the good Kirk had convinced the evil Spock to take command from the evil Kirk. And Kirk told him about the Tantalus camp. So you would have assumed that at the Eventually the evil Spock would send Kirk to Tantalus’ camp [and taken] command of the Enterprise.”
“So now we have this pocket universe with the evil guy we called Tiberius Kirk, kind of stuck with other people that the evil Spock banished. But they forged this kind of community basically in a prison. The idea was, “And if Archer and the Enterprise came across this pocket universe and the evil Tiberius Kirk was now an older, but still formidable man, and wanted to take control of the Enterprise and escape. It was a prison escape.
“So it would have been the evil Kirk, William Shatner, Tiberius, trying to take control of the Enterprise with other servants who were trapped there.”
That would have been a really great Star Trek story to tell! I would have loved to see it! This is a concept that could still be played with, but I doubt it will ever happen. I’m not sure Shatner would want to play Kirk again at this point in his life.
The reason this never happened is because Paramount didn’t want to pay Shatner the kind of money he was demanding in return.
As for the series, Coto believes the studio “wanted it [Enterprise] die” and that the studio didn’t bring Shatner back “not because it was too expensive, but because they could have saved the series.”
Would you have liked to see Kirk return as the villain? Star Trek: Enterprise?
by Joey Paur
Source: Geek Tyrant
Lloyd Grunewald is an author at “The Fashion Vibes”. He is a talented writer who focuses on bringing the latest entertainment-related news to his readers. With a deep understanding of the entertainment industry and a passion for writing, Lloyd delivers engaging articles that keep his readers informed and entertained.
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