Fans have been holding out hope for some time for Star Trek 4, but we're sorry to report that, according to franchise star Simon Pegg, they may have to continue to wait for some time yet. Pegg has been discussing the future of the series recently and blames the emergence of Marvel, as well as financial issues, for keeping Star Trek out of cinemas.

"The fact is, Star Trek movies don't make Marvel money. They make maybe $500 million at the most, and to make one now, on the scale they've set themselves, is $200 million. You have to make three times that to make a profit."

That is certainly a big mountain to climb at the box office. Since 2009, there have been three entries into the Star Trek film franchise. They began in 2009 with Star Trek, which brought the crew of the Starship Enterprise to a new audience and which grossed a respectable $385.6 million. The sequel, Star Trek Into Darkness, which starred Marvel alumni Benedict Cumberbatch as the villainous Khan, grossed $467.3 million worldwide. The third and most recent movie, Star Trek Beyond, came out in 2016 and made $343.4 million. All of these are pretty respectable box office gains, but pale in comparison to the likes of the Marvel output and, sadly due to this, Paramount Pictures are in no rush to offer up another Star Trek installment.

Simon Pegg, of course, played the engineer known as Scotty in all three Star Trek movies, with the third giving him more of the spotlight than the previous two. Though the movies were well-received, Pegg does put part of the blame on the studio for not successfully capturing the potential of the franchise, particularly with the release of Star Trek Beyond.

"I don't feel like the last one... They didn't really take advantage of the 50th anniversary. The regimen at the time dropped the ball on the promo of the film."

He does also highlight the tragic death of his co-star, Anton Yelchin, back in 2016 for the somewhat deflated attitude from the cast and crew, a feeling that is completely understandable.

"And we've lost momentum. I think losing Anton [Yelchin] was a huge blow to our little family, and our enthusiasm to do another one might have been affected by that. So I don't know."

Basically, it sounds like there is a multitude of reasons as to why we have yet to hear much of an announcement regarding a Star Trek 4. Of course, that does not mean it will never happen, but it certainly sounds like it will not be happening any time soon. There have been rumors for years of a Tarantino Star Trek movie, but so far that remains about as mythical as the Holy Grail. For now, we will just have to make do with the Star Trek franchise as it is until somebody decides in which direction to take the beloved franchise. This comes to us from Games Radar.