10 Best 2016 Movie Fan Theories
5. William Shatner Will Feature As Future Kirk - Star Trek Beyond
After Leonard Nimoy made an appearance in the first two Trekkie reboot instalments, Star Trek and Star Trek Into Darkness, as Spock Prime (an older version of the Spock played by Zachary Quinto) fans were hoping they might see more original Star Trek cast members show up in cameo roles. When Nimoy sadly died in 2015, it left Star Trek Beyond with a gaping whole just waiting for a fellow original cast member to fill it. As the original Captain James T. Kirk, William Shatner, had previously expressed interest in returning to his iconic role in some way or another, fans logically came to the conclusion that Shatner might appear in Star Trek Beyond. Add to that the fact that 2016 marks the 50th birthday of the Star Trek franchise and a Kirk Prime cameo in the reboot seemed like a perfect way to mark the occasion.
They were wrong, but they weren’t too far off the mark. Shatner did indeed make an appearance in Star Trek Beyond – alongside fellow original cast members Leonard Nimoy, George Takei, Nichelle Nichols and others – if only in a photo (it’s actually a cast photo from the film Star Trek V: The Final Frontier) that Quinto’s Spock comes across. It might not have been a physical cameo, but it’s a nice nod to both Nimoy’s passing and Star Trek’s 50th anniversary nonetheless.