MOVIE NEWS – William Shatner is about to embark on a journey that, until now, the legendary character he portrayed, Captain Kirk, could only achieve on the small and big screen!

William Shatner will follow in the footsteps of Star Trek character Captain Kirk and boldly go… well, where more and more are going, as he reportedly joins the growing number of people who have ventured into space aboard Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin rocket.

An article report has revealed that Shatner plans to become the oldest person to venture into space at the age of ninety as part of Bezos’ “15-minute civilian flight”, which would be a repeat of the flight that took Bezos into the lower atmosphere earlier this year. The report also suggested that Shatner would like to use the opportunity to make a documentary about the experience.

This is not the first time William Shatner has talked about jumping on board a space shuttle, having previously joked that he would be willing to go into space if Elon Musk was with him. Those comments were made a few years ago when a fan asked him on Twitter to go to the stars with the Space X founder. “Yes, with him in the seat next to me. As a bonus, I’ll be holding his hand during takeoff,” Shatner joked at the time. Now it seems he might not be joking.

According to TMZ, the 90-year-old is currently on the shortlist to be part of the second crew to launch the New Shepard rocket when it takes off on its next voyage in October. If all goes to plan, we’ll likely learn more about where and when we’ll be able to see his documentary, which was initially scheduled to air on Discovery but has since been moved elsewhere due to meetings.

In July, Jeff Bezos first went into space with his brother Mark, Wally Funk and Oliver Daemen, when the rocket blasted off to 66.5 miles, spent a short time in zero gravity, and then returned safely to Earth. There is no further information on who will be boarding the space module alongside Bezos and Shatner or how much the latter will pay for the privilege. However, it has been suggested that he may not pay the price that anyone else would be expected to pay, which would be logical given the free publicity opportunity provided by Shatner’s documentary.

The last seat occupied by Daemen on Blue Origin’s first flight was sold at auction, eventually costing the student’s father $20 million. Whether there will be a similar auction on the latest flight has yet to be announced, but it seems there will be no shortage of people with that kind of change in their pockets who would be willing to spend money for the honour of taking part in Bezos’ space race.

While Shatner seems ready to make his first real trip to the final frontier, one thing he doesn’t plan to do is return to the franchise that made him a cultural icon. In 2019, the actor made it clear in an interview with ComicBook.com that he was done with the punishing work schedule that comes with TV roles. “You’d have to prop me up, Shatner, to take down the daily… [laughs] I don’t know what Patrick [Stewart] does. Doing a show that I did when I was 25 is exhausting. It’s physically and mentally destructive, and it’s also destructive at home because you’re working 14 to 18 hours a day. And on my last series, Boston Legal, I had to commute two hours during rush hour. So you have to add that in. So no, I wouldn’t be interested in another series.”

Source: TMZ