The news of the hiring today of SJ Clarkson to both direct and executive produce HBO’s upcoming “Game of Thrones” prequel pilot came with another revelation. Reportedly the premium cabler snagged Clarkson after she recently became available because a previous commitment fell through – “Star Trek 4”.

In 2018 Clarkson was the first female director to be tapped to direct a “Star Trek” movie when she was hired to helm the fourth feature in the current J.J. Abrams-produced series. Today, Deadline reports that the project has since been shelved by Paramount and won’t be proceeding.

This was not entirely unexpected as in August talks with actors Chris Pine and Chris Hemsworth to appear in the next film had fallen through when Paramount wanted to tighten the budget in the wake of the poor performance of “Star Trek Beyond”.