Reply #14: Shatner didn't want Kirk killed off.

[Kutjara]

He fought against it, and even tried to give Kirk a shot at the afterlife with his ad-libbed last words "oh my" (delivered with his eyes on eternity like he saw something beyond).

Shatner even wrote a Trek book that picks up where Generations left off, in which Kirk is revived (in a sort-of clone form), and fights the Romulans alongside Picard and the TNG crew. I think he "wrote" a few more in a similar vein and has always said in interviews that Kirk may not be absolutely, totally dead. Unfortunately for Bill, the owners of the ST franchise say that Kirk is dead as velvet crimplene leisure suits, so that appears to be that.

Of course, someone could always revive him in an alternative timeline, but they'd have to do it soon, before Shatner himself gets too old. Oh, wait. That already happened thirty years ago.