Random News of the Week (October 27 - November 2, 2008)

Mark Millar (WANTED) is getting closer to having his vision of a completely new Superman franchise take off. In an interview, he says, “It’s gonna be like Michael Corleone in the Godfather films, the entire story from beginning to end, you see where he starts, how he becomes who he becomes, and where that takes him. The Dark Knight showed you can take a comic book property and make a serious film, and I think the studios are ready to listen to bigger ideas now. I want to start on Krypton, a thousand years ago, and end with Superman alone on Planet Earth, the last being left on the planet, as the yellow sun turns red and starts to supernova, and he loses his powers."

Jon Favreau and Robert Downey Jr. are both officially locked down contractually for THE AVENGERS. Favreau will Produce (not direct though because he will probably be working on IRON MAN 3 at that point) and Downey will of course be playing Tony Stark for the official AVENGERS film. Don Cheadle is also locked in for the film as War Machine. Favreau also mentioned some story details for IRON MAN 2 that help set up the AVENGERS film. "There's some relationship between Tony's father and what was going on in World War II, in the Marvel Universe, and Shield, so we're trying to lay some pipe here so that when it all happens it feels somewhat inevitable."

J. Michael Straczynski (BABYLON 5) has been hired to script a remake of the classic Sci-Fi film FORBIDDEN PLANET. Unfortunately, Joel Silver is producing but who knows how it will come out. The original film dealt with the tale of an expedition sent from Earth to check on a colony of scientists on a far-off planet. They find two members, a man who has found alien technology that doubled his intellect, Dr. Morbius, and his daughter, both of whom have managed to survive an unseen monster roaming the planet.

Vin Diesel will be back for a 3rd XXX called XXX: Return of Xander Cage. Rob Cohen says, “Yes, they're doing it with me and producer Joe Roth. We made the deal recently, it's named xXx: The Return of Xander Cage. We met the writers yesterday and we're trying to get into production by late spring, to have it out for the summer of 2010."

Sam Jackson has joined INGLORIOUS BASTARDS and will do all the narration in the film.

M. Night’s 3 picture horror deal which he is producing just got the greenlight on its first film. It will be called DEVIL and is being scripted by Brian Nelson (30 DAYS OF NIGHT). M. Night is producing and it is based on an original story that M. Night came up with.

Joaquin Phoenix has announced this week that he will be quiting acting to “focus on his music.” "This will be my last performance as an actor... I'm not doing films anymore...I'm working on my music. I'm done.” His upcoming TWO LOVERS film will be his last at 34 years old. We’ll see how long this lasts.

David Lindsay-Abaire (Pulitzer prize winning playright) will be scripting SPIDER-MAN 4. She previously co-wrote the script for ROBOTS. Not a good sign folks.

Riddick is still getting life in video games even though he’s been screwed at the Box Office. The follow up to the hit Riddick game is finally coming called CHRONICLES OF RIDDICK: ASSUALT ON DARK ATHENA.

After the HBO deal to do a PREACHER series fell apart a couple of weeks ago, not much has been announced. Now we find out this week that Sam Mendes (ROAD TO PERDITION, AMERICAN BEAUTY) has picked it up and will direct a feature length film for the popular graphic novel.

More A-list actors are joining Tim Burton’s ALICE IN WONDERLAND which is shaping up to be quite the big event film. Christopher Lee is playing an undisclosed character. Alan Rickman is the smoking Caterpillar. The film is still on track for a 2010 release.

Nolan actually talked a little bit this week about a 3rd Batman film. “Well ... let me think how to put this. There are two things to be said. One is the emphasis on story. What’s the story? Is there a story that’s going to keep me emotionally invested for the couple of years that it will take to make another one? That’s the overriding question. On a more superficial level, I have to ask the question: How many good third movies in a franchise can people name? [Laughs.] At the same time, in taking on the second one, we had the challenge of trying to make a great second movie, and there haven't been too many of those either. It’s all about the story really. If the story is there, everything is possible. I hope that was a suitably slippery answer.”