Tag: Aquaman 2

Posted on in Film News, News

WB Reportedly Might Delay Releases Of ‘Dune 2,’ ‘The Color Purple’ & ‘Aquaman 2’ To Due To Strike

While there have been ups and downs during the wave of studio blockbusters this summer. The fall and winter film season is a little less crowded, however, we might not have as many big films to look forward to later this year, specifically from Warner Bros. Pictures.

Variety is now claiming that Warners is potentially considering moving their three big 2023 movies “Dune Part Two,” the musical remake of “The Color Purple,” and their DC Comics film “Aquaman & The Lost Kingdom” into 2024. Although, they stop short from sharing details of when those projects could be added to the 2024 slate and suggest it’s also possible they could stick to their intended dates as well. Respectively those previously etched-out dates were November 3, December 20, and December 25.

Citing the ongoing labor strike in Hollywood as the main cause of the potential disruption. Given that the actors’ union is requiring members not to do promotion for upcoming films after the strike. Many studios rushed to get junkets and interviewers completed ahead of the SAG-AFTRA strike to make sure promos were recorded and could be pushed-out at a later date. Actors aren’t looking to cross picket lines to attend red carpets or do interviews which would make things increasingly difficult for studios (strikes are meant to be disruptive for a reason) to promote their films in the manner they’re used to.

Also, it might be worth mentioning that “Dune 2” boasts a massively popular young cast such as Timothee Chalamet, Zendaya, Florence Pugh, and Austin Butler who would all be key to getting younger audiences to support the expensive sci-fi fantasy sequel.

This news comes after reports that the James Wan sequel to the billion-dollar hit has undergone three rounds of reshoots. If you consider the superhero pic’s budget already started out in the $200 million-plus range, those reshoots are expected to have been pricey. I think it was obvious that “Aquaman 2” wasn’t going to be making that December 20 release given the studio still hasn’t even released a teaser trailer for the sequel.

SOURCE: VARIETY

Posted on in Film News, News

‘Aquaman 2’: James Wan Says Sequel “Heavily Inspired” By Mario Bava’s Classic Sci-Fi Horror Film ‘Planet Of The Vampires’

Production has been underway for a while now on Aquaman & The Lost Kingdom at Warner Bros. Studios Leavesden in Watford, England. However, we don’t know a lot about the film outside of it focusing on Necrus (assumed to be the “lost kingdom”) and the DC Comics villain Mongo.

Director James Wan has mentioned a key film that will “heavily inspire” the Aquaman sequel. While speaking with Total Film, the filmmaker cited Mario Bava’s classic Italian sci-fi horror film Planet of The Vampires from 1965.

“Aquaman 2 is very heavily inspired by Planet of the Vampires. You can take the boy out of horror but you can never take the horror out the boy.”

It’s a little shocking given how goofy and colorful the original installment was, but Wan seemingly indicates they’ll be doing a little darker with Aquaman 2.

“Well, the first movie took a lot of people by surprise, right? And that’s partially because they were not familiar with the comic book, which deals in this very lurid, strange world. People were taken aback that I didn’t throw all that stuff away and make a dark, heavy film. But I didn’t feel that would have been right for it. So with the second film, I feel it will be easier for people to accept where we go because I’ve already laid the foundation.”

If you’re not familiar to the Italian sci-fi horror film check out a synopsis and trailer (alongside Joe Dante talking about the film for Trailers From hell) below.

PLANET OF THE VAMPIRES – In the near future the two spaceships Argos and Galliot are sent to investigate the mysterious planet Aura. As the Galliot lands on the planet her crew suddenly go berserk and attack each other. The strange event passes, but the crew soon discovers the crashed Argos – and learns that her crew died fighting each other! Investigating further, the explorers come to realize the existence of a race of bodiless aliens that seek to escape from their dying world.

Aquaman & The Lost Kingdom is set to hit theaters on December 16, 2022.

SOURCE: TOTAL FILM

Posted on in Film News

‘Aquaman & The Lost Kingdom’ Has Officially Started Filming & Cinematographer Don Burgess Confirmed

Director James Wan has taken to Instagram to announce that the Aquaman sequel, Aquaman & The Lost Kingdom, has begun filming on the United Kingdom stages and the photo also confirmed that cinematographer Don Burgess is back after shooting the last installment.

Wan’s photo below showcases an icy set and reiterates the sequel’s working title of Nercus, a reference to King Mongo’s kingdom aka The Black City.

Filming will be taking place at Warner Bros. Studios. Leavesden in Watford, England and a bit of a change-up of shooting location as the first film was shot at Village Roadshow Studios in Australia. The English facility is also being used for The Flash movie alongside recently wrapped Warner Bros. pics such as The Batman and Fantastic Beasts 3.

Other DC Comics films in production include Dwayne Johnson’s Black Adam that is about finish up soon and David F. Sandberg’s Shazam!: Fury of The Gods recently just started down in Atlanta.

Aquaman & The Lost Kingdom is set for release on December 16, 2022 pitting it against James Cameron’s Avatar 2.

SOURCE: JAMES WAN

Posted on in Film News

‘Aquaman’ Sequel Officially Titled ‘Aquaman & The Lost Kingdom’; Confirming The Setting Of Necrus

Danish actor Pilou Asbæk (Overlord, Ghost In The Shell, Game of Thrones) is the latest addition to the Aquaman sequel with Jason Momoa and Amber Heard set to return as Aquaman 2’s leads.  The working title going to be Necrus, a direct nod the underwater city of Necrus aka The Black City that is ruled by King Mongo, a character that Pilou is most likely playing.

Well, the film’s title seems to all confirming Necrus will be the setting, as director James Wan announced on Instagram the official title will be Aquaman & The Lost Kingdom.

Momoa previous confirmed a production start next month at Warner Bros. Studios Leavseden in Watford, England. Those same stages are being used for The Flash and Fantastic Beasts 3. The actor revealed he’ll also be landing story credit on the sequel.

The Ronin can confirm that production designer Bill Brzeski is back for Aquaman & The Lost Kingdom.

The original film was shot at Village Roadshow Studios in Australia under the working title Ahab.

It’s expected that Patrick Wilson, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Nicole Kidman, and Temuera Morrison will appear as well.

Other DC Comics films currently in production are The Flash, Black Adam, and Shazam! Fury of The Gods.

Warner Bros. has given the sequel a release date of December 16, 2022.

AQUAMAN – Once home to the most advanced civilization on Earth, the city of Atlantis is now an underwater kingdom ruled by the power-hungry King Orm. With a vast army at his disposal, Orm plans to conquer the remaining oceanic people — and then the surface world. Standing in his way is Aquaman, Orm’s half-human, half-Atlantean brother and true heir to the throne. With help from royal counselor Vulko, Aquaman must retrieve the legendary Trident of Atlan and embrace his destiny as protector of the deep.

SOURCE: JAMES WAN

Posted on in Film News

‘Aquaman 2’: Jason Momoa Wrote The Sequel’s Story Treatment & Confirms A July Production Start – Shooting At Warner Bros. Studios In Watford, England

Warner Bros. is in an interesting position with their DCEU franchise as The Batman has seemingly finished-up production, The Suicide Squad releases this summer, with production started on The Flash and Black Adam respectively. Shazam: Fury of The Gods is also set to begin shooting soon as well.

The next big DC Comics film will be James Wan’s sequel to the billion-dollar hit Aquaman and Jason Momoa has confirmed during an interview with The Drew Barrymore Show that production will begin this July, adding that he contributed to the film as a writer working on the sequel’s story treatment and originally pitching the idea to the studio.

The Ronin can confirm that production will be taking place at Warner Bros. Studios Leavesden in Watford, England. It’s a facility commonly used for DC Comics shoots including Wonder Woman 1984, The Flash, The Batman, and Justice League. The previous Aquaman film was shot mostly under in Australia at Village Roadshow Studios and it’s unclear why they decided to stick with Watford, England this time around.

Amber Heard is confirmed to reprise the role of Mera with Danish actor Pilou Asbæk (Game of Thrones, Overlord, Ghost In The Shell) joining the sequel’s cast.

Momoa has been filming projects in Canada recently such as the Netflix film Slumberland.

Aquaman 2 is still set to be released by Warner Bros. on December 16, 2022.

AQUAMAN – Once home to the most advanced civilization on Earth, the city of Atlantis is now an underwater kingdom ruled by the power-hungry King Orm. With a vast army at his disposal, Orm plans to conquer the remaining oceanic people — and then the surface world. Standing in his way is Aquaman, Orm’s half-human, half-Atlantean brother and true heir to the throne. With help from royal counselor Vulko, Aquaman must retrieve the legendary Trident of Atlan and embrace his destiny as protector of the deep.

SOURCE: THE DREW BERRYMORE SHOW

Posted on in Film News

‘Game of Thrones’ Alumni Pilou Asbæk In Talks To Join James Wan’s ‘Aquaman 2’

As director James Wan is preparing to shoot the sequel to the billion-dollar hit Aquaman starring Jason Momoa under the working title Necrus, there is a casting update.

A report from Deadline from yesterday states that Danish actor Pilou Asbæk is currently in talks to take a role. Pilou is likely best known for his villainous role in the latter seasons of HBO’s Game of Thrones and playing an evil Nazi in Bad Robot’s Overload. He also co-starred alongside Scarlett Johansson in DreamWorks’ live-action Ghost In The Shell movie playing Batou.

While his part in the DC Comics project wasn’t mentioned. The working title is likely a reference to the underwater city of Necrus aka The Black City that is ruled by King Mongo, it’s possible that could be Pilou’s role in Aquaman 2.

Black Adam is currently filming in Atlanta with upcoming productions The Flash and Shazam! Fury of The Gods in the United Kingdom.

Aquaman 2 is still set to be released by Warner Bros. on December 16, 2022.

AQUAMAN – Once home to the most advanced civilization on Earth, the city of Atlantis is now an underwater kingdom ruled by the power-hungry King Orm. With a vast army at his disposal, Orm plans to conquer the remaining oceanic people — and then the surface world. Standing in his way is Aquaman, Orm’s half-human, half-Atlantean brother and true heir to the throne. With help from royal counselor Vulko, Aquaman must retrieve the legendary Trident of Atlan and embrace his destiny as protector of the deep.

SOURCE: DEADLINE

Posted on in Film News

WarnerMedia CEO Jason Kilar Suggests Blockbusters Will Return Exclusively To Theaters In 2022 Before Landing On HBO Max

As Godzilla Vs. Kong ended up having a better than expected international and domestic debut at the box office, it sounds like WarnerMedia won’t be carrying over the day-and-date model into 2022 at the same level.

WarnerMedia CEO Jason Kilar spoke with Vox on their podcast Recode Media, revealing that 2022 is expected to see blockbusters return to more traditional release windows with a theatrical run and landing on HBO Max later on.

KILAR: “I think it’s very fair to say that a big, you know, let’s say a big DC movie … it’s very fair to say that that would go exclusively to theaters first and then go to somewhere like an HBO Max after it’s in theaters.”

Their 2022 lineup includes The Batman on March 4, Fantastic Beasts 3 on July 15, Black Adam on July 29, The Flash on November 4, and Aquaman 2 on December 16.

However, only specifically mentioning the bigger movies might mean that movies like Judas & The Black Messiah won’t get the same theatrical exclusivity as the the massive blockbusters that would still need a large box office return to turn a profit.

This comes after AT&T CEO John Stankey had been quoted last year suggesting the day-and-day model would be something they’d considering continuing beyond the pandemic as the standard release window, something that had been controversial at the time.

We still don’t know if a film like Legendary’s Dune will even land on HBO Max later this year, as a deal has yet to be made official and director Denis Villeneuve has argued that it could seriously damage the sci-fi films’ franchise chances. It’s worth noting that Dune is only part one of a two-part story as they’ve split the first Dune book into two planned films, the 2021 release will end on a cliffhanger. Denis hasn’t even shot the second film and could screw-up Legendary’s plans for future installments (there are six original novels from author Frank Herbert).

SOURCE: VOX

Posted on in Film News

‘New Gods’ & ‘Trench’ Movies Given The Ax By Warner Bros.

Warner Bros. and DC Films have been developing a heap of feature films based on DC Comics characters along with a few spinoffs of existing projects set within the DCEU. There was a time when announcing projects felt like they’d never follow through with the volume of press releases.

Yesterday, it made huge waves when The Hollywood Reporter announced that Warner Bros. won’t be moving with Ava DuVernay’s New Gods movie she was writing with comic book writer Tom King, featuring the cosmic characters created by Jack Kirby. Some appeared in the Justice League (Granny Goodness & Darkseid) and were expected to play a bigger role in Zack Snyder’s never-made sequels.

It’s not the only project getting the boot.

Aquaman’s James Wan was working to develop a horror spinoff from his Aquaman film with Trench, a horror flick that was penned by Noah Gardner and Aidan Fitzgerald. Wan and Peter Safran (Black Adam, Shazam!) were producers on the project that was expected to have a much smaller budget than it’s superhero counterparts. It’s also not moving forward as well.

Wan is about to shoot Aquaman 2 and produced the Mortal Kombat reboot set to be released later this month. Ava is also working on a CW series Naomi and a DMZ series for HBO Max. So their working relationships with WarnerMedia don’t seem to be tarnished over this decision.

This what the studio had to say in a statement suggesting they might consider circling back in the future.

“As part of our DC slate, some legacy development titles including New Gods and The Trench will not be moving forward. We thank our partners Ava DuVernay, Tom King, James Wan and Peter Safran for their time and collaboration during this process and look forward to our continued partnership with them on other DC stories. The projects will remain in their skillful hands if they were to move forward in the future.”

Ava posted on Twitter her reaction to the news praising co-writer Tom King.

This news comes after WarnerMedia Studios CEO Ann Sarnoff revealed to Variety last month they weren’t interested in restoring the Snyderverse and hoped to continue moving forward with new projects instead.

I wouldn’t be terribly shocked if the studio started announcing other things they won’t be making, officially. Projects like Steven Spielberg’s WWII flick Blackhawk I suspect will go the way of Sgt. Rock, Joker & Harley Quinn, Lobo, and the purposed Cyborg movie.

SOURCE: THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER

Posted on in Film News

Damien Chazelle’s R-Rated 1920s Hollywood Drama ‘Babylon’ Bumped To Christmas 2022 By Paramount

Deadline has revealed that Paramount Pictures is bumping the release date of Damien Chazelle‘s latest movie titled Babylon an entire year to December 25, 2022 . The film will be a period drama set in Hollywood’s transition to talkies in the 1920s with Brad Pitt attached to star and Margot Robbie reportedly in talks for a role after Emma Stone exited.

The film is a period, R-rated drama, set in the shifting moment in Hollywood when the industry turned from silent film to talkies. 

This new release date would place Babylon in direct competition with upcoming blockbusters Avatar 2 and Aquaman 2 as both will drop earlier in the month.

The pair of actors starred in Quentin Tarantino‘s Once Upon A Time In Hollywood leading to Pitt’s Oscar win for Best Supporting Actor, however, they never shared the screen together. It’ll also be interesting to see if the project will skew more in the realm of something similar to David Fincher‘s latest project Mank, a dramatic biopic about the Citizen Kane screenwriter that takes place well after that talkies have dominated the film industry.

Brad Pitt is currently shooting the Sony Pictures assassin action flick Bullet Train in Los Angeles for director David Leitch (Deadpool 2, John Wick, Atomic Blonde).

Margot Robbie‘s next theatrical release will be The Suicide Squad on August 6th and is said to have a role in David O. Russell‘s next project.

It’s certainly notable that movies focused on Hollywood and the film industry tend to do extremely well during awards season nominations suggesting that Babylon could be gearing-up to become a contender even before cameras roll.

SOURCE: DEADLINE

Posted on in Film News

Walter Hamada To Continue His Role As President of DC Films Into 2023

Variety is reporting that DC Films President Walter Hamada has re-upped with extension that will last through 2023. This means Hamada will be around long enough to execute a heap of projects for both the big screen and WarnerMedia’s domestic streaming service HBO Max that he’s been developing for the last couple of years.

There are plenty of upcoming feature film projects on the horizon including films expected to begin shooting this year such as The Flash, Black Adam, Shazam!: Fury of The Gods, and Aquaman 2. James Gunn is also set to begin shooting his Peacemaker series starring John Cena this month in Vancouver, a mature spinoff series of The Suicide Squad exclusively or HBO Max.

Other things in the fire are Wonder Woman 3, Batgirl, Static Shock, The Trench, Plastic Man, a Green Lantern series at HBO Max, and development on a Supergirl movie before things stalled.

Hamada joined DC Films back in 2018 coming from New Line Cinema.

James Gunn‘s The Suicide Squad is expected to be the next big DC release on August 6th, 2021 as Matt Reeves‘ The Batman had been bumped from October 1st, 2021 to March 4th, 2022 giving the production a bit of breathing room as they attempting to complete filming during the pandemic as there is increased strain in the United Kingdom.

SOURCE: VARIETY