Movies
Rob Zombie Almost Directed ‘The Punisher’ Sequel During Thomas Jane’s Run
Thomas Jane starred as Frank Castle aka The Punisher back in 2004. The vigilante badass, took on John Travolta in the film. He also took on the famous Punisher baddie, The Russian in a bare-knuckle brawl. The film did okay in the box office. Nothing to write home about but it didn’t suck either landing at $54 million with a budget of $33 million. When a sequel was discussed, Rob Zombie was brought on as a potential director for the follow-up.
Unfortunately, Zombie’s Punisher never made it to screen, but the ideas were in place and Thomas Jane was very much onboard with the gnarly direction that Zombie wanted to take things in. A departure from the first film, into a more stylized and gory take, the folks at the studio turned down the idea entirely. They even let go of Jane and went with Ray Stevenson in Punisher: Warzone. That entry did poorly with only $10 million at the box office.
While chatting at Fanboy Expo Knoxville, Jane spilled the beans on Zombie’s potential take on The Punisher. Sadly, as mentioned above it got trashed along with Jane’s role.
“There were a couple of iterations of Punisher 2. One of them was with Rob Zombie directing, which I thought would have been interesting. Jane said. “But that was one iteration. We were batting around script ideas and trying to find a new director. The Marvel folks wanted to go with a different director, and that was their choice, so it was like, ‘Who is that person going to be?'”
Ironically, Zombie did end up with a song on the Punisher: War Zone soundtrack with the exclusive track “War Zone.”
The synopsis for The Punisher went like this:
This dark action film, based on the comic book series, follows FBI agent Frank Castle (Thomas Jane) as he transforms into the vengeful Punisher after criminals murder his family, including his wife and son. Castle is gravely injured in the attack and believed to be dead by Howard Saint (John Travolta), the crime lord who ordered the hit. Following his recovery, Castle becomes a heavily armed vigilante who will stop at nothing to exact revenge on Saint and dismantle his underworld empire.
I would have loved to see Zombie’s version of The Punisher. I mean, gore for sure. brutal fights for sure, a pitch black-hearted character for sure, and psychedelic neons and gels lighting the entire film for sure. What could have been?
Check out the closest thing we got to a Thomas Jane starring Punisher sequel below. The short film was directed by Phil Joanou and produced by Adi Shankar. The result was amazing and made me severely wish that Jane had made a Punisher trilogy. The next bad guy up would have been Wilson Fisk himself, The Kingpin.
Would you have liked to have seen Zombie direct Jane in a Punisher sequel?
Pssst. Watch the Punisher short film, you won’t regret it! Let us know what you thought about it.
Source: (Movie Web)
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Movies
‘Evil Dead’ Film Franchise Getting TWO New Installments
It was a risk for Fede Alvarez to reboot Sam Raimi’s horror classic The Evil Dead in 2013, but that risk paid off and so did its spiritual sequel Evil Dead Rise in 2023. Now Deadline is reporting that the series is getting, not one, but two fresh entries.
We already knew about the Sébastien Vaniček upcoming film that delves into the Deadite universe and should be a proper sequel to the latest film, but we are broadsided that Francis Galluppi and Ghost House Pictures are doing a one-off project set in Raimi’s universe based off of an idea that Galluppi pitched to Raimi himself. That concept is being kept under wraps.
“Francis Galluppi is a storyteller who knows when to keep us waiting in simmering tension and when to hit us with explosive violence,” Raimi told Deadline. “He is a director that shows uncommon control in his feature debut.”
That feature is titled The Last Stop In Yuma County which will release theatrically in the United States on May 4. It follows a traveling salesman, “stranded at a rural Arizona rest stop,” and “is thrust into a dire hostage situation by the arrival of two bank robbers with no qualms about using cruelty-or cold, hard steel-to protect their bloodstained fortune.”
Galluppi is an award-winning sci-fi/horror shorts director whose acclaimed works include High Desert Hell and The Gemini Project. You can view the full edit of High Desert Hell and the teaser for Gemini below:
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Movies
Fede Alvarez Teases ‘Alien: Romulus’ With RC Facehugger
Happy Alien Day! To celebrate director Fede Alvarez who is helming the latest sequel in the Alien franchise Alien: Romulus, got out his toy Facehugger in the SFX workshop. He posted his antics on Instagram with the following message:
“Playing with my favorite toy on set of #AlienRomulus last summer. RC Facehugger created by the amazing team from @wetaworkshop Happy #AlienDay everybody!”
To commemorate the 45th anniversary of Ridley Scott’s original Alien movie, April 26 2024 has been designated as Alien Day, with a re-release of the film hitting theaters for a limited time.
Alien: Romulus is the seventh film in the franchise and is currently in post-production with a scheduled theatrical release date of August 16, 2024.
In other news from the Alien universe, James Cameron has been pitching fans the boxed set of Aliens: Expanded a new documentary film, and a collection of merch associated with the movie with pre-sales ending on May 5.
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Movies
‘Invisible Man 2’ Is “Closer Than Its Ever Been” to Happening
Elisabeth Moss in a very well-thought-out statement said in an interview for Happy Sad Confused that even though there have been some logistical issues for doing Invisible Man 2 there is hope on the horizon.
Podcast host Josh Horowitz asked about the follow-up and if Moss and director Leigh Whannell were any closer to cracking a solution to getting it made. “We are closer than we have ever been to cracking it,” said Moss with a huge grin. You can see her reaction at the 35:52 mark in the below video.
Whannell is currently in New Zealand filming another monster movie for Universal, Wolf Man, which might be the spark that ignites Universal’s troubled Dark Universe concept which hasn’t gained any momentum since Tom Cruise’s failed attempt at resurrecting The Mummy.
Also, in the podcast video, Moss says she is not in the Wolf Man film so any speculation that it’s a crossover project is left in the air.
Meanwhile, Universal Studios is in the middle of constructing a year-round haunt house in Las Vegas which will showcase some of their classic cinematic monsters. Depending on attendance, this could be the boost the studio needs to get audiences interested in their creature IPs once more and to get more films made based on them.
The Las Vegas project is set to open in 2025, coinciding with their new proper theme park in Orlando called Epic Universe.
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