Abrams Producing Boilerplate

It seems that JJ Abrams doesn't have enough on his plate as he has decided to produce another movie according to the Hollywood Reporter. The movie will be done under his Bad Robot banner. Right now it’s all in the preliminary stages with Paramount buying the rights to the novel "Boilerplate: History's Mechanical Marvel" by Paul Guinan and Anina Bennett and turning over to Abrams to turn into a movie.

THR describes Boilerplate as "the story of the world’s first robot, who, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, fought alongside Teddy Roosevelt and Lawrence of Arabia, journeyed to the South Pole and was involved in the silent movie business before disappearing on the battlefields of World War I." We will probably hear more about this next year as the movie is likely at least one to two years away from getting before the cameras, if it ever does. Until an official greelight, no movie and right now all this idea has is a strong advocate to get it made but no guarantees.

Whedon and Abrams The Visionaries Panel

The San Diego Comic-Con is over but the videos are being uploaded even as we speak. One of them includes coverage of "The Visionaries" panel with Joss Whedon and JJ Abrams. If the highlights wasn't enough information, check the panel playlist below thanks to The Buffyfest Blog.

Abrams, Whedon SSDC Panel

Yesterday two great sci-fi minds shared the stage at the 2010 San Diego Comic-Con as Joss Whedon and J.J. Abrams participated in a Q&A panel together. Sadly these two are also huge fans of keeping secrets so not a whole lot of information was leaked. If you are hoping for collaboration, it’s not in the cards but the panel for con fans anyway, not really to promote a particular project.

About the information that was revealed was confirmation of the months long rumor that Whedon has been tapped to direct The Avengers movie for Marvel. JJ Abrams confirmed that he is directing Super 8 with production starting this September but still would not confirm if he would be directing Star Trek 2.

He also said he would not be releasing the film in 3D, bucking the current overdone trend. "When you put the glasses on, everything gets dimmer. It all gets a little gray and muted. You get into it, my brain adjusts to it after a while, but for the first few minutes, it seems less than the experience…I’m not totally on board."

More details of the panel can be found at Ugo.com and TrekMovie.

Mission: Impossible 4 Remains Barely Alive

The JJ Abram's produced (but not directed) Mission: Impossible 4 remains on life support according to The Hollywood Reporter. Paramount has been waiting on the results of Tom Cruise's latest film, Knight and Day, to determine if they would green light the next film in the franchise. Well the domestic results are in and the film was basically a box office disaster in the states.

However, while Cruise's star may have fallen here, he remains popular overseas. Paramount has decided on a wait and see stance to see how the film does overall before making decision since worldwide sales could make a failure into a huge success. Recent billion dollar films of Avatar and Alice in Wonderland owe its huge grosses to overseas sales so the precedent has now been firmly established that a film doesn't necessarily have to make big buck in the States to succeed.

According to the article, Knight and Day needs to at least pass the $300 million worldwide mark before Paramount will give serious consideration to a green light. As it stands, Box Office Mojo is reporting a total of $103.3 million so that seems highly unlikely but then again the film still has not opened in all major markets.

Assuming Knight and Day doesn't achieve the box office requirements Paramount is seeking for an easy green light, which leaves three possibilities for the franchise. One, is to kill it (highly unlikely), two is to recast the lead role (a la James Bond), and last is a complete relaunch (like Spider-Man). At this point, I don't think a decision will be made until the relaunched Spider-Man is released just to see how audiences handle that option. Long story short, it will probably not be until after Star Trek 2 is released before M:I4 becomes a possibility. Another unanswered question is if the franchise continues without Cruise, will JJ Abrams remain on board as producer?

Abrams in Running to Direct Wicked Movie?

Deadline is reporting that four big name Hollywood directors are vying for the chance to direct the movie version of Wicked. The list is of rumored directors is JJ Abrams, James Mangold (Knight and Day), Ryan Murphy (Glee), and Rob Marshall (Nine). Wicked is a Broadway musical based on the fictional story of the Wicked Witch of the West from The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. Considering that Abrams is expected to start filming Super 8 this fall and Star Trek next summer, I don't see how he can even be on the short list unless Universal is willing to wait until 2012 to start production. So take at least the Abrams part of the rumor with a grain of salt.

JJ Abrams Joining Joss Whendon in San Diego

The geek heaven that is the San Diego Comic-Con (one year I will go) will have a match made in geek heaven with a two-man panel of JJ Abrams and Joss Whedon. Yep the two most powerful sci-fi/fantasy masters in Hollywood today will participate in a panel that Entertainment Weekly is hosting. Details beyond that bit of news is unknown, I just hope a recording of the panel pops up on YouTube. The Comic-Con will be from July 22-25th.

Fringe Season 3 Update

JJ Abrams' created show Fringe will be back this fall and production is about to start back up. While at the Saturn Awards last weekend, stars Anna Torv and Lance Reddick dropped about few hints about the upcoming season. Click here to view the video interviews (worth it just to look at the lovely Torv and hear her Australian accent) from TrekMovie.com. Highlights below.

Lance Reddick
- Expects S3 of Fringe to "spend a lot of time going back and forth between universes"
- Expects to see "a lot of development" between the two Olivias
- He has "absolutely" lobbied for a part in Star Trek, but it was too late for first movie, Abrams said maybe a role in the sequel
- Thinks it is possible that William Bell (Nimoy) can return to Fringe, as "anything is possible" with JJ Abrams

Anna Torv
- Shooting starts next week on season 3
- Expects that the casting of her mother is for the mother of the alternate universe Olivia
- She didn’t until later her scenes with Nimoy for Fringe were to be his last as an actor, but says he still got a huge round of applause when he wrapped