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Bidding War Ongoing for "Voltron"
Source: NY Times
Activate interlock! Dynotherms connected! Infracells up! Megathrusters are go! Go Voltron Film! That's right, nearly 30 years after it premiered on US televisions, "Voltron: Defender of the Universe" may actually make it's way to the silver screen. A bidding war is currently going on to finance a Transformers-sized blockbuster version of the classic TV cartoon about five robotic lions and their human pilots. Among the groups bidding are Relativity Media ('Battle: LA', 'Cowboys & Aliens') and Atlas Entertainment ('Twelve Monkeys', Superman: Man of Steel').
The film has been tied up in development for decades, due to the fact that 'Voltron' was actually a mix of two entirely separate anime shows, both owned by Japanese company Toei Animation, Co. Ltd. and working out financial compensation for all parties as well as financing the film proved to be difficult. However, World Event (the US studio who made 'Voltron') recently acquired the full rights to the property from Toei, and - after another series of legal snafus - finally worked it all out and have made it clear that they want to bring the show back to American audiences with both a new TV series (to air on Nicktoons this May) and a feature length film.
Atlas Entertainment had already been developing a script for the project from Thomas Donnelly and Joshua Oppenheimer ('Sahara') and the following concept art images were leaked last year by JoBlo.com:
(Click for full-size)
Now, with the rights finally ironed out and so many companies vying for production rights, it looks like you'll be seeing them "Form Blazing Sword!" in a movie theater near you sometime in late 2013.
Comment
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Comment by Gift of the Magi on March 14, 2011 at 7:51am -
'Reality' is always a tricky thing in sci-fi. For the people that don't like sci-fi, using 'reality' helps draw them in by making the story more plausible. However, too much can delute the thrill and theme of the story...and make it like too dirty and grimy.
The point made with Casino Royale (sorry, but GOLDENEYE was not cartoony? I am In-VINC-ible!) and the recent vision of Bond puts a lot of 'reality' in it to balance out what fans were seeing as too many years of Roger Moore-like antics. However, neither Royale or Solace are as memorable as Goldfinger or Live and Let Die, some of the crazier and yet most fun Bond films ever made.
So how does this apply to Voltron of all things? Well, I think 'reality' needs to step back a bit here. Voltron is a series about five robotic lions, powered by magic, that fight against an evil space empire that primarily uses giant monsters to attack their foes. No amount of 'reality' is going to fix that, and removing parts of the original story will just piss off the fanbase you're HOPING will promote this.
I say go nuts with this. Go absolutlely bat-shit, over the top, epic beyond the stars with it. Do make it plausible, make it FUN! When Voltron attacks, make the heavens shutter. When the lions roar, make the earth quake. Go for broke!
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Comment by Happy Birthday Roboto on March 12, 2011 at 9:40am -
Also I feel that Goldeneye and Casino Royale are two Bond films that ignore cartoonish elements for a non cartoon character whereas Die Another Day introduces as many cartoonish elements as possible, like the invisible car, the laser from space and the villains Arctic fortress (where have I seen that before) that's made of ice and is still warm enough for Bond and his girl to sleep naked! Great stuff!
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Comment by Happy Birthday Roboto on March 12, 2011 at 6:04am
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@Gift of the Magi
This could easily devolve into an argument about small details, but the point I was trying to make is that those stories started out as comics that looked good as drawings and the directors found a way to make them work.
We would really need to decide what the 'superheroic' qualities of Batman are, but I feel that the costume, vehicles, gadgets, villains, villain gimmicks and costumes, batsignal and batcave, are the real superheroic/cartoonish elements but I feel Nolan's strategy was to ask if this particular thing existed in the real world what would it need to look like to fperform it's function like the batmobile.
I feel the same is true for Jon Favreau on Ironman as well.
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Comment by Gift of the Magi on March 11, 2011 at 10:13pm
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Actually, Nolan had success by basically ignoring nearly everything 'superhero' about Batman, while Singer...well...Singer played to the general audience so he's a better example here.
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Comment by Happy Birthday Roboto on March 11, 2011 at 2:47pm
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@Ged and Gift of the Magi
I totally agree that they'll do the Hollywood cliches and that the cartoon was about teamwork! The lead pilot controls the robot in combined form, I think.
The truth is when you start applying logic a LOT of cartoons/comics/toys don't make sense! I hold the Chris Nolan Batman films and the Bryan Singer X-Men films as great examples of good directors taking the cartoonish elements out and replacing them as and when necessary.
...doesn't always work though...
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Comment by Gift of the Magi on March 11, 2011 at 1:28pm
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@Ged....nah, they'll do the whole team. Hollywood has to run its cliches, so they'll need a female love interest(Princess), goofy fat guy (Hunk), asshole(Lance), smart nerd(Pidge) and standard good looking young leader (Keith)
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Comment by Ged on March 11, 2011 at 3:55am -
Thanks for that. Like I said, never watched the cartoon. Actually I don't think we got Voltron down here in darkest Africa. Same as Speed Racer. Some folks go nuts for it I honestly never heard of it before the (terrible) movie was released.
But back to the robot. Would it not have made more sense to have one pilot....?
P.S: I know it is only a cartoon... :P
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Comment by DickVanSwype on March 11, 2011 at 1:27am -
Too bad the world might potentially be over by the time this film gets released :-x
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Comment by Eiji Hino on March 10, 2011 at 11:25pm
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Comment by Gift of the Magi on March 10, 2011 at 9:38pm
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@Roboto, in one episode of the series, they showed the pilots' chairs moving on tracks into the cockpit areas when they suited up.
On another note...why? why do this? at all?
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