Beyond Good and Evil Movie in Development: The cult classic Ubisoft game Beyond Good and Evil is being turned into a movie for Netflix. Rob Letterman, the director of Detective Pikachu, is directing the movie and it will be a similar live-action/CG hybrid based on the game, which originally came out in 2003.
Courtney Cox returning for new Scream movie: A new Scream movie is on the way and another familiar face is returning as Courtney Cox is coming back as intrepid reporter Gale Weathers, joining David Arquette who is also returning as Dewey Riley. The new movie is coming from the directors of last year’s Ready or Not.
New Battletoads gets a release date: Announced at E3 2018, the reboot of Battletoads on Xbox One and PC is finally arriving on August 20th. Featuring a radically new cartoony style with the same basic gameplay, the game features the return of Rash, Zitz, and Pimple and has three-player co-op. The game will also be available for subscribers of Xbox Game Pass.
Bloody Disgusting launching a streaming service in October: Just in time for Halloween, Bloody Disgusting is launching a new horror streaming service in October. Partnered with Cinedigm, the streaming service will be an ad-supported, free service offering a mix of classic horror, cult classics, and original programming.
Splinter Cell anime series coming to Netflix: Netflix is going all-in on anime/anime-inspired video game shows and Splinter Cell is the next property getting a series. Already receiving a two-season, 16 episode order, the series is being written by John Wick writer Derek Kolstad. It’s not clear if it will be based on a particular game in the series or be an original story and, more importantly, it’s not clear if Michael Ironside will return to lend his iconic voice to Sam Fisher.
Potentially historic AMC/Universal deal: It’s been a roller coaster of a relationship for Universal and AMC Theaters this year. After releasing Trolls: World Tour on Premium VOD, Universal announced it was a massive hit and PVOD would be a new venue for their movies. AMC responded by banning all future Universal movies from being shown in their theaters. That seems to have been worked out and Universal has seemingly come out on top with an unprecedented release window deal. As part of the new deal, Universal can put theatrical releases up as a premium digital rental 3 weeks after they debut in AMC theaters, which is significantly shorter than the current model of around 3 months. AMC will also get a portion of any of the revenue from the PVOD rentals. This doesn’t mean that every Universal movie will do this as Universal has the option to implement the PVOD or not, so movies that will be gigantic like F9 or Jurassic World wouldn’t need PVOD to make money but smaller movies like Blumhouse horror releases might benefit from the extra viewing option.
The Witcher prequel series in development: Netflix is fully committed to The Witcher and, along with an anime-inspired movie and the upcoming second season, they are developing a six-episode limited series that will go back 1,200 years to tell the story of the first Witcher in history. Witcher showrunner Lauren Schmidt Hissrich is executive producing this series as well and it will explore Elven society before “The Conjunction of the Spheres” when the worlds of Men, Elves, and monsters collided, resulting in the current world of Rivia and the creation of Witchers.
RIP John Saxon, Olivia De Havilland, and Regis Philbin: A trio of deaths occurred over the last week. Character actor John Saxon passed away at age 83 from pneumonia. Saxon co-starred in Enter the Dragon with Bruce Lee and appeared in three movies in the Nightmare on Elm Street series along with numerous other TV and movie roles. Olivia De Havilland was 104 and was one of the last actresses left from the Golden Age of Hollywood, co-starring in Gone With The Wind, Captain Blood, The Adventures of Robin Hood, and more. Regis Philbin was 88 and a legendary TV personality from both Live with Regis and Kathie Lee/Kelly and Who Wants to Be A Millionaire? and numerous other hosting gigs and guest appearances. Regis holds the Guinness World Record for most hours on US television.
