SkimIt
Stoner detectives, video game soldiers, Sly Stallone, a vengeful raccoon, and dying celebrities all figure in this week's look into the future.
Woody Harrelson, Matthew McConaughey Series Picked Up By HBO
HBO has ordered eight episodes of True Detective, starring Harrelson and McConaughey as cops hunting a serial killer in Louisiana over 17 years. Cary Fukunaga, who directed the excellent recent adaptation of Jane Eyre, is set to direct all eight episodes. If the series is a success, subsequent seasons are supposed to follow different cases with a new cast each time. Harrelson is a tremendous actor, and while McConaughey seems to select his projects based on how much time they allow him to spend on the beach, this one looks promising. It's an interesting pairing that makes me wonder about the show's marijuana budget.
(HBO)
Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn Online this Fall
For a while, it looked like the Halo video game franchise was going to become a hot multimedia property. But FOX/Universal's plans for a live-action feature, produced by Peter Jackson and directed by Neill Blomkamp (District 9) fell through. Now Microsoft is producing a live-action webseries featuring the game's Master Chief. It seems designed to renew interest in bringing the game to the big screen, but I get the sense that maybe the video game world has moved on. Then of course there's the issue that it's nearly impossible to make anything good in another medium based on a video game.
(Microsoft)
Will Sylvester Stallone Get Animated for Lionsgate?
Lionsgate, which produced the hit The Expendables and its upcoming, hotly anticipated (strange but true) sequel, is putting together an animated series that would star Stallone as a mercenary, naturally. Despite his recent resurgence, he's already pretty much a cartoon at this point, isn't he? So this project would seem to suit his skill set. We can only hope that the series, if it gets off the ground, will be some type of Archer-style genre parody.
(AP)
Harold & Kumar Director to Helm Live Action/CGI Mix
Warner Brothers is going to produce an adaptation of Brendan Hay and Justin Wagner's Rascal Raccoon's Raging Revenge graphic novel, which concerns a clever cartoon raccoon who kills his animated nemesis, and decides to go after his human creator next. Shades of the infamous Brenda Fraser flop, Monkeybone, but director Todd Strauss-Schulson, who did A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas, seems like a good choice for the material.
(Oni Press)
Funny People at The End of the World
Sony Pictures Entertainment has teamed with Mandate Pictures to produce The End of the World, which will mark the directorial debut of Seth Rogen, who is co-directing with his sometime writing partner Evan Goldberg, also a novice. Based on a comedic short, the film stars Jason Segel, Emma Watson, Jonah Hill, Jay Baruchel, and so many more, as themselves, a group of celebrities attending a party at James Franco's house, who are ill-equipped to cope when they are faced with the apocalypse. It sounds humorous, but it also sounds like it could be the type of thing that would wear thin after 20 minutes. Still, there are a lot of funny people on board, so I'm going to keep my hopes up.
It gives me hope to think that even while we reject their current offerings, the wizards of Hollywood are hard at work producing more. They never stop trying.
Emma Watson (AP)
