“ Akira ” right of the rights to be won while Japanese science fiction leaves Warner Bros.
Rolling in Ne-Tokyo will take a little more time.
After more than two decades to develop a live vision of Japanese science fiction AkiraWarner Bros. abandoned the rights of the film.
The rights returned to Kodansha, the manga publisher who first issued the history of the post-apocalyptic cyberpunk by Katsuhiro Otomo from 1982. Producers and talents would be lined up to focus on the property in preparation to be presented to select studios and stream.
Appearing for the first time as a manga that defines the genre that ran through the 1980s, Akira is best known as the seminal anime of 1988 which was a decisive moment for adult animation and Japanese culture in terms of reaching a global audience.
Warners took the rights to the film in 2002 and set Blade The filmmaker Stephen Norrington directs an adaptation, with Jon Peters producing.
What followed is one of the longest escapades in hell of development in Hollywood history, because the studio would continue to pass millions, well in the eight figures, in the next two decades. The Norrington version has withered (failure to the box office of its League of extraordinary gentlemen was a contributing factor) and several years later, Legendary was brought aboard co -finance. Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Davisson came on board to produce, sticking on the project as glue until the end.
The writers and directors who come and go include Garry Whitta, Mark Fergus, Hawk Otsby, Steve Kloves, Allen and Albert Hughes and Jaume Collet-Sera. Storyboards and concept art of Tommy Lee Edwards, Chris Weston, Ray Lai, and many others were then ordered in drawers.
The project was confronted with budgetary battles, cultural battles (at some point, Neo Tokyo became New Manhattan) and accusations of laundering the cart while it was in several times of pre-production. In 2012, Warners closed the production offices in Vancouver to take a break to rethink the project. On a budget of $ 90 million and Tron: inheritance The headliner Garret Hedlund signed to play. Kirsten Stewart, Helena Bonham-Carter and Ken Watanabe were in negotiations. It took a few years in the studio to recover and move on.
Finally, in 2017, Taika Waititi went on board to help write and direct a socket. This version also went far enough. The project caught the cinematographic tax credits in California and had a release date of May 21, 2021 (it would have faced John Wick: Chapter 4) and had thrown representatives in the field in Japan because it was aimed at a completely Japanese distribution. It was before Waititi was pulled in several directions – he was in office Jojomaking an episode of The Mandalorianwriting Thor: Love and thunder. And the project calendar continued to change while winning two additional producers, Garrett Basch and Jeremy Kleiner. Waititi has never been reduced to Akira And the project has been sleeping since.
Located in Tokyo post-apocalyptic, Akira tells the story of a teenager in a biker gang named Tetsuo who discovers that he has powerful telekinetic capacities that threaten the world. The only person who seems to be able to stop the all-powerful and dangerous adolescent is his friend and childhood gang leader Kaneda.
The rights to Akira are the last to join a list of some other high -level properties whose screen rights have become available this year. In March, the two horror classics Massacre of chainsaw in Texas went to the market, as is the rights to the spy stories of Jason Bourne, who was called Universal Home for more than two decades.
As Akira Seems to a new house for its big screen ambitions, perhaps a quote from the anime is appropriate: “The future is not a straight line. It is filled with many crossroads. There must be a future that we can choose for ourselves. ”
