Michael-Gordon
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Source: MechWarrior movie 'in development' at Eisner's Tornante
Back in the pre-Joystiq days of 2003, cavemen spoke of preliminary plans for a MechWarrior movie, to be produced by Dean "Oops, I made Godzilla" Devlin who referred to the opportunity as "a real passion project" ... about giant robots. Of course, we know nothing ever came of that passion; however, with a reboot on the horizon, another MechWarrior film is "in development" at former Disney chief (and apparent Robot Jox fanboy) Michael Eisner's The Tornante Company, a trusted source told Joystiq. Eisner owned the rights to the franchise through a series of acquisitions, series creator Jordan Weisman told Gamasutra last month: "WizKids bought FASA, and then Topps bought WizKids, and then [Michael] Eisner bought Topps." Perhaps seeing an opportunity to capitalize on the upcoming video game, our source tells us that a movie is "in development" and that the writer is one Mr. Michael Gordon, credited with screenplays for 300, G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra and an "in development" EverQuest movie. As great as that sounds, a potential cloud may be looming over the production, with Robotech co-owners Harmony Gold sending cease-and-desist letters to outlets hosting the teaser trailer for the latest MechWarrior game, claiming some of the 'bots are a little too similar to Robotech's own. It remains to be seen if Harmony Gold will extend its claim to any film adaptation.
Upcoming MMO movies (and why they'll suck)
var digg_url = 'http://digg.com/pc_games/Upcoming_MMO_movies_and_why_they_ll_suck'; Dorothy Parker once said "The only 'ism' Hollywood believes in is plagiarism." While not technically plagiarism, the practice of mining popular properties of other media is a time-honored mainstay of Hollywood's. Why invent a new franchise when you can adapt one that already exists? Well, if we're talking about translating videogames to cinema, there are at least 3 reasons against that we can think of right away: Street Fighter: The Movie, Double Dragon, and Doom. Oh, and the entire body of work of Uwe Boll.With such a history of failure, why does Hollywood keep banking on videogames as good sources of material? Because it's always desperate for the next big hit, and adaptation is seen as being easier than originality, even though by now it's apparent that it's not quite as simple as it seems. An even better question is: why exactly don't these translations work? What is it about games that makes for poor films? Let's see if we can answer this question and assess the potential success/failure of some upcoming MMO movies.
Everquest movie is inc, Avid Arad producing
The Warcraft movie is going to have some competition-- Everquest is also going to be the target of a movie property, and word is going around that it'll be produced by Avi Arad, former Marvel Comics head and the man behind Spider-man and X-men.Michael Gordon is supposedly writing the screenplay-- he was one of three writers who worked on 300 ("This is Norrath!!"), and unfortunately doesn't have that much more to his name yet. Apparently he did the original pitch, though, so maybe he's a player, and word is that the story will feature actual characters from the game itself.I don't want to ruin your day or anything, EQ fans, but I wouldn't hold your breath on this one. I'd love to see a movie starring Erudites and Iksar as much as the next guy, but right now this is looking more like Alone in the Dark than Silent Hill.
