Last week we heard rumors that Star Trek 3 scribes J.D. Payne and Patrick McKay were being eyed to pen the script for a Flash Gordon reboot, and today, that news has been confirmed. According to THR, 20th Century Fox will be the next studio to try and bring the space adventurer rocketing back to the big screen.
Producer John Davis (Chronicle, The Man From U.N.C.L.E.) is overseeing the film, after spending more than a year securing the rights to the pulp comic-strip, while Bourne Ultimatum scribe George Nolfi’s original script will now be written by Payne and McKay.
Created in 1934 by Alex Raymond, Flash Gordon follows a Yale graduate who, along with the lovely Dale Arden, is kidnapped and taken into outer space by a mad scientist named Dr. Zarkov. They end up on the planet Mongo, and find themselves fighting against the tyrannical dictator, Ming the Merciless.
Despite a wealth of great material to mine from, there has not yet been a successful Flash Gordon adaptation. Instead, we’ve gotten a handful of bad serials and the infamous 1980 film from director Mike Hodges. A reboot has been in the works for ages now and has been passed around between a handful of studios, including Sony, Universal, and Mandalay. Hopefully now that it rests in Fox’s hands with two up-and-coming screenwriters in place, things will proceed smoothly.
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