As disappointing as Tim Burton‘s ALICE IN WONDERLAND was, it did bank about $210 Million in its opening weekend so with that kind of money, every studio in town is thinking all you need is take a classic tale and plaster today’s 3D mania all over it and voila! You got yourself a box office win. The upcoming CLASH OF THE TITANS is another example of why this strategy will work. LA TIMES said WB wants the same for THE WIZARD OF OZ remake…
Now keep in mind that the studio already has 2 in early development stages..
One of them is called OZ for Warner’s New Line label, produced by Temple Hill (Twilight) and the script was written by Darren Lemke, the scribe of the upcoming SHREK FOREVER AFTER.
The next one is that one OZ project that some of us have been hearing about for quite some time. The dark twisted sequel pushed forward by Spawn creator Todd McFarlane, with a script by Josh Olson and it’s about Dorothy and her granddaughter returning to Oz to fight evil. Last we heard, the working title was OZ: RETURN TO EMERALD CITY and that there were creative differences between McFarlane and Olson on the direction of the story .
Once again, WB wants to remake THE WIZARD OF OZ so it’s going to examine those 2 project above and choose which one they’re going to eventually greenlight, which one that’s going to get that CG 3D goodness. Although nothing is in the works yet, the plan has been advanced seriously enough so much so that representatives for some of the top Hollywood directors have been contacted and briefed.
I personally want to see the dark twisted OZ story get made but I just don’t like how it just always has to be about the character returning to the land. Hook, Alice, and now this? There’s gotta be a more unique concept than that.
