There are two reboots of ‘War of the Worlds‘ currently being developed and Greg Kinnear (‘House of Cards’,’Little Miss Sunshine’) is in the talks to join one of them. Currently, BBC is in the process of tackling this tale with Rafe Spall and Eleanor Tomlinson in the leading roles but this is the first bit of casting coming out of the Canal+ and Fox Networks Group version of the material. Howard Overman (‘Misfits’) has penned the script that it will be based on and Kinnear is the first star whose name has been floated around this production. The series will be produced by Overman’s Urban Myth Films which he runs with Johnny Caps and Julian Murphy.
It isn’t clear if this is set to be an ongoing series or a mini-series which is what BBC is planning to release.
While this iteration is still in pre-production, rumors have been swirling that it will fully go into production next year which means that we’ll likely be hearing quite a bit of casting in the near future.
This take is said to be set in the present day and is going to be a new take on H.G. Wells’ iconic alien invasion story. This will be the big difference from the BBC version mentioned above as that one is stated to take place in Edwardian England which is when Wells’ original book took place. The BBC release was also initially announced in 2015 with Peter Harness (‘Doctor Who’) working on the script.
Interestingly enough, all of this news is coming forward shortly after we learned that Steven Spielberg doesn’t feel that the ending of the original book or his cinematic adaptation really makes sense and never enjoyed how it closed out.
Do you love ‘War of the Worlds’ and are thrilled that we’ll be getting two iterations of this classic in the coming years? Are you more excited for a modern retelling of the story or taking it back to the original time period it was written in? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
Source: Deadline Hollywood
