Warner Brothers has completely removed ‘The Six Billion Dollar Man’ from its release schedule. With all of the release date shuffling that’s been going on with all the studios lately, WB took the opportunity to quietly pluck ‘The Six Billion Dollar Man’ from its June 5, 2020 date and replace it with ‘Wonder Woman 1984’, which had previously been slotted for November 1, 2019.
‘The Six Billion Dollar Man’ has Mark Wahlberg attached to star. It was first announced in 2014 and was supposed to hit theaters in December 2017. That didn’t happen. It was then reported that filming would begin this past summer in Atlanta. That also didn’t happen. In May, director Damián Szifrón, who had replaced Peter Berg, departed the project and has yet to be replaced. Szifrón also penned the script.
‘The Six Billion Dollar Man’ is, of course, based on ‘The Six Million Dollar Man’, the action TV series from the 1970s, which starred Lee Majors as astronaut Steve Austin who is rebuilt as a cyborg after a nearly fatal crash. After three made-for-TV movies in 1973, the series ran from 1974-78 and generated a spin-off, ‘The Bionic Woman’ starring Lindsay Wagner. ‘The Six Million Dollar Man’ was based on the novel ‘Cyborg’ by Martin Caidin, which Szifrón reportedly also used as inspiration for his screenplay.
Wahlberg was last seen on the big screen this past August in the thriller ‘Mile 22’, directed by long-time collaborator Peter Berg. Wahlberg and Berg are currently filming another movie together, ‘Wonderland’. Wahlberg will next appear in a lighter film, the comedy ‘Instant Family’ which costars Rose Byrne and will be out on November 16.
Beyond ‘Wonderland’, Wahlberg doesn’t appear to another film lined up, so he may be saving a spot on his calendar for ‘The Six Billion Dollar Man’. Hopefully, Warner Brothers can scare up a new director, who won’t want to make too many changes to the existing script and this movie can actually get off the ground.
