Gareth Edwards No Longer Directing 'Godzilla 2,' Who Will Take His Place?
'Godzilla 2' has lost its director according to Deadline Hollywood. Gareth Edwards claims that he is departing the American franchise he helped reboot in 2014 so that he can go back to working on smaller projects. The split with Warner Bros. is supposedly on good terms and the agreement was settled before the decision to push back the film for March 22, 2019. Max Borenstein wrote the latest version of the screenplay and WB is already searching for a director to replace Edwards.
'Godzilla 2' has lost its director according to Deadline Hollywood. Gareth Edwards claims that he is departing the American franchise he helped reboot in 2014 so that he can go back to working on smaller projects. The split with Warner Bros. is supposedly on good terms and the agreement was settled before the decision to push back the film for March 22, 2019. Max Borenstein wrote the latest version of the screenplay and WB is already searching for a director to replace Edwards.
This makes sense as the director is just finishing up 'Rogue One: A Star Wars Story' and the idea of rushing right into pre-production on another shared-universe tentpole film probably seemed incredibly daunting.
The big question is who will they get to replace him? Edwards had an amazing visual style when it came to shooting building-sized action, but rubbed fans the wrong way with his slow creature reveals and "less is more" approach with Godzilla himself. I'd love to see someone come in and be confident enough with the monsters to let them lead the story and action beats. Legendary and WB now have the rights to Rodan, King Ghidorah, Mothra, and several other Toho classic kaiju, so we should have a proper "versus" film with the sequel.
I really want to see some discussion from our audience on who should take over the reigns. My vote? Matt Reeves. He's shown that he can handle amazing giant monster action with 2008's 'Cloverfield,' while not letting the human characters in that film fall into generic and bland background caricatures. I also truly believe his work in 'Dawn of the Planet of the Apes' was stunning and that he gave real life to fictional creatures with independent personalities and instincts.
Who would you have step up to the plate?
'Godzilla 2' Delayed, 'Godzilla Vs. King Kong' Release Date Announced
Warner Bros. revealed some late night release date shuffling yesterday evening and fans of Gareth Edwards' 2014 'Godzilla' reboot found themselves disappointed that the sequel has been pushed back almost a year. Originally slated to arrive June 8, 2018, it has now been delayed until March 22, 2019. This can be seen as a smart move by Warner bros. if they're as dedicated to their new cinematic monsterverse as they seem to be and care about the quality of the individual films that will make it up. Edwards will be fresh off of 'Rogue One: A Star Wars Story,' and will need time to develop a worthy sequel that will answer some of the criticisms audiences had with the first film.
Warner Bros. revealed some late night release date shuffling yesterday evening and fans of Gareth Edwards' 2014 'Godzilla' reboot found themselves disappointed that the sequel has been pushed back almost a year. Originally slated to arrive June 8, 2018, it has now been delayed until March 22, 2019. This can be seen as a smart move by Warner bros. if they're as dedicated to their new cinematic monsterverse as they seem to be and care about the quality of the individual films that will make it up. Edwards will be fresh off of 'Rogue One: A Star Wars Story,' and will need time to develop a worthy sequel that will answer some of the criticisms audiences had with the first film.
Another viable reason for the date change comes in the form of a giant monster's worst enemy: giant robots! Paramount had slated the new Transformers film to debut on the same date as 'Godzilla 2,' so it makes sense that one of them would blink first and move to a less competitive weekend.
The other monstrous shoe to drop in this announcement, found the upcoming 'Godzilla vs King Kong' finally getting an official release date. The reboot/remake/sequel will crash into theaters May 29, 2020, and so far, doesn't have much competition in the month.
One other curious news item came out of this report, and it may or may not be giant monster related. Apparently on December 25, 2018, WB's will release an "untitled event film." What does that mean? If it is part of this monsterverse they're creating, it could be something early in development that they're confident enough in to schedule a release date for, or maybe even tied to something that occurs in 'Kong: Skull Island' which comes out the same year. They could even be trying something along the lines of '10 Cloverfield Lane,' attempting Bad Robot's marketing blitz strategy and surprising audiences with a big property out of nowhere. Either way, we all know that WB's is becoming the studio to look to for our gargantuan creature feature fix thanks to their newly acquired 'Monsterpocalypse' rights presumptively revealing their focus over the next few years.
Does it bother you having to wait even longer for a 2014 'Godzilla' follow-up? What do you think their "untitled event film" might be? Let us know in the comments section.
