Voltron Headed For The Big Screen

An anonymous reader writes "Following the success of the Transformers movie, Hollywood is preparing to make another live-action film featuring giant robots from the 1980s: 'Voltron: Defender of the Universe'. The script, by Justin Marks, is described as '...a post-apocalyptic tale set in New York City and Mexico. Five ragtag survivors of an alien attack band together and end up piloting the five lion-shaped robots that combine and form the massive sword-wielding Voltron that helps battle Earth's invaders.' Let's go, Voltron force!"

Comments

Original

[Bibz]

My god, I can't believed that I found the PowerRangers original when they came out... It's the "same" thing as Voltron!

Re:Original

[falcon5768]

There is a good reason that it is the same thing. Go-Lion (the anime Voltron came from in Japan) was a anime version of the Super Sentai shows there... which is what eventually power rangers was developed out of.

Technically Power Rangers is much older. The series had started as early as the mid 70's

Re:Original

[garett_spencley]

I used to watch Voltron when I was around 4 or 5 years old. I had the toy robot that you could assemble / dissemble etc.

Around the age of 11 or so the Power Rangers became "huge". Being a young, impressionable kid with no free will I watched it after school with my friends even though I thought it was "total crap". Anyway at that time I had completely forgotten about Voltron yet I KNEW that it was a rip-off of something that I used to watch as a young(er) child.

I remember absolutely loving Voltron and for years I tried to figure out what that cartoon I used to watch as a kid with the cat-like vehicles that could assemble into one. Every person I described it to, in hopes that they would remember, could only think of "power rangers!" to which I'd respond "no definitely NOT the power rangers ... it was a cartoon!" and they'd just think "err... transformers ? :\"

It was actually thanks to this /. article that I've discovered ... it was Voltron! :) ... and now, thanks to another poster, I know why the Power Rangers was so similar. Some days it pays it to slack on work and just hang out on /.

Shit my boss is calling me ... oh well, he'll understand when I tell him "it was Voltron!"

Re:Original

[Capt James McCarthy]

Screw that, it's all a copy of the Banana Splits. Just with different a different agenda.

Re:Original

[elh_inny]

I highly recommend seeing the Robot Chicken remake:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=OGNCWxWTGFg

Re:Original

[Dogtanian]

Some days it pays it to slack on work and just hang out on /. Shit my boss is calling me ... oh well, he'll understand when I tell him "it was Voltron!" Oddest response to "You're fired, you lazy sonofabitch!" ever...

Good old Holywood

[hine_uk]

...a film does well and they start looking for the next easy cashin. Think back to how the recent comic adaptions were kick started by the likes of Xmen, one does well and all of a sudden there is a bandwagon trundling down the hill.

Now a giant robot film has done well so the bandwagon looks for the next passenger it can send down. Personally I think voltron will tank. Hardly anyone knows what it is and it lacked that 'cool' factor when I was a kid growing up, even my father knew what transformers were then and wanted to see the film now. But Voltron?

Its over reaching and says straight to dvd.

I know I know, flamebait, troll, whatever you want but this is just my opinion from the UK, in the US it might be different.

Re:Good old Holywood

[Overzeetop]

A comic (whos name I cannot recall now) commented on the amazing popularity of March of the Penguins a couple of years ago. He pointed out that this was a turning point for Hollywood, to see a well-shot documentary with a solid actor doing narration and a storyline to hold the piece together. He felt that with the commercial success of this documentary we would see many more like it in the coming years. Not other documentaries, of course, but lots of penguin movies.

Re:Good old Holywood

[CastrTroy]

Gabe and Tycho saw it coming the whole time. Here's 2 approriate comics

Part 1
Part 2

Re:Good old Holywood

[Ecuador]

Actually, "March of the Penguins" was not a Hollywood documentary, but a French production. What's more, having seen both the original French version and the English
translation, I have to say that all Hollywood did to the movie, by adding the narration of Morgan Freeman, was to destroy one great and original aspect of the film. You see, the French version doesn't have a narrator, but voices for Mother, Father and Baby penguin. It sounds very silly doesn't it? Well, apparently it was very hard to make it good enough, so that it doesn't sound silly, and the translated versions followed the easy route of narration. Now in the original French version, the voice over was done brilliantly so that it does not sound like a "animals are talking" kids movie, but rather an alternate and more "personal" narration that added more feeling to the movie.
</offtopic>

On the current topic, I always thought it would be very hard to make a good live action Transformers movie. They pulled it off very well. But Voltron? Come on! From the far-fetched Transformers we are going to ridiculous lion headed fighters (or even worse, lionhead-limbed when combined as Voltron). If you want giant mecha, do Macross or something...

just stop

[radarsat1]

I,Robot, Transformers, all the comic book movies lately.. ... When is the movie industry going stop pissing all over my childhood?

One would hope that they at least write a decent script this time.
From the summary though, I doubt it.

Sorry to be a downer. I just find that this trend of ransacking all our 80's childhood memories is starting to get on my nerves. It feels like they've just made some kind of list, with $$ next to each item, and they will continue down that list until the $$ gets lower than the expenses of creating CG effects. (And the latter is constantly getting lower.)

They don't pick these movies to make based on good scripts, good ideas, or good director/writers, they are just knocking them down one after the other because people will go see something they have good memories of. They're completely taking advantage of everyone's misplaced hope that the next one will be better, because "that was sooo awesome when I was a kid." (Perhaps they have the right to do so... you can only vote with your wallet.) I went to see Transformers hoping it would be something decent, but these movies are constantly disappointing. (X-Men wasn't bad to be completely honest..)

I think, this time around, at the very least I'll wait and heed the reviews instead of going to see it on opening day. (The hard part is finding a reviewer that usually agrees with you.)

Re:just stop

[garett_spencley]

They don't pick these movies to make based on good scripts, good ideas, or good director/writers, they are just knocking them down one after the other because people will go see something they have good memories of. They're completely taking advantage of everyone's misplaced hope that the next one will be better, because "that was sooo awesome when I was a kid."

If one single person feels obligated to pay his/her hard earned cash on a movie for that reason alone and then feels "duped" afterwards then they got what they had coming.

Come on, seriously! I realize it's cliche on /. to bash big money but it's not like they're employing slave labour to produce these films or robbing money right out of people's wallets at gun point. You're talking as if they're exploiting a group of people and forcing them to do something against their will. They're bloody movies! If you don't like them don't go see them. It's really as simple as that.

Honestly, for a crowd who is so vocal about free speech and copyright law I get the feeling that the same group of people, if given the power, would strip the rights of anyone to make movies based on anything that they feel close to. It's like, they just can't do right. No matter what. Even though Transformers was a huge success you just can't escape the bitching and whining and, in this case, total exagerated teenage drama queen hyperbole about evil corporation raping some childhood memory and forcing you to consume it "mwuhahahahahaha we're rolling in money and it's all at the expense of some Joe Blow's precious childhood interpretation of a corny and cheesy cartoon who's sole purpose was to sell a line of toy's and make massive amounts of money anyway..."

But then, I supposed it really is the "geek" thing to do. To quote Kevin Smith / Ben Affleck "The Internet is a communication tool used the world over where people can come together to bitch about movies and share pornography with one another".

/ rant

But...Voltron got SERVED!

[SCHecklerX]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lVswFzaYcCM

For some reason...

[david.given]

...I can't get this sequence from ReBoot out of my mind when reading the story...

Re:Voltron is Japanese..

[Chineseyes]

I dub thee Comic Book Guy.

Go forth and overstate the seriousness of children's cartoons wherever you shall go. Be a menace to all those who may decry the merits of such entertainment for this is your calling!!

What's next???

[Ctrl-Z]

What could possibly follow up a Voltron movie? Thundercats?

Re:What's next???

[gatzke]

Thundercats is in pre-production, slated for 2010.

http://imdb.com/title/tt1047015/

The Man Who Just... Wasn't

[SpaceToast]

Marks on imdb.com:

Writer:

• Voltron (2008) (announced)
• Masters of the Universe (2009) (pre-production) (screenplay)
• Unbroken (2003)
• The Stranger (2003)
• Fast Forward (2002)

Producer:

• Unbroken (2003) (producer)
• Risk/Reward (2003) (associate producer)
• The Stranger (2003) (producer)
• Fast Forward (2002) (producer)

Miscellaneous Crew:

• Saved! (2004) (assistant: Sandy Stern)
• Family Secret (2000) (assistant to director)

Editorial Department:

• Family Secret (2000) (assistant editor)

Basically, Marks self-produced a couple of indy shorts early in the decade, then there's a big gap where he fell off the radar. Hard to say if he was script doctoring, working the business side of the industry, or just had enough money to bum around Hollywood bugging people to read his screenplays. Suddenly he reappears screenwriting two big (the studios hope) franchise relaunches.

I have to wish him all the luck personally, but resumés like this don't fill me with confidence about the final product.

Re:Obligatory

[Stormwatch]

You're doing it wrong. It is:

>:3

JESUS CHRIST IT'S A LION GET IN THE CAR!

.
.
.

(posting more text here to work around lameness filter)

Re:You like comic book movies? Weird!

[theNeophile]

Comic books movies are embarrassing. Comic books are for children and we aren't children. To tell people that we really like comic book movies, such a Superman, Batman, X-Men, Transformers, is to tell people that you are still a child in your cultural development. Not as in 'child-like', but in 'retarded'. This is not a good thing. I really can't fathom how insecure and fear-based you must be to advise hiding you enjoyment of these movies like there were a crack addiction. I don't know how long you've been in a cave, but comic book movies have never been more respectable. Yeah, Batman Begins, A History of Violence, Sin City, American Splendor, all kids stuff!

Now before you start to flame me or boot me down to -2 Score, just a short word. This is simply a warning to people who usually don't interact in the non-tech world. If you actually are a serious fan of comic books and comic book movies, keep it quiet. Be quite discreet. This same advice goes out to the guy who still thinks that Turtle LOGO is a serious programming language. Fuck that shit. How about, instead, you just admit what you like without a crippling fear that people won't think you're cool. You'll be much happier.

No, seriously, shut up.

[StarKruzr]

Transformers was way, WAY better than ANYONE expected, and you know it. It was a great popcorn flick and didn't try to be anything more.