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Idris Elba Attached to Dark Tower TV Series

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While not quite as full-on horror as one might normally expect from Stephen King, The Dark Tower series is arguably his most epic creation, right up there with tomes like IT and The Stand. Spanning eight books, The Dark Tower’s core is the tale of gunslinger Roland Deschain, and his epic quest to reach the titular structure.

Hollywood has been trying to make a Dark Tower movie adaptation happen for decades, but next month, such a film finally hits theaters. In an intriguing decision though, the movie doesn’t directly adapt any of the books, instead serving as a sort of sequel to King’s sprawling series.

The Dark Tower movie poster

The Dark Tower stars Idris Elba as Roland, with Matthew McConaughey as the gunslinger’s evil nemesis The Man in Black, who in the books is revealed to be an alter ego of The Stand’s Randall Flagg. Newcomer Tom Taylor plays Jake Chambers, a young boy who becomes both a friend and almost surrogate son to Roland.

Years ago, back when Ron Howard was set to direct a Dark Tower film, the plan was to do both a series of movies and a companion TV series, all serving to fully realize King’s massive vision. Surprisingly enough, producer Akiva Goldsman tells Deadline that as of now, a companion TV series is still part of the plan.

“The first episode of a show has been written, and we hope to retain Ron’s original idea to mix platforms, something that seemed revolutionary 10 years ago but now is something that others have done,” Goldsman said. “Idris for sure is part of this, and if the movie is Roland Deschain the gunslinger, the show is his origin story, based on the fourth novel in the series, Wizard and Glass.”

Goldsman has been involved with bringing Dark Tower to the screen since back when Howard came up with the above idea, so it’s not too surprising that he’s still pushing for the TV part. What’s a bit more surprising is that star Elba is also attached to the TV show, as his film career is booming as of late.

Idris Elba and Matthew McConaughey in The Dark Tower

Of course, Elba is no stranger to TV, playing the lead in the well-received UK crime series Luther, for which production will begin in 2018 on a fifth season after nearly three years without new episodes airing.

That all said, if The Dark Tower performs poorly at the box office, there’s no guarantee further films will be made, much less a TV series to go along with them. We’ll all find out Roland’s financial fate on August 4th.

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‘Evil Dead’ Film Franchise Getting TWO New Installments

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It was a risk for Fede Alvarez to reboot Sam Raimi’s horror classic The Evil Dead in 2013, but that risk paid off and so did its spiritual sequel Evil Dead Rise in 2023. Now Deadline is reporting that the series is getting, not one, but two fresh entries.

We already knew about the Sébastien Vaniček upcoming film that delves into the Deadite universe and should be a proper sequel to the latest film, but we are broadsided that Francis Galluppi and Ghost House Pictures are doing a one-off project set in Raimi’s universe based off of an idea that Galluppi pitched to Raimi himself. That concept is being kept under wraps.

Evil Dead Rise

“Francis Galluppi is a storyteller who knows when to keep us waiting in simmering tension and when to hit us with explosive violence,” Raimi told Deadline. “He is a director that shows uncommon control in his feature debut.”

That feature is titled The Last Stop In Yuma County which will release theatrically in the United States on May 4. It follows a traveling salesman, “stranded at a rural Arizona rest stop,” and “is thrust into a dire hostage situation by the arrival of two bank robbers with no qualms about using cruelty-or cold, hard steel-to protect their bloodstained fortune.”

Galluppi is an award-winning sci-fi/horror shorts director whose acclaimed works include High Desert Hell and The Gemini Project. You can view the full edit of High Desert Hell and the teaser for Gemini below:

High Desert Hell
The Gemini Project

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‘Invisible Man 2’ Is “Closer Than Its Ever Been” to Happening

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Elisabeth Moss in a very well-thought-out statement said in an interview for Happy Sad Confused that even though there have been some logistical issues for doing Invisible Man 2 there is hope on the horizon.

Podcast host Josh Horowitz asked about the follow-up and if Moss and director Leigh Whannell were any closer to cracking a solution to getting it made. “We are closer than we have ever been to cracking it,” said Moss with a huge grin. You can see her reaction at the 35:52 mark in the below video.

Happy Sad Confused

Whannell is currently in New Zealand filming another monster movie for Universal, Wolf Man, which might be the spark that ignites Universal’s troubled Dark Universe concept which hasn’t gained any momentum since Tom Cruise’s failed attempt at resurrecting The Mummy.

Also, in the podcast video, Moss says she is not in the Wolf Man film so any speculation that it’s a crossover project is left in the air.

Meanwhile, Universal Studios is in the middle of constructing a year-round haunt house in Las Vegas which will showcase some of their classic cinematic monsters. Depending on attendance, this could be the boost the studio needs to get audiences interested in their creature IPs once more and to get more films made based on them.

The Las Vegas project is set to open in 2025, coinciding with their new proper theme park in Orlando called Epic Universe.

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Jake Gyllenhaal’s Thriller ‘Presumed Innocent’ Series Gets Early Release Date

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Jake gyllenhaal presumed innocent

Jake Gyllenhaal’s limited series Presumed Innocent is dropping on AppleTV+ on June 12 instead of June 14 as originally planned. The star, whose Road House reboot has brought mixed reviews on Amazon Prime, is embracing the small screen for the first time since his appearance on Homicide: Life on the Street in 1994.

Jake Gyllenhaal’s in ‘Presumed Innocent’

Presumed Innocent is being produced by David E. Kelley, J.J. Abrams’ Bad Robot, and Warner Bros. It is an adaptation of Scott Turow’s 1990 film in which Harrison Ford plays a lawyer doing double duty as an investigator looking for the murderer of his colleague.

These types of sexy thrillers were popular in the ’90s and usually contained twist endings. Here’s the trailer for the original:

According to Deadline, Presumed Innocent doesn’t stray far from the source material: “…the Presumed Innocent series will explore obsession, sex, politics and the power and limits of love as the accused fights to hold his family and marriage together.”

Up next for Gyllenhaal is the Guy Ritchie action movie titled In the Grey scheduled for release in January 2025.

Presumed Innocent is an eight-episode limited series set to stream on AppleTV+ starting June 12.

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