All's well that ends well, I guess. After Disney suddenly pulled the plug on The Lone Ranger, it appeared they had finally caught wind of the fact that these $250M+ blockbusters are no longer guaranteed successes. Not even with the Pirates of the Caribbean team of Johnny Depp, Gore Verbinski, and Jerry Bruckheimer involved. There've been too many high profile flops lately(Cowboys & Aliens) to justify such a huge budget, and so the Mouse House demanded the costs be trimmed down to roughly $200-215M. Last we heard, some major changes had taken place to make the film more palatable for Disney's number crunchers, and now according to Deadline the film is back on track with all it's pieces intact.
Earlier in the month it looked like Disney was asking for a lot more than just shedding a few dollars before they'd greenlight such a risky film. We heard that some of the story's supernatural elements had been jettisoned, and there was even talk of canning spend-happy director Verbinski. It appears that Verbinski will in fact return, so I guess everybody kissed and made up. The plan is for production to kick off in January or February, with the December 21st 2012 release date still likely to be in place.
What about the cast? Depp is obviously in, and so is Armie Hammer as the masked gunslinger himself. Hammer would've stood to lose the most if the project fell by the wayside, as this should be his first and best chance to capitalize on his The Social Network buzz. The supporting cast is less certain. Ruth Wilson is in. But the delay may have hurt the chances of holding on to Tom Wilkinson, Dwight Yoakem, Helena Bonham Carter, James Badge Dale, and Barry Pepper.
I don't like the sound of this, but then again I never really thought The Lone Ranger had the type of appeal to be as successful as something like Pirates of the Caribbean. With the smaller budget, and Verbinski's tendency to spend money like water, I see trouble on the horizon. We'll just have to wait and see how this develops.
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