'Interstellar' Writer Jonathan Nolan Developing Isaac Asimov's 'Foundation' for HBO

With Christopher Nolan's Interstellar racking up a huge $130M worldwide at the box office, his screenwriting brother Jonathan is embarking on another sci-fi venture, one that fans of the genre have been waiting a long time for. The Wrap reports Nolan will write and produce an adaptation of Isaac Asimov's classic novels, Foundation, as a series for HBO.

This is the second series Nolan and HBO are teaming up on as he's currently developing Westworld, and the network must be extremely happy with how that's going to agree to this. Nolan is definitely stoked, as just days ago he was talking to ThePlaylist about how much he loved Foundation...

Nolan: "Well, I fucking love the ‘Foundation’ novels by Isaac Asimov —they’re certainly not well-known, but that’s a set of books I think everyone would benefit from reading. That’s a set of books where the influence they have is just fucking massive; they have many imitators and many have been inspired by them, but go back and read those, and there are some ideas in those that’ll set your fucking hair on fire."

 He won't be the first to attempt a Foundation adaptation. Roland Emmerich had been planning to turn it into a feature film for Sony, but when the rights lapsed Warner Bros. swooped in and struck this deal with HBO. The Hugo Award-winning book series was first published in 1951 and was a trilogy until 1981 when he began adding further sequels. The collected series follows “a mathematician named Hari Seldon, a psychohistorian who is able to predict large-scale events using scientific principles. When Seldon foresees the downfall of the Galactic Empire, which will precipitate a dark age lasting 30,000 years, he establishes two human oases (”Foundations”) in an effort to preserve human knowledge.”

No word on how many episodes, who will direct them, or when this will begin production but likely not until Westworld wraps up next year. 

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J.J. Abrams and Jonathan Nolan Bringing 'Westworld' Remake to HBO

At this point it seems that the realm of science fiction is being completely dominated by J.J. Abrams, with his hands all over the Star Trek and Star Wars franchises. And of course, it's a genre he's been more than happy to tackle on the small screen through Lost, Fringe, and Almost Human, which just got picked up by Fox. Now he's teaming up with his The Dark Knight Rises scribe Jonathan Nolan for a TV series remake of 1973's sci-fi classic, Westworld.

HBO has ordered up a pilot for Westworld, which will be produced by Abrams' Bad Robot and Nolan serving as co-writer and director. Abrams and Nolan are currently working together on the CBS series Person of Interest, which will be entering its third season soon. HBO is describing the series as a “a dark odyssey about the dawn of artificial consciousness and the future of sin.”. Put simply, the original film was directed by Michael Crichton, and involved robots at a historically-themed amusement park that become self aware. The park in the film was broken up into multiple "eras", including the Wild West, Roman, and Middle Ages, and it will be interesting to see how they're incorporated into a series. Yul Brynner played the main robot, a cowboy of course, and he returned for the poorly-received sequel, Futureworld.

Joining Nolan as co-writer is Pushing Daisies scribe Lisa Joy, with Jerry Weintraub producing. Weintraub has been trying to get this remake done for years, mostly on the silver screen, but finding a spot on HBO's roster of series hits could be even better. How does a Sunday night of Game of Thrones of and Westworld strike you? [Variety]

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Superman Update: Jonathan Nolan to Direct?

The Superman rumors are flying faster than a speeding bullet lately, but it's turning out that the most recent ones have more validity than I gave them credit for. Just a few days ago there was a story from Geektyrant that Jonathan Nolan, brother of Batman Begins director Christopher Nolan, was up to direct the Superman reboot. Now Moviehole is reporting that the rumor may indeed be true, sighting an inside source from Warners Brothers who had this to say...

"You know, some of that is true", my very reliable* contact, said ."Jonathan Nolan is not onboard yet, but it looks like he will get the job. Jonah wants to direct, Chris wants to land him that gig, WB doesn't want to upset Chris. That said, it is far from a done deal -- but with Chris and Emma producing, the odds are with Jonah - kind of like Michael Mann producing his daughter's first feature: "How bad could things go?".

Despite my skepticism, it's hard to argue against that logic. Jonathan has written the script, and with Chris's "overseer" role already cemented  it wouldn't be shocking to see him land the gig. I'm just amazed that they'd trust a first time director for such an important job.

The other half of that rumor was that Zachary Levi had auditioned for the role of Clark Kent. I think there's a better chance of Reese Witherspoon donning the red & blue tights, but apparently I'm wrong....

"Also, it is a TV star that they're looking at for the lead - but, despite what that article says, I don't believe anyone has actually tested." (He/She has heard nothing of Zachary Levi being considered).

Warner Brothers has someone in mind already, and they say it's someone nobody's considering but if he gets the gig we'll all be surprised. Oh no. Please don't be Patrick Dempsey! I'll boycott!! Eric Dane? I got no clue who it could be. Kevin Sorbo? He's still alive, right?

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The Bat Signal's Been Answered! WB Announces BATMAN 3 Release Date!

Just a couple of days ago, Warner Brothers and IMAX inked a deal have as many as 20 of the studio's tentpole films released in the expansive format. The press release pushed that it was to last until 2013, with the most notable film on the list being Batman 3. Speculation shot off almost immediately, with most analysts suggesting a summer 2012 or 2013 release date.

Today Warner Brothers decided to shut everybody up for the moment by announcing through an internal email that Batman 3 will indeed hit theaters in the summer of 2012, specifically July 20 2012.

That date puts it right in the thick of an already jam packed summer, as it follows just a few short weeks after the Marc Webb helmed Spider-Man reboot(July 3rd) and The Avengers(May 4th).  That's only just the comic book competition. Don't forget JJ Abrams' Star Trek sequel is set for around that same timeframe, likely to hit in late June.

Still no confirmation of Christopher Nolan's return to direct the project. The script is currently in the hands of his younger brother, Jonathan, based on an idea from David Goyer. Goyer is also in charge of the upcoming Superman relaunch, which Christopher Nolan will be overseeing.

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