Back in July of 2010 it was announced that Disney was putting together a live action Tinkerbell movie called Tink, and that Elizabeth Banks would star. That sounded like a fun idea, but July 2010 was a long time ago…whatever happened to it? Apparently it’s still a possibility, and while talking to Movie Hole, Banks spilled a few more details about the concept: “It’s a live action Tinkerbell movie sort of in the vein of Elf in which I would play Tinkerbell. Tinkerbell gets thrown out of Never Never Land, and it’s about where she goes and who she meets and the adventures she has…Tinkerbell is one of the greatest characters because she’s mischievous and snarky and fun and sexy and jealous and vengeful.” Invoking the name of Elf  is a pretty bold move. Could Disney really make something that funny? The possibility is there, as Banks is a talented comedic actress, and the script is being written by Fright Night screenwriter and Buffy the Vampire Slayer veteran Marti Noxon, who is no slouch either.

It’s been a while since we have heard about the possibility of a live action version of the 80s cartoon Voltron. Back in October of 2009 it was reported that The Dark Knight producer Charles Roven was working with rights-holder World Event Prods. to get a movie on track, and also there was some business with UTA assisting them in bringing the product to multiple platforms. In general, it was the typical Hollywood quagmire of company names and rights issues, and who knows what. But now, quite a while later, things seem to be moving in a more concrete direction. Roven, still involved with the project in some way, has helped bring the rights over to Relativity Media. They now apparently have a live action Voltron movie optioned, and they’ve brought on Thomas Dean Donnelly (Conan the Barbarian) and Joshua Oppenheimer (Sahara) to write a screenplay.

Afro Samurai started off as a manga series written and illustrated by Takashi Okazaki. After garnering some fame and acclaim it then became an animated mini-series back in 2007. Then, in 2009, they made an Afro Samurai made-for-TV movie called Afro Samurai: Resurrection that was so well received it scooped up a couple of Emmys. Not bad for a little cartoon about a guy with an Afro avenging his father’s murder. In it’s cartoon form, the lead character of Afro Samurai has been voiced by blustery badass Samuel L. Jackson, and now a press release has come out stating that Jackson and the newly formed distribution house The Indomina Group will be bringing the adventures of the big-haired one to the big screen, and in live action to boot. Jackson said of the venture, “This has been one of my very favorite properties ever since our amazing debut at Comic Con with the original series pilot out of Japan. I can’t wait to produce the epic feature film version with our new partners at The Indomina Group.”

Cartoon Network has a show called Ben 10 that’s ridiculously popular with young boys at the moment. I’ve never heard of it before, but I imagine that some of our readers with children are all too familiar with shelling out big bucks to their grubby little offspring so they can buy all of the latest Ben 10 whosits and whatsits. I mean, when they made a live-action special based on this character, four million people watched. I didn’t even know that many people still watched cable TV in total; this thing has to be huge. And you know what happens any time something becomes a well-known brand name in the world of anything. Hollywood looks to make it the next big summertime franchise. This time it’s legendary producer Joel Silver looking to help Ben 10’s jump from small to big screen happen. I’m sure you’ve heard of him, he produced pretty much every amazing thing ever, like Die Hard, Lethal Weapon, Predator, The Matrix, and Hudson Hawk. Okay, so maybe Hudson Hawk isn’t awesome, but point is: Silver has been around the block. For the people behind Ben 10, having him on board to put this project together must be seen as a real coup. As a matter of fact, I have a quote from the chief operating officer of Turner animation Stu Snyder that says as much right here, “I cannot think of anyone better suited than Joel Silver to develop a theatrical action-driven adventure based on our franchise [Due to Content Scraping and Theft, we have been forced to try abbreviated feeds. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause and woud very much appreciate you clicking through to view the full article on FilmSchoolRejects.com]

The thought of a live-action version of Underdog isn’t an awful concept, but how it eventually came to fruition is.