While his Warner Bros/DC Films Snyderverse may be dead, following the zombie action flick “Army of The Dead,” Zack Snyder seems to be developing a mutually beneficial working relationship with the streaming giant Netflix. After the success of his zombie film for the streamer, the filmmaker secured two projects in a row at Netflix: the sci-fi film “Rebel Moon” and “Planet of The Dead,” the latter being his sequel to “Army of The Dead.”
Before returning to zombies, Zack Snyder will tackle his sci-fi actioner “Rebel Moon,” a project that was once a “Star Wars” pitch made to Lucasfilm during the early years before the studio landed on “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” and other spinoffs. Back then, Snyder had wanted to make a sci-fi version of Akira Kurosawa‘s samurai epic “Seven Samurai” and is now recycling that idea as an original property at Netflix.
Deadline has revealed that Algerian-French actress Sofia Boutella has landed the lead role in “Rebel Moon.” Snyder will direct and co-wrote the script alongside Shay Hatten and Kurt Johnstad. Hatten previously worked on scripts such as “John Wick: Chapter 3” and “Army of The Dead.”
Here’s the basic log-line: “‘Rebel Moon’ takes place on a peaceful colony on the edge of the galaxy that is threatened by the armies of a tyrannical regent named Balisarius. Desperate people dispatch a young woman (Boutella) with a mysterious past to seek out warriors from neighboring planets to help them make a stand.“
Boutella isn’t a terribly shocking selection as the actress has a string of action projects among her credits, such as “Kingsman: The Secret Service,” “Atomic Blonde,” “Star Trek Beyond,” “Hotel Artemis,” and “The Mummy.” She was most recently seen opposite Nicolas Cage in the gonzo genre movie “Prisoners of The Ghostland.”
It’ll be interesting to see who Snyder assembles around Sofia Boutella as these other intergalactic warriors and what kinds of names and faces he builds around her for the ensemble. No word on when it’ll come out, but it’s starting to already feel like a 2023 movie.