Mark Wahlberg has been attached to a remake of The Six Million Dollar Man since 2014, with Peter Berg, Damian Szifron, and Travis Knight among the filmmakers to have taken a crack at the project before it got caught up in rights issues at Skydance.
All we really know is that the movie has been retitled The Six Billion Dollar Man and that Wahlberg still hopes to play the title character.
ComicBook.com spoke to the actor at the premiere of his and Halle Berry's new Netflix movie, The Union, and asked where things stand with the project. "You know, I have one superhero movie in mind, and it's The Six Billion Dollar Man, formally known as The Six Million Dollar Man, gone up due to inflation," he joked.
"It's grounded, and it's plausible, real. You know, there is lots of bionics technology and science happening right now. So this is something that has all the wish fulfillment of a superhero, incredible things," Wahlberg continued. "But I don't have to wear one of those suits. I don't have the confidence to walk around in one of those suits."
"Halle goes, 'Oh you'd look great in one of those costumes,' I go, 'It's not the physical appearance, it's the mental confidence to walk out of my trailer.'"
Wahlberg has long said he has little interest in joining the Marvel or DC Universe, meaning The Six Billion Dollar Man will be the closest he comes to playing a superhero-like character.
The Six Million Dollar Man aired on TV from 1973 to 1978 and starred Lee Majors as Colonel Steve Austin. The show is based on the 1972 novel Cyborg by Martin Caidin.
The story follows Steve Austin, a former astronaut who suffers severe injuries in a crash. He is "rebuilt" in a top-secret government program led by the Office of Scientific Intelligence (OSI). Austin is outfitted with bionic implants that give him superhuman strength, speed, and vision. His bionic arm, legs, and eye are worth $6 million, hence the title of the show.
Austin becomes a secret agent for the U.S. government, using his enhanced abilities to tackle dangerous missions that ordinary humans could not. A spin-off series, The Bionic Woman featuring Lindsay Wagner, later followed.
"You know what, I think there is finally hope for that to happen," Wahlberg said of the reboot last December. "And I think it’s kind of actually a lot to do with this movie, because hopefully Skydance will have the rights, if not fully buttoned up now, very soon, and we’ll fast-track that movie to get made."
"So, I’m still not out of the fight, I’m still grinding every day to get it made. You know, it's tough to get certain things made it’s very difficult, it was an uphill battle, but I think certain ones are worth just seeing through to the end."
As you can probably imagine, The Six Billion Dollar Man doesn't have a confirmed release date.