Now that Disney has acquired Fox, the studio has a long list of new franchises at their disposal. That includes Planet of the Apes, and as that's such a marketable property, it's no great surprise that a reboot is in the works (this time from The Maze Runner director Wes Ball).
Ball's adaptation of that YA novel was a hit, and helped establish him as a filmmaker to watch.
During an interview with Discussing Film, he was asked where things stand with the reboot, and after explaining that he's been regularly meeting with writer Josh Friedman via Zoom, Ball said that the script is "continuing to move forward." Explaining that there's a team working on concept art, he believes they "could actually be in virtual production relatively soon because it’s largely a CG movie."
As beloved as Rupert Wyatt and Matt Reeves' Planet of the Apes movies were, Ball cautioned that he's not necessarily looking to find a way of continuing that series after such a definitive ending.
"Those last three movies are one of the great trilogies we have in modern movie history. They are just so well done. They honored the original movies they sprang from, the Charlton Heston movies, but they grounded it in a modern sensibility and it just worked. Caesar is one of the great movie characters that we’ll have throughout time. So what do you do to follow that up, right? At the same time, I wasn’t interested in doing a part four either. We want to also do our own thing."
"We have a take," Ball continued. "We have a way of staying in the universe that was created before us, but we’re also opening ourselves up in being able to do some really cool new stuff. Again, I’m trying to be careful here. I’ll say this, for fans of the original three don’t worry – you’re in good hands. The original writers and producers that came up with Rise and Dawn, Rick Jaffa and Amanda Silver, they’re also on board with this."
Reading between the lines, it's likely Ball's film will take place in the distant future, finally taking us to a true "Planet of the Apes," rather than the final few years of humanity in the present day.
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