Universal Pictures has announced the dawn of a new era in monster movies, as it intends to revive all its classic creatures under a new label entitled: Dark Universe. The studio announced this news with a dramatic new compilation video of all its great old movie monsters, which you can watch below.
While the video does more to remind us about the greatness of the older generation of Universal monster movies than it does amp up any anticipation for what is to come, the studio did announce a few surprises along with the video. Here’s everything we know so far about the Dark Universe franchise:
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- The debut title in Universal Pictures’ relaunch of its classic monster movies is The Mummy, starring Tom Cruise, which hits theaters on June 9th.
- Beauty and the Beast director Bill Condon will direct Bride of Frankenstein, the next Dark Universe title, currently slated for a February 14th, 2019 release. (My inside sources say Universal has been eyeing none other than Angelina Jolie for the title character.)
- Bride of Frankenstein is being written by David Koepp whose has an impressive resume of credits that includes Jurassic Park, War of the Worlds, Mission: Impossible, and Death Becomes Her.
- Each Dark Universe movie will open with a new motion logo specially designed with musical theme by Danny Elfman, which you can see in the clip above.
- Many other Dark Universe titles are currently in the works, and several actors have already been cast in key roles. Universal released the first image of all its ‘new generation’ of monster movie stars together (see above): Russell Crowe will play Dr. Henry Jekyll, Javier Bardem is Frankenstein’s monster, Tom Cruise as The Mummy’s Nick Morton, Johnny Depp has signed on to portray the Invisible Man, and Sofia Boutella is the Mummy.
- The piece that ties all of these monsters together in Dark Universe is Dr. Jekyll’s organization, Prodigium, which tracks, researches, and sometimes destroys evil monsters. The company works outside of the government… naturally.
Okay, so it’s all starting to sound a lot more like another comic book franchise than a horror movie one, but time will tell if Universal can balance the two nicely or if it all just dissolves into a Marvel-wannabe knock off.
Personally, I’m not all that keen on the trailers for the new Mummy movie, but Bride of Frankenstein sounds VERY promising with Bill Condon and David Koepp at the wheel.
What do you think? Are YOU eager to see the new Mummy, or Bride of Frankenstein movies from Dark Universe? Let me know in the comments below.
Oh, and in the meantime, you can gear up by watching all these old Universal monster movie classics! To get these films on DVD or Blu-Ray, or to watch now in streaming HD on Amazon Video, click the box cover for your movie of choice below.
