Paramount announced plans to expand their Hasbro Toys cinematic universe, including G.I. Joe, M.A.S.K., Visionairies, ROM: Spaceknight and Micronauts, two years ago. The studio put together a writer’s room full of the best writers Hollywood, but now word comes that potential ROM: Spaceknight and M.A.S.K. films may be effectively dead.
The writer’s room had some of Hollywood’s brightest writers, Michael Chabon, Brian K. Vaughan, Akiva Goldsman, Joe Robert Cole, Nicole Perlman and directors John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein, both of whom are recently attached to direct the DC Flash movie. There hasn’t been a single film involving any of the Hasbro properties since the writer’s room. So, what happened?
In a recent interview with IGN, Daley and Goldstein talk about what happened, and how two of the properties (ROM: Spaceknight and M.A.S.K.) are basically dead:
“Those are probably not likely to see the light of day, unless they’re moving on separate from us. It’s a funny thing. We spent three weeks in a room with a lot of talented writers. We broke eleven or so movies and, I don’t know. It just kind of went into the vortex. There’s been some leadership changes at Paramount, so it’s hard to say. Nobody’s contacted us about those.
It was fun. It was a fun challenge to take these properties that were so barebones in any kind of narrative and create a movie around them. You know, these little cheap, plastic things, and to give them a backstory was an exciting challenge.”
At the time, the films were to be produced by Brian Goldner, Stephen Davis and Josh Feldman, but mum’s been the word at Paramount. Whether we will ever see any of these films is anyone’s guess. For now, Paramount is focused on Transformers and its spin-off film Bumblebee set to hit theaters this December.
