Editorial: There's No Place Like Home: Hollywood Returning to its Greatest Hits

There's No Place Like Home: Hollywood Returning to its Greatest Hits

Familiarity is comfort. In times of austerity it's no surprise to find Hollywood returning to the old safe hands, mining the past to secure a hit. Here's a run down of some of the biggest come backs over the next few years.

First up is the return of Harry Potter. Well, sort of. FANTASTIC BEASTS AND WHERE TO FIND THEM is the story of Newt Scamander and, according to Ms Rowling herself, is "neither a prequel nor sequel to the Harry Potter series, rather an extension of the wizarding world". 

Although she doesn't seem overly fussed about returning to Potter in novel form, JK Rowling is scripting this one which bodes well for quality. Plotwise all we know is "Newt's story will start in New York, seventy years before Harry's gets underway", which is nice.

No news on director or cast yet, though a 2016 release is likely. The  prohibition era New York setting is enticing and given their steller work on Potter, the effects whizzes will surely work wonders with the plethora of beasties for our hero to get to grips with. Looks promising.

Sticking with fantastic beasts, Jurassic Park 4, now titled JURASSIC WORLD, is now in production after years of development. Goodwill for the original Dino-romp is infinite and the creative team here top notch, so at the very least we can expect spectacle. Although original honcho Senor Spielbergo is taking a back seat, newcomer Colin Trevorow, known for directing accalaimed indie comedy Safety Not Guaranteed is a safe bet.

Regards plot, there is no official news aside from original star Sam Neill calling it a "total re-jig", implying we're either getting a reboot or new story set in the same universe.The petition to bring back Jeff Goldblum starts here. Released: June 12th 2015

Speaking of Goldblum, big news on mega destructive franchises as INDEPENDENCE DAY 2, nicknamed ID4-EVER (cringe) is also a-go-go. Original director and master of smashing shit up Roland Emmerich (The Day after Tomorrow, White House Down) has bigged this up for a while now with no luck. But now Big Willy Style himself has hopped on board, this is getting fast tracked for release on July 4th 2015.

On a lighter  note, the wonderful folk at Pixar are deep in production on FINDING DORY. Dory is one of the more compelling and lovable characters from a studio who excell at compelling and loveable, and given their recent success with Monsters University and Toy Story 3, we can expect this will be all kinds of wonderful. Bad news though, it isn't out until summer 2016. Sorry folks!

Onto STAR WARS EPISODE VII. While the prequels may be varying degrees of meh, the franchise is now free of George Lucas's iffy decision making and things are looking up. Disney are investing in quality for the new trilogy with Toy Story 3 scribe (and oscar winner) Michael Arndt on scripting duty, and Star Trek wunderkind JJ Abrams directing part one.

Details are thin, but the confirmed return of godlike genius John Williams bodes well, as does the fairly certain return of stars Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher and Mark Hamill as older incarnations of Han, Leia and Luke. With Benedict Cumberbatch also rumoured to be playing the villain, the Force is strong with this one. Expect it Summer 2015.

Before slipping back in the Falcon, Harrison Ford takes a rare comedy turn in the hugely anticipated ANCHORMAN 2: THE LEGEND CONTINUES, relocating the anarchy of the first film to New York, this will otherwise  continue where the last film left off. As expected, it looks hilarious and is released this Winter.

Speaking of bonkers, next year will see Jim Carrey and Jeff Daniels return to Dumb and Dumber after 2 decades in the form of DUMB AND DUMBER TO (sic). Expect it to be mad, and very very funny.

The biggie next year is X-MEN: DAYS OF FUTURE PAST (Released May 23rd), supervised by original director Brian Singer, this crunches together the time frames of the original X-trilogy and recent First Class whilst bringing in fan favourite villain the Sentinels. Word is good, with a cast to die for and a possibilty it may be the last time we see Hugh Jackman as Wolverine on our screens, which is sad.

Also released next summer, MAD MAX: FURY ROAD sees everyones favourite hottie Tom Hardy taking over from drunken racist Mel Gibson on the classic  franchise, where he'll be seen driving through a desert for some reason.

Further in the future, James Cameron's AVATAR 2 hits in 2016. Cameron has been working on scripts for a while now, so at least we know he's going for quality. Still, with three (yes THREE) sequels currently in the pipeline, it seems he's milking it. Rumours hint that old Terminator pal Arnold has been cast as the big villain which is quite frankly ace, and at the very least we know the films will be pretty to look at.

Finally, speaking of Arnie, the aging Austrian Oak is on somewhat of a comeback bender at the moment, starring in both TERMINATOR 5 (July 4th 2015) and another CONAN THE BARBARIAN film (ignoring the recent reboot). Strange times, folks.

*Originally written for York Vision