An Update on Universals 'Monster Cinematic Universe'

quote:

---

The Mummy is first out of the gate, with Kurtzman directing that film, but Universal also assembled a writers room to come up with ideas/stories for The Wolfman, The Invisible Man, Bride of Frankenstein, Van Helsing, Creature from the Black Lagoon, etc

Some of these films do have talent attached—Johnny Depp is set to star as the titular Invisible Man, and Javier Bardem is in talks to play Frankenstein—but the studio has yet to pull the trigger on directors for these movies as Kurtzman and Morgan are overseeing the screenwriting process with writers like Eric Heisserer (Arrival) and Jon Spaihts (Prometheus).

“I think why people will love these monster films is the they are an homage to the originals, which means you’re gonna get complex characters. And the thing that I think is interesting about monsters is that they are always exaggerations of human attributes or human fears. For example, Frankenstein was a result of the kind of industrial and scientific revolution—are we playing God? Should we be playing God? And with the Wolfman there’s that worry of what happens if I lose control? What happens if I hurt the things around me that I love? There’s very human questions and worries and fears and darkness and cravings.”

“We kind of designed them all to be kind of standalone sorts of franchises that have kind of similar things between them. And as the scripts came in, then we started putting them in a, ‘Well this would be a good order. We reveal this here’ so now it really comes down to, again, it’s a studio decision on which film is coming out next. Just with all the films we’re working on, Bride of Frankenstein, Van Helsing, Creature from the Black Lagoon, Wolfman, Invisible Man, and on and on and on, it’s a real embarrassment of riches in terms of awesome, fun characters

“We kind of designed them all to be kind of standalone sorts of franchises that have kind of similar things between them.

---