Channing Tatum was one of the highlights of last night's MTV Movie Awards, stepping onstage to present an award with his Magic Mike co-star Matthew McConaughey, and getting surprised not just by Joe Manganiello in full fireman's gear, but a very giddy Elizabeth Banks as she stepped up to accept her award. Tatum is on fire this year, for sure, and that's probably only going to continue with Magic Mike-- but if you're ready to see him do something other than show off those famous abs, there's reasons to be getting excited for you too.
Talking to MTV on the eve of the Movie Awards, Tatum confirmed that he will in fact star in the Wachowskis' new film Jupiter Ascending, which they plan to make as their follow-up to this fall's Cloud Atlas. New details emerged on the film just last week, promising that Tatum would play a higher-power alien being assigned to kill a young human woman (Mila Kunis), but falling in love with her instead. Kunis had already confirmed her involvement, so it looks like all the pieces are in place for Kunis and Tatum to get on set with the Wachowskis and start blowing our minds any time now.
There are a million mean jokes to be made about the notion of Tatum playing an alien with advanced intelligence, but he's done a lot this year to get past his dumb hot guy reputation-- sure, his character in 21 Jump Street was dumb as a brick, but Tatum also made him hilarious. I'm dying not just to see what the Wachowskis will do with their first original film since The Matrix series, but how Tatum will fit in.
