One reason I’m not a big fan of science fiction or fantasy novels is that the plots just seem so unbelievable. For example, Variety reports that Disney is planning on making a movie called The Surrogates, based on a comic book (or graphic novel, for those of you over 12 who still read comic books) by Robert Venditti and Brett Weldele. The story covers a world in the future where humans live in isolation but interact through surrogate robots. I’m mean, do they really expect me to believe that people would sit alone in their houses and only connect through a machine? That’s simply ridiculous. Hang on while I post my outrage on the Internet.
Someone well acquainted with the subject of machines of the future, Jonathan Mostow, is scheduled to direct the adaptation. He directed Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines and will reunite with that movie’s writers, Michael Ferris and John Brancato. No casting has been announced, but one of the producers will be Elizabeth Banks. You may recognize her as Zach Braff’s baby’s mommy on “Scrubs” or as Mark Whalberg’s bartender gal-pal in Invincible.
Another producer, David Hoberman, seems to be stretching to compare the movie to the current flavor of the month. He says, “This is a grounded sci-fi premise, but there are big effects, and it's clear from 300 that people want to see different kinds of things, and this falls into that category." This falls into what category? The big effects category? The green-screen category? The adapted comic book category? It’s probably more in the “boy, we sure as hell hope this makes $70 million in the opening weekend” category.
