It's been months and months since we saw the first photo from the set of Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle, but now that we are getting closer to the movie's December release date, some real news about the flick is finally trickling in. Namely, Jack Black recently revealed the new Jumanji will pay tribute to Robin Williams' character from the original flick, and he also explained a little bit more about how the movie will do it. He said:
We're exploring this jungle and trying to conquer the game; it's life or death. But while we're there, we find clues left behind by [Williams' character Alan Parrish]. He built up a full-blown jungle house, similar to a Swiss Family Robinson situation. It's like he's there helping us without actually being there.
If you know much about Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle, you may already know the new movie will be set in the jungle this time around, and there's more on this in Jack Black's comments to THR. It will also be bringing characters into the jungle world somehow through a video game. The new cast--which includes Jack Black, Dwayne Johnson, Karen Gillan and Kevin Hart--will have to play a new sort of game in the jungle, and luckily for them, Alan Parrish will have left plenty of clues behind.
In the original Jumanji movie, Alan Parrish was sucked into the Jumanji board game as a child. He spent a good chunk of his adult life stuck in the jungle of the game, where he learned to deal with bugs and monkeys and all manner of impressive and terrifying aspects of life there. Twenty years later, he was brought back into his own world thanks to Judy and Peter, two kids who also got their hands on the copy of Jumanji. The movie ended happily with a time reversal, but the years Alan Parrish spent in the game before he was spit back out will apparently be remembered by the game.
Although Robin Williams is no longer with us, it's pretty cool that Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle has figured out a way to incorporate his memorable character into the new movie. This is hardly the first remake or reboot that has done something like this. It was only recently that Alex Kurtzman's The Mummy also paid homage to the 1999 movie starring Brendan Frasier by incorporating The Book of the Dead. Although the torch has been passed to the newer movies, it's still nice to nod at earlier incarnations that have paved the way, making the reboot or remake possible.
Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle is out on December 20, 2017, so we should be seeing more from the movie in the coming months. In the meantime, you can take a look at our full movies schedule.
