The International House of Mojo

As reader BillieJoe86 informs us, Michael Giacchino picked up a golden statuette at last night's Academy Awards for his musical score for Disney/Pixar's Up. In addition to his movie and TV credits, Giacchino is an experienced game composer, having worked on such LucasArts titles as Secret Weapons Over Normandy, Mercenaries, and Thrillville.

Though I'm guessing he wasn't at the ceremony, also worth noting is the fact that Best Animated Feature Film nominee Coraline featured the storyboarding talents of Graham Annable, former LucasArts animator and Telltale Creative Director, not to mention the father of Dank/Dunk.

While it's heartbreaking to think that we won't get anymore Bone games from Telltale, the epic saga's upcoming animated film version seems to be chugging along nicely. The evidence is this new interview with Jeff Smith. Although it admittedly doesn't offer a wealth of information you don't already know if you've been following the production along with us, Smith provides a progress update and describes the level of involvement he will have to ensure that the cinematic adaptation of Bone doesn't turn out calcium deficient:

For more than 10 years, Hollywood has been interested in putting Smith's entertaining epic on the big screen. At one point, Nickelodeon Movies and Paramount held an option. In 2008, Warner Bros. acquired the rights for producer Dan Lin (Sherlock Holmes). Animal Logic, the Australian visual effects company (The Matrix, Happy Feet, 300) will turn Smith’s drawings into CGI. Despite a recent kerfuffle with Warner—a potential train wreck that instead became “one of those fires that gets put out”—Bone, the movie, is on track and a director will soon be announced. Smith is the film’s executive producer. And although he is not writing the screenplay, all quality control decisions pass through him. “I’ve seen everything,” he says. “It’s their project. But they’ve been very good about keeping me in the loop and showing me everything and it’s pretty exciting so far.” He admits that he is “kind of stubborn when it comes to Bone and animation.”

The film will apparently utilize motion capture in some way, though considering the production company's pedigree (Happy Feet), you have to think that there will be plenty of, erm, "traditional 3D animation" involved as well.

Source: printmag.com

As you know by now, the fourth Pirates of the Caribbean film, subtitled On Stranger Tides, will be loosely based on the Tim Powers novel of the same name that heavily influenced Ron Gilbert's conception of Monkey Island. The assumption that the adaptation will be "loose" is logical considering that the book's protagonist, Jack Shanty, has very little in common with Depp's Jack Sparrow in personality and background.

However, the outline of the novel, which is about the Fountain of Youth and stars as its villain the infamous Blackbeard, will survive the translation to the silver screen, and today the rumor mill informs us that Blackbeard will be played by Ian McShane, who you may know from Deadwood and who represents some pretty pitch-perfect casting.

Previous casting rumors include reports of Penelope Cruz playing the female lead, and I'm sure you've some kind of reaction to that. But why don't we hear anything about Geoffrey Rush's Barbossa anymore? I was rather hoping that the early reports that claimed that the film would see Sparrow and Barbossa questing for the Fountain together had merit.

Source: CHUD

So, why did Telltale make the first two chapters of Jeff Smith's Bone but never continued then? Here's a possible explanation: the movie is well under way. The producer of the new Sherlock Holmes movie, Dan Lin, was talking to Collider about his future projects - of which Bone is one, well into production at Happy Feet creators Animalogic.

It's a (CGI presumably) animated movie, Jeff Smith is closely involved, they're meeting with directors now and hope to have one announced in January, and it (HOORAY!) won't be one movie. So, bought the books yet?

(Tingler's Side Note: although excited frankly I'm terrified about Lin and Animalogic's other project, a Tom & Jerry origin movie, which sounds like a terrible idea. Oh well, let's hope for good things)

Source: Collider

I randomly stumbled upon this blog post that explores the relationship between Monkey Island, On Stranger Tides, and the Pirates of the Caribbean films, and figured you might want to read it. The thought-provoking piece was written back in September, in response to the announcement that the fourth Pirates movie would in fact be based upon the Tim Power's novel.

Just when you think Steve Purcell can't dig up a piece of concept art for the scrapped Monkey Island movie that can top the last, he goes and pulls a stunt like this.

Steve Purcell has uploaded another two pieces of never-before-seen concept art from the scrapped Monkey Island animated movie. That conclusion being speculation on my part, of course.

Steve Purcell has posted yet another bit of concept art from the canceled animated Monkey Island flick. Hopefully this hungry fellow settles whatever debate that has sprung up about the presence of mythological creatures in the MI universe. Who knew a few mer-folk would get so many people's earlobes uncurled?*

* You can't prove that my sly reference to The Great Cow Race won't cause Bone 3 to exist.

Update: Steve Purcell is a freaking genius. Way too cool.

On his blog, Steve Purcell has shared a new piece of concept art from the canceled The Curse of Monkey Island animated movie, in pre-production at some point in 2000. Sorry, by that I mean "speculative piratey piece of potential film entertainment."

The art depicts LeChuck staring with unbridled emotion at Tia Dalma's musical locket some sort of weird seashell.

Update: We caught these previously unseen character designs (for CMI the game - yes, Purcell did some early sketches for that!) from last month too, right?

It seems kind of obligatory to post about this. Ever since Kingdom of the Crystal Skull was released, there have been rumors about a possible fifth Indy film. No surprise, as there are always going to be rumors - you might recall mumblings about Indy4 since the release of Last Crusade. But in the past week things have started to get a little bit more convincing. As our friends at TheRaider.net have pointed out, son of Indiana Jones Shia LaBeouf said the following while interviewing about the upcoming Transformers sequel:

Steven [Spielberg] just said that he cracked the story on it before I left and I think they're gearing that up.

Then there's another quote by producer Frank Marshall which states that while there is not yet a script (which of course means anything could happen), there is an active effort going on to get the project greenlit.

Personally, I would welcome Indiana Jones 5, and I was among the most deeply disappointed with the character's latest cinematic outing. It's just that these guys are all really old, and Ford probably only has one left in him, so why not? It's not like they can damage the series any more than they have, and I suspect after returning to Indy after such a long hiatus, Spielberg might actually be in the groove of fun summer escapism again and be able deliver a satisfying Indy flick that serves as a proper farewell to the iconic hero. We'll see, of course.

According to reports in magazine The Hollywood Enquirer, Mojo has learned that actor William Kasten has replaced Nick Jameson as Richard Malkin on the famous TV show Lost.

Mr. Jameson told reporters, "I'm gonna kill that guy!"

Source: Hollywood Enquirer

The legendary Drew Struzan, inarguably the most famous movie poster artist of all time, has decided to end his seasoned and extensive career. Our friends at TheRaider.net have the full story as well as this quote from the man:

Having been working at not working has produced a guy who could never return to illustration again. It took a lot to attempt the idea of retiring from my 40 years of effort and sacrifice but now that I have, I am delighting in life as never before. I had forgotten how to rest, to smell the proverbial roses and to see the future as opportunity. I am grateful and honored to have had the opportunity to do all the work I did. I am well pleased to have been able to give a gift of beauty and peace through my artwork to so many throughout the world. Now I have laid down the burden and have peace and happiness as the reward for my day's labor.

As you hopefully know, Struzan has his fingerprints on a multitude of posters for high profile films, including all of the Star Wars and Indiana Jones movies. (His style of course also served as inspiration for LEC artist Bill Eaken in creating the cover art for Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis.) Struzan has recently updated his web site with galleries of his artwork, which includes the unmolested, un-studio-Photshopped versions of his Crystal Skull art, which this thread on TheRaider.net's forums has done a good job of collecting.

Damn.

In a double-whammy of Star Wars whup-ass, two falls have been reported for the previously inconquerable series.

Firstly, The Dark Knight continues to beat all expectations and has now ousted Star Wars: A New Hope as the No. 2 Top-Grossing Film of All Time in the domestic US market. Bear in mind the new Batman film has only been on the market for five weeks, whereas A New Hope has had 30 years.

And if that weren't enough, new animated movie The Clone Wars is doing absolutely shockingly and has only made $15.5 million this weekend - which was also beaten by The Dark Knight. It's basically a TV cartoon pointlessly put up on the big screen, so obviously the fans aren't as stupid as they appear (cough).

Although I quite enjoyed it... I'll get me coat.

Source: ComingSoon.net

I'm sure all of you have seen this before as it's almost a year old, but I don't remember seeing it mentioned on Mojo then. Anyway, it brightened my day a bit, and so thought it was worth posting.

The long-awaited (well, by me at least) Indiana Jones Comics Omnibus Volume 2 is now available in stores, online or off, a few days earlier than expected.

All of these comics have been out-of-print for years and are very hard to come by, but they're mostly of interest to us because this volume contains the two stories that could have been Fate of Atlantis 2 - Iron Phoenix and Spear of Destiny.

While Spear of Destiny most likely bears little relation to the intended story for the cancelled game, Iron Phoenix is very game-like in its structure, and contains several elements that ended up in the true sequel - Infernal Machine. The artifacts being scattered across remote points of the world, including one at Shambala Sanctuary, and Russians being in it for example.

The script for Frank Darabont's version of Indy IV that leaked online and released the Wrath of LucasLegal upon a few hapless websites has received a few reviews. G4TV did one first, and now Vanity Fair has one too.

You can discuss the script and these reviews in our forum thread here.

Just thought I'd mention that the most infamous of the rejected screenplays for the fourth Indiana Jones film, the one by Frank Darabont, has finally been leaked online. While there's no way to verify the script's authenticity (though I'm pretty sure it's legit), and it's not clear whether or not this is the final draft, Indy fans will surely want to grab it anyway before LucasLegal gets wind.

Update: Wind gotten. :(

If you managed to read it before pdfscreenplays opened the Ark of the Covenant and found a 'Cease And Desist' letter inside, or just want to know about it, have a chat about it on our forums.

Those wiley scamps at GamesRadar have put together their case to prove that the Force, that mystical energy field that surrounds us and gives Jedi their power, is actually a bit rubbish. Far from making the planet-destroying power of the Death Star look insignificant, it can't even be consistent from film to film.

Oh, and be warned - if you're a big Star Wars nerd (yes, like me sadly), there's possibly a spoiler for The Force Unleashed on page 3, in the middle of Point 5. It's the Secret Apprentice's name, which hasn't yet been properly revealed by LucasArts.

Yep, there's another LucasFilm franchise with a movie on the way. The animated Star Wars: Clone Wars movie trailer is now up on starwars.com.

Samuel L Jackson has reprised his role as Mace Windu for the movie, though it's unconfirmed if he will continue to do voicework for the TV series that the movie is launching.

Also, the second part of the animated LEGO short for Raiders of the Lost Brick has been posted online here.

Source: starwars.com

The Amazon.Com page for the Indy IV Soundtrack now has samples! Listen to the new Indy Soundtrack now!

I thought I would post this as news partly because whether the film's good or bad the Soundtrack will be fantastic, partly because I think John Williams is great and I'm looking forward to the Soundtrack almost as much as I am the film, but mostly it's to annoy Jason. :D