Movie News: Tom Cruise for ‘Highlander,’ ‘Avatar’ sequels delayed and new ‘Trek 3’ writer

This is a round up of some the recent news on big projects, more specifically: a reboot of the Highlander franchise, now with Tom Cruise possibly attached and James Cameron saying the Avatar sequel won’t arrive next year after all.

From Scotland comes rumor and “hopeful thoughts?” as Scotland Now reports that Tom Cruise is being sought to play the character made famous by Sean Connery in the 1986 film.

“Summit Entertainment hopes to cast Cruise as Spanish sword fighter Juan Sanchez Villa-Lobos Ramirez, a character Connery played with a Scottish accent…Scotland could be a possible filming location for the Highlander reboot after Scottish Screen offered its help to Summit via the US office of the UK Film Council,” they write in their Jan. 25 article.

Cruise is busy with the Mission Impossible franchise (with Jeremy Renner, Ving Rhames and Simon Pegg), a Jack Reacher sequel and a new Top Gun film.

Speaking of Simon Pegg, he’s rumored to be writing Star Trek 3. 

“He will co-write the script with Doug Jung, creator of the TNT series Dark Blue. Pegg’s already a pivotal player in the JJ Abrams-produced Paramount/Skydance pic; he also will reprise his role as Scotty, the engineering wiz originated by James Doohan in the original 1960s Gene Roddenberry series,” Deadline reported.

Justin Lin will take over as director.

Avatar sequel delayed to 2017

James Cameron, the director, speaking at an event held by New Zealand Screen Advisory Board, said that he is working on the scripts and production of three new films simultaneously. “We were probably a bit ambitious with [the film],” says Cameron, “It took me six months to write the first and we’re writing three altogether,” according to 3News.

“There’s a layer of complexity in getting the story to work as a saga across three films that you don’t get when you’re making a stand-alone film,” Cameron said.

“Parallel with that, we’re doing all the design. So we’ve designed all the creatures and the environments,” he added.

Working on the scripts of these sequels are Rick Jaffa and Amanda Silver, Josh Friedman and Shane Salerno along with Cameron.

“If it all stays on track, the saga would wrap up in 2019.”

Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana and Sigourney Weaver are all under contract for the three new films.

Tom Cruise joining “Highlander” reboot?
20th Century Fox