20th Century Fox has made a doozy of a release date announcement today, with the first dates for two highly anticipated sequels and a big shift for Steven Spielberg’s next film. Briefly:
- The currently untitled sequel to X-Men: First Class will be released on July 18th, 2014
- The sequel to Rise of the Planet of the Apes, now titled Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, will hit theaters on May 23rd, 2014
- Director Steven Spielberg’s sci-fi film Robopocalypse has been pushed from July 3rd, 2013 to April 25th, 2014.
Hit the jump for much more.
Fox is poised to have a massive year in 2014. First up, the highly anticipated sequel to last year’s excellent X-Men: First Class has landed a prime July 18th release date in 2014. Director Matthew Vaughn is poised to return once again, with all of the original cast—including Michael Fassbender, James McAvoy, Jennifer Lawrence and Nicholas Hoult—contracted to reprise their characters. The sequel is currently untitled, but Simon Kinberg—the scribe behind X-Men: The Last Stand—recently came onboard to write the script. Vaughn has had a hand in the screenplay in all of his previous projects, so I expect he’ll have a lot of say in the script. Production is expected to get underway in January once Lawrence wraps The Hunger Games: Catching Fire.
Additionally, the sequel to Rise of the Planet of the Apes not only has a release date it but now has a fantastic title. Dawn of the Planet of the Apes will hit theaters on Memorial Day, May 23rd, 2014. Rise director Rupert Wyatt is thankfully returning to helm the follow-up, and he previously talked at length about his ideas for further entries in the franchise. Contagion and The Bourne Ultimatum scribe Scott Z. Burns is writing the screenplay, and I’m incredibly eager to see Wyatt and star Andy Serkis continue the Apes saga. Sony’s animated film Pixels is also slated to open the same weekend, but the film’s main competition will be repeat business from Marvel’s untitled film that’s slated to open one week earlier.
Finally, Steven Spielberg’s adaptation of the sci-fi novel Robopocalypse has been pushed nearly ten months from July 3rd, 2013 to April 25th, 2014. Though Spielberg is known for working fast, the futuristic thriller likely has a great deal of visual effects work to be done and a production start date hasn’t even been announced yet. Drew Goddard (The Cabin in the Woods) wrote the screenplay for the pic based on Daniel H. Wilson’s novel that tells the story of a sentient artificial intelligence that takes over our global technology and begins a systemic attack on mankind. The only other films slated for the month of April in 2014 are Stretch Armstrong on the 11th and Captain America 2 on April 4th.
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Am I the only one who thought both of those movies were good at best but have no real sequel potential. First class barely made sense as far as a part of the original trilogys timeline and they already climaxed by destroying charles and eriks brolationship. Apes movie will need some ballsy story telling to make it interesting
I don’t think First Class was intended at all to stick doggedly to the timeline of the prior X-Men films ( and probably avoids directing itself into a creative cul de sac as a result ), and Apes was a great way to reopen up the Apes franchise.
Some ( possessive ) apostrophes in the appropriate places in your comments would be appreciated.
It may not mean that much to anyone else, but I am ecstatic at the title on the next apes film, because I always wanted this title ( for the previous Apes film ) for evoking a different, bygone era of cinema, and for evoking the beginning of 2001: A Space Odyssey…
Dawn of the Planet of the Dead Apes
Now THAT would be an awesome movie.
im not suprised.i heard robopocalypse has a record-breaking budget(like 300+ mill $)its a gigantic movie
Isn’t Robopocalypse original title The Terminator? Doubt this will make its money back. When was the last time Speilberg made a great sci-fi movie? Jurassic Park? E.T.? Close Encounters?
MR.Rich316 what about Minority Report I thought that was some solid sci fi.
I like Fassbender & McAvoy but First Class is an amateurish mess
The new APES is much better, focused, don’t try to do anything too ambitious. And it ends its character arc nicely while leaving an opportunity for a sequel possibility.
WHAT ABOUT THE ’24′ MOVIE, FOX, WHAT ABOUT THE ’24′ MOVIE…?
Nice! Dawn of the Planet of the Apes comes out on my birthday!