Multiverse News

Welcome to Multiverse News, your source for information about all your favorite fictional universes.Everyone’s forgotten Peter Parker…or have they? Sony gave us a second full trailer for Spider-Man: Brand New Day and the interwebs are buzzing about it. We get longer looks at Mark Ruffalo’s Bruce Banner/Hulk and Jon Bernthal’s Frank Castle/Punisher in the film, as well as allusions to the big bad of the movie - though Tom Holland recently said on the press tour that the antagonist has not been figured out yet by fans. Films continue to top each other’s openings at the box office this year, with Toy Story 5 having the current title of best opening of the year to the tune of $160 million domestically over the Father’s Day weekend. This was also the all-time best opening for the 30-year-old franchise. Disclosure Day took second place this weekend, though Toy Story practically beat its global take in the states alone, and Obsession and Backrooms continue their strong streaks coming in at third and fourth respectively.Universal and Blumhouse’s Atomic Monster are jumping on the Curry Barker bandwagon having acquired the young director’s third film in a reported eight figure deal. While Universal has been backing Barker, both Obsession and his upcoming film Anything But Ghosts are coming from Focus Features. Blumhouse has produced those same films, but this new move puts the horror powerhouse in a stronger position for film development. To tag onto the box office talk and remind you, Obsession was made for $750,000 and has now made more than $300 million worldwide - making it a tantalizing prospect for Blumhouse.Netflix has opted not to proceed with a second season of The Boroughs, a sci-fi TV series executive produced by Stranger Things creators The Duffer Brothers. The series debuted its first season last month. Universal and Imagine Entertainment are developing a sequel to 2000’s How the Grinch Stole Christmas, with Jim Carrey in talks to reprise his role as the classic Dr. Seuss character the Grinch and Ron Howard returning to direct. Manny Jacinto, Emily Mortimer, and Thomasin McKenzie have joined the Season 3 cast of Prime Video’s Fallout in recurring roles. In a new interview with Collider, Illumination CEO Chris Meledandri revealed that Star Wars creator George Lucas was cast in a small voice part in the upcoming Minions and Monsters because Lucas is a longtime fan of the Despicable Me franchise. Toy Story 4 director Josh Cooley is reteaming with Keanu Reeves for a live-action hybrid Lego movie that Cooley will direct and Reeves will star in according to Deadline. Netflix has won the rights to develop Alix E. Harrow’s best selling novel The Everlasting and will enter production on a series adaptation immediately according to Variety. The Everlasting is a time loop fantasy novel and was one of the best selling books of last year.Universal Pictures has announced that the next Illumination animated film will be Not Alone, an alien movie starring Timothée Chalamet & Selena Gomez which will release in April of next year. Dylan Clark’s reboot of The Blair Witch Project for Lionsgate has landed a release date of September 24, 2027.Legendary has announced that a live action Magic School Bus movie is officially in the works with Elizabeth Banks set to play Ms. Frizzle. Detective Pikachu and Goosebumps director Rob Letterman will helm the feature.

Welcome to Multiverse News, your source for information about all your favorite fictional universes.While it may come as no surprise, the biggest Marvel news this week is still just as exciting as it is obvious with the revelation that Chris Evans will indeed appear in Secret Wars. While not officially confirmed by Marvel, the news broke via a social media post from March 26, that is just now gaining notice, with the actor himself telling Instagram user @comicconmomsi, "I can tell you that...I start work on the next one in a couple of months, I can tell you that," in a video message. That tracks with the projected August production starting date for Secret Wars we’ve discussed previously.While rumors and speculation are typically not our forte here, the rumor mill surrounding The Batman II cast warrants some attention. In May, we discussed headlines from sources like Variety and The Wrap that seemingly confirmed Sebastian Stan had been cast as Harvey Dent, as he had long been rumored to be, with Scarlett Johansson and Charles Dance announced as Dent’s wife and father, respectively. In hindsight, those headlines resulted from Matt Reeve’s social media post where he confirmed and welcomed a number of actors as part of the film but did not actually reveal any roles. In the last week, industry insider Jeff Sneider has suggested that his sources claim that Stan will instead play Victor Zsasz and Brian Tyree Henry is set to portray Harvey. Steven Spielberg has returned to the blockbuster arena for the first time in eight years with Disclosure Day, his UFO sci-fi thriller starring Emily Blunt and Josh O'Connor, which opened to approximately $44 million domestically and $93.9 million globally, making it his biggest opening weekend ever for an original film. Meanwhile, Obsession continues its extraordinary run, adding another $19 million in week five for a domestic total of $188.3 million. Spielberg’s $115 million production earned strong reviews and a B CinemaScore.Sony has released the trailer for The Social Reckoning, Aaron Sorkin’s sequel to The Social Network. Jeremy Strong stars as Mark Zuckerberg alongside Mikey Madison, Jeremy Allen White, and Bill Burr. The film opens October 9.Peter Sarsgaard has joined the Season 3 cast of HBO’s The Last of Us in a recurring role. He will play an original character named Amon, one of the leaders of the Seraphites. Production is currently on a planned hiatus to accommodate World Cup matches filming in Vancouver.It: Welcome to Derry writer Jason Fuchs has been tapped to write a new untitled Transformers script for Paramount and Hasbro.Channing Tatum, Jonah Hill, and Ice Cube are in talks to return for 24 Jump Street at Sony Pictures, reuniting most of the original production team.Apple TV+ has renewed horror comedy Widow’s Bay for a second season ahead of its season finale this week, and has signed creator Katie Dippold to a multiyear overall deal.Jason Momoa has made clear he has no interest in a PG-13 Lobo solo movie. In an interview with Collider, he said if he makes a standalone Lobo film, it will be rated R, full stop, though he’s open to appearing in ensemble DCU projects in the meantime.Peter Serafinowicz has been cast as Peeves the Poltergeist in HBO’s Harry Potter series.Anya Taylor-Joy has joined the cast of the upcoming Lord of the Rings prequel The Hunt for Gollum, playing an elf character named Seren.Marvel Comics will publish a one-shot crossover this September titled The Muppets Take the Marvel Universe, celebrating the 50th anniversary of The Muppet Show by teaming Muppets characters with iconic Marvel heroes.Mark Hamill is joining Peacock’s Twisted Metal for Season 3 in a recurring role, playing the father of Sweet Tooth.Chris Sanders, co-creator and co-director of the original Lilo & Stitch animated film, will direct Disney’s live-action sequel Lilo & Stitch 2. Shooting is expected to begin later this year.

Welcome to Multiverse News, your source for information about all your favorite fictional universes.Everything old is new again, especially at this week’s box office. The Wayans Brothers’ nostalgia-driven sequel Scary Movie opened to a franchise best of $55 million. Unfortunately for Masters of the Universe, the 80s-tv show inspired live action adaptation barely scraped more than $29 million - a true bust for a film that cost more than $170 million to make. Horror darlings Obsession and Backrooms are still ruling the roost at theaters, both having crossed over the $200 million threshold this past weekend.Here’s the news you didn’t know you wanted, Hugh Jackman is set to star in a Ridley Scott-directed adaptation of the truly classic novel Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson. Adolescence writer Jack Thorne will pen the script that stars Jackman as the pirate Long John Silver himself. The original novel was published in 1883 and has been adapted many times.The project is ready to be bid on by all studios. Netflix has announced an official title and revealed a logo for an upcoming Ghostbusters animated series which will officially be titled Ghostbusters: Nightshift. The series is expected to debut sometime in 2027. The upcoming John Wick spin off series currently titled Caine has added Bill Nighy, Dacre Montgomery, and Mason Thames to the cast. The series is being directed by martial arts master Donnie Yen and is currently in production in Budapest and Hong Kong. Netflix has revealed a first look at Scooby Doo from the upcoming live action Scooby Doo series which will premiere sometime in 2027. A short teaser was also released online to make the reveal. This will be the first time the iconic character will be played by an actual dog. Deadline has reported that Jason Momoa is departing PlayStation Productions and Sony Pictures’ film adaptation of Helldivers, based on Arrowhead Game Studios’ video game franchise, from director Justin Lin. The reason for his departure is unknown. 

Welcome to Multiverse News, your source for information about all your favorite fictional universes.Marvel dropped the first full trailer for X-Men ’97 Season 2 this week, confirming a July 1 premiere on Disney+ and Apocalypse as the season’s central threat. The nine-episode season picks up from the Season 1 finale with the X-Men scattered across time from ancient Egypt to the far future, while those left behind in the ’90s work to bring them back, with the trailer also sneaking in a Morph-as-Deadpool shapeshifting moment for good measure. A third season is already in production. On the Doomsday front, Joe and Anthony Russo posted a series of cryptic images to Instagram with various hints and teases towards an Avengers: Doomsday reveal connected to this week’s SXSW Film Festival in London; as of Tuesday morning, the hype seems to have all been for a Doctor Doom themed coffee shop pop-up for attendees of the festival. James Gunn took to Instagram this week with a fit check from the set of Superman: Man of Tomorrow, revealing a first look at Nicholas Hoult in Lex Luthor’s iconic mech-suit, which in the comics gives Luthor superhuman strength, flight, and force fields. The image also appears to show a sandy, otherworldly backdrop, leaving plenty to speculate about heading into the film’s 2027 release. A24’s Backrooms had one of the biggest opening weekends of the year, pulling in 81 million dollars domestically and 118 million worldwide in its debut, the largest opening in A24 history and more than triple what Civil War earned in 2024. The film was adapted from the viral YouTube web series by its creator Kane Parsons, who at 20 years old is now the youngest filmmaker ever to open a number one film, and was produced for roughly 10 million dollars. Meanwhile The Mandalorian and Grogu fell to third place after its second week in theaters with a 69% drop.Prime Video has renewed The Rings of Power for a fourth season ahead of its Season 3 debut later this year, with early preproduction beginning this fall and filming targeted for early 2027.A24 has released the first trailer for Primetime, starring Robert Pattinson as Chris Hansen of Dateline NBC’s To Catch a Predator fame, from acclaimed documentarian Lance Oppenheim, with the film set to premiere this fall.ElevenLabs has struck a deal with the estate of Stan Lee, licensing the Marvel legend’s voice and likeness for AI-generated content available both to app users and commercial partners.The Minecraft Movie sequel now has a title: A Minecraft Movie Squared, due in theaters next July.HBO has dropped the full trailer for House of the Dragon Season 3, offering the first look at the season’s major battle sequences, with the show returning June 21st.Anna Kendrick has been tapped to direct Netflix’s adaptation of Taylor Jenkins Reid’s novel The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo.During Playstation’s annual State of Play showcase, God of War: Laufey was announced to be the next entry in the franchise and an extended gameplay trailer for Insomaniac’s Wolverine was released online.

Over this past Memorial Day weekend, The Mandalorian and Grogu opened to $163 million dollars worldwide, exceeding its projected expectations. In a big second weekend, horror film Obsession pulled in $30 million dollars, bringing the worldwide total for the film over $60 million dollars. Obsession was shot on a budget of less than $1 million dollars. Prime Video has released the first trailer for The Boys spinoff and prequel Vought Rising, which stars Jensen Ackles and Aya Cash. The series is expected to start streaming sometime next year. Set in the 1950s, the teaser trailer follows a younger Soldier Boy and Clara Vought (later Stormfront) as a noir-style conspiracy and murder mystery unfolds amid secret experiments, corporate corruption, and the creation of America’s first superheroes. More details have begun to emerge about The Daniel's upcoming sci fi film project. Matt Damon is currently in talks to star, replacing Ryan Gosling who dropped out of the project. The Hollywood Reporter also reports that the plot of the film involves global warming, time travel, as well as a possible superhero angle. There are two timelines, one set in the 1980s and one set in the present day and protagonists of the story are teens in the 1980s timeline."Abbott Elementary” creator and Emmy winner Quinta Brunson will develop and star as Betty Boop in a feature film adaptation of the nearly century-old animated icon, Variety has learned exclusively. Brunson’s company, Fifth Chance Productions, is bringing the character back to life with Mark Fleischer who is the grandson of original Betty Boop creator Max Fleischer. Notably, the film’s plot will trace the character’s evolution through the perspective of Max and how the name that became an icon emerged.