Director Adam Wingard has provided a hopeful update on the live-action ThunderCats movie, stating that the project is "still kicking around" and that a new draft of the screenplay was completed at the beginning of this year. Wingard, known for "Godzilla vs. Kong" and "The Guest," has been attached to the adaptation of the '80s cartoon classic for several years, though other projects have taken precedence.
"My career's kind of bouncing around, so different things have taken precedence," Wingard told Polygon. "But [ThunderCats is] still kicking around. I think it's just a matter of finding time to really re-concentrate and re-engage with it. We did a new draft at the beginning of this year. It wasn't too long ago, and then things got put on hold for this movie [Onslaught]. So I don't really have any exciting updates. But it's not dead. It lives. It's just not the number one [thing] I'm working on right now."
Wingard and Warner Bros. initially announced plans for the ThunderCats film in 2021, with Wingard describing it as a "dream project" that he had conceptualized in high school, even writing a 272-page screenplay. He envisioned a "new type of fantasy sci-fi spectacle film" that would retain the '80s aesthetic of the original cartoon, aiming for a hybrid CGI approach that would bridge the gap between traditional animation and modern CGI, rather than a typical live-action interpretation.
Recent developments suggest momentum for the project. Wingard recently departed his planned sequel to John Woo's "Face/Off," potentially freeing up his schedule. This news comes as Warner Bros. Pictures Animation also announced its own separate ThunderCats animated movie development at the Annecy International Animation Film Festival in June. The existence of a competing animated project is unlikely to halt Wingard's live-action/CGI hybrid vision, especially following the mixed reception of other '80s cartoon adaptations like Amazon MGM Studios' "Masters of the Universe."