By Alec Meer on February 6th, 2013 at 5:30 pm.
Lackluster Hitman: Ablutions sales and wider money woes at publisher Square Enix don’t seem to have deterred their interest in doing something more with old Baldy McMurderpants. Or maybe money woes is exactly why they’re happy to let a sequel to/reboot of the rather wretched 2007 Hitman movie go ahead.
Bland-faced Fast & Furious man Paul Walker will allegedly be the star, and commercials director Aleksander Bach will take the helm, reports Deadline of the Fox picture. The script is written by Skip Woods, the same dude who wrote the last mess, along with the reliably addled likes of X-Men Origins: Wolverine, G.I. Joe: Rise of Cobra and The A-Team. Apparently Woods is also working on the Kane & Lynch movie. He sounds like a budget Damon Lindelof.
Doesn’t sound promising to me, but maybe I’m just too cynical about the long history of entirely shitty videogame movies handled by people who don’t know or care about the subject matter and made purely for quick money by studios who bought the license ages ago and don’t really know what to do with it now.
Also, original Hitman star Timothy Olyphant, so good at ill-contained rage in Deadwood, deserves to be so much bigger than he is. I fear his role in the Hitman movie did him far more harm than good.
06/02/2013 at 17:34 Ice-Fyre says:
I wish Square would put more of their console games out on pc, I’d love to play FF etc on my pc
06/02/2013 at 17:49 RobinOttens says:
Likewise.
As for this hitman movie, “Meh” says I.
07/02/2013 at 05:04 sbs says:
I kind of wish every game was on every system so everybody could play everything.
I hope I will live to see the day
06/02/2013 at 17:37 tobecooper says:
Bah, they should just hire Jason Statham. Baldy McMurderpants is his middle name.
06/02/2013 at 17:50 Jonesy says:
While casting Stathom would probably make the movie a monetary success, it surely would make for a better movie. Bad director working off a bad script make for a bad movie. My only hope is that it can sink Walker’s carreer boat to the hellish pits of . . . um, the movie oceans.
06/02/2013 at 18:00 Tommando says:
Seanema., if you will.
06/02/2013 at 21:44 Xardas Kane says:
Actually it wouldn’t. He’s been making one box office disappointment after the other as of recent (The Mechanic, Safe, Parker). And he would be an absolutely dreadful choice for the role as well.
06/02/2013 at 17:56 BockoPower says:
Totally agree with this. And I should add they better remove the pitiful love story. I swore never to watch the movie when I read Agent 47 falls in love. Absolutely ridiculous thing and totally ruins everything about the Hitman series.
06/02/2013 at 18:05 tobecooper says:
If I remember correctly, they actually kept him asexual, which was a surprise to me too. But there are other sins against the canon that they committed. Still, the film wasn’t that bad. I expected a lot worse.
06/02/2013 at 19:39 iucounu says:
Oh, it was pretty awful though. The script made exactly zero sense – it was like three entirely unrelated thrillers had a horrific car crash. You could practically see, before your very eyes, the film passed around from editor to editor in a desperate attempt to save it.
06/02/2013 at 18:36 rapchee says:
he knocks the girl out when she gets too hot for him, for chrissakes. i think it was okay movie with a plot related to the games – we’ve seen worse
06/02/2013 at 20:11 Ross Angus says:
This. Yes, the film isn’t great, but the last shot is him watching her go, through a sniper scope. As a metaphor for both character’s inability to form relationships, I’ve seen worse. Or am I overthinking this?
06/02/2013 at 22:46 Insurgence says:
Statham is not stoned enough to properly play Hitman unless they completely rewrite the character. And Paul Walker is enough to make me ignore the movie in it’s entirety.
06/02/2013 at 17:37 Lord Custard Smingleigh says:
Hitman: Absolution is an anagram of “Soon: A mint halibut”.
Sorry, I don’t actually have anything more to add than that.
06/02/2013 at 17:51 Low Life says:
I spent several minutes trying to come up with an anagram of Lord Custard Smingleigh before I remembered that anagram creation is not a skill I possess.
06/02/2013 at 17:58 Fanbuoy says:
Lord Mustard Scingleigh?
06/02/2013 at 18:02 Lord Custard Smingleigh says:
I’m rather partial to “Smug cad thrilled groins“.
06/02/2013 at 18:17 Simon Hawthorne says:
Yes, yes, but enough of that – we’re trying to think of anagrams of your name here!
06/02/2013 at 18:03 darkChozo says:
A Chilled God’s String Rum?
I may have cheated to get that. Maybe.
06/02/2013 at 19:40 Dr I am a Doctor says:
A Godchild Gremlin Rusts
06/02/2013 at 19:22 iucounu says:
“Hunt a moist albino”
“A thumbprint in soot”
“Lo, a moist nun habit”
(Sorry, two moists in there. It’s a very moist game.)
06/02/2013 at 22:28 Sleepymatt says:
I guess it’s because of all the wetwork.
06/02/2013 at 17:38 Andy_Panthro says:
I imagine the film will be as good as that example of photoshop.
07/02/2013 at 06:39 Caiman says:
That Photoshop was a missed opportunity to cut and paste his gigantic right elbow onto his forehead, it would have looked far more realistic.
06/02/2013 at 17:40 Thirith says:
Olyphant seems to be doing pretty darn well in Justified, and it’s a rare TV actor who gets a break in the movies. For the moment at least, he’s probably better off doing interesting, worthwhile television work, Alec.
06/02/2013 at 18:28 mondomau says:
Can I get an Amen?
Amen!
Justified is head and shoulders above everything else on telly at the moment IMO.
06/02/2013 at 19:47 derbefrier says:
I almost agree. Obviously your forgot about Breaking Bad.
07/02/2013 at 05:06 sbs says:
and Boardwalk Empire
06/02/2013 at 18:58 geoffreyk says:
Had to make sure this was covered by a commentor. Justified is brilliant, and Timothy Olyphant is brilliant in it.
06/02/2013 at 19:02 WHS says:
Dear UK Olyphant fans:
Watch Justified. That is all.
07/02/2013 at 02:09 Jackablade says:
Olyphant is on record (on the Nerdist Podcast, citation fans, though quite probably elsewhere too) as saying that the only reason he did the Hitman movie was because Deadwood was very suddenly cancelled right after he’d bought a house.
06/02/2013 at 17:40 Inverselaw says:
Frankly I hope they do something interesting with the movie. The first ones statement that it was connected to the game was a bald-face lie.
06/02/2013 at 17:46 Yargh says:
oh crap, same script writer. That does not bode well at all.
06/02/2013 at 18:27 mondomau says:
What was wrong with the first movie? Stupid, boring and had unconvincing characters – let’s get a totally different lead but keep the writer!
Pah, Olyphant was too good for this dross anyway – Walker and his weak-watered version of Keanu Reeves can ride this train all the way to DVD release hell.
06/02/2013 at 18:02 The_B says:
Anyone else think they cast the wrong Walker? :(
06/02/2013 at 18:37 The Magic says:
John Walker? I mean he’ll certainly be familiar with the material, but I personally don’t think he can pull it off.
06/02/2013 at 18:47 USER47 says:
I think Hitman movie needs Walker: Texas Ranger.
06/02/2013 at 20:12 Ross Angus says:
John doesn’t do unemotional. Quite the opposite.
06/02/2013 at 21:29 The_B says:
But Horace The Endless Bear would be a great garotte! :(
06/02/2013 at 18:57 Radiant says:
Polly?
06/02/2013 at 22:58 Stellar Duck says:
I’d watch that.
06/02/2013 at 19:16 sinister agent says:
Jesus, they’re casting another bright-eyed preppy prettyboy? What the fuck is wrong with them? No offence to the actor, but there are roles that you suit and roles that you don’t.
And the same writer… oh dear. Although I suppose he might have had time to finish puberty by now.
06/02/2013 at 21:46 Muzman says:
Why do they keep trying to put the young(ish) and pretty in these parts (see also, Max Payne. Forgot they made a movie out of that didn’t you!)
What have they got against the grizzled?
06/02/2013 at 22:00 int says:
They could make a great Max Payne movie if they got Sam Lake to write and James McCaffrey to star.
07/02/2013 at 02:18 Jackablade says:
I still think Tom Waits would have made a good Max Payne.
07/02/2013 at 05:35 orange says:
I think Ted Danson (from old TV show Becker) would make a great Max Payne, but he’s probably too old now. He looks almost identical at times.
06/02/2013 at 23:00 pocketlint60 says:
The 6th Hitman game should be called Hitman: Baldy McMurderpants.
06/02/2013 at 23:03 Mr-Link says:
Lukeluster sales?
Exactly how many copies were Square Enix thinking a game like Hitman absolution was going to sell in 3 months? Even Blood money was an incredible slow burner in sales and after all these years it still didnt sell all that much (if the charts that I have seen are to be believed).
Guess they shouldnt have invested so much money in making sure that the baldness shines through, eh?
07/02/2013 at 11:45 OutrightErrant says:
fgsfds.
DAVID BATESON. HE IS LITERALLY AGENT 47.
Make it a thriller. Day of the Jackal with a bald killer clone.