Filmonic » Zak Penn

Zak Penn is meeting with the Captain America and Thor people next week

Liam — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 13:40:16 +0000

Iron Man 2 director Jon Faverua has a fair amount of pressure on his shoulders as he has to make a sequel that builds and improves upon the first film. Thor director Kenneth Branagh has a different type of pressure as he has the task of making the Thor world believable, and making it fit in the Iron Man and Hulk worlds that we’ve already seen. However, Zack Penn probably has the most complicated job in the Marvel movie universe, as he has to combine all of the worlds and characters into one film, The Avengers. Penn spoke to Scifi Wire at a recent event in Los Angeles and said that he would be meeting with other creative people to see how he will pull off the greatest crossover in movie history.

Now that Marvel is itself producing movies as a company, Penn said, “It is a world of difference; it is a lot easier to do things like that, and they encourage it.”
Penn said he is meeting this coming week with the team writing the other movies so they can piece together storylines and overlap some of the film plots.
“They’re doing Captain American and Thor first, and then Avengers is coming out,” Penn said. “They want to see that they’re all connected, not like the Fantastic Four can’t come into the X-Men world, like I was told. I’m taking a meeting next week with the Thor and Captain America people, and we are all going to get together, and I will see what is going to happen. I’ll see where they are leaving the characters; it’s pretty complicated. … There’s a board that is tracking what is happening. [We'll see] how this movie overlaps in that movie. … Marvel is autonomous now. It is night and day: Everyone has read every comic. They know how to make a cool movie.”
And although Penn holds the responsibility for bringing all the characters of the other films together, he remains insecure. “It’s hard to make a good movie,” he said. “We all have the best intentions, and it still might suck.”

That last sentence wasn’t very encouraging. I will be cheering Penn on and hope that it doesn’t suck, however his past work isn’t the best. He wrote Elektra, X-Men 3, and his Incredible Hulk script was rewritten by Edward Norton. While some of his past turds may be the result of crappy directors, his scripts were probably a reason for them not being that great. Hopefully with a good director (possibly Jon Favreau) and the Marvel Creative Committee Penn can produce gold.

Thor, Captain America and The Avengers updates

Liam — Tue, 05 May 2009 19:29:39 +0000

With Iron Man 2 currently in production everyone wants to know when all those other movies Marvel have been planning will follow suit. Empire recently spoke to Kevin Feige (President of Production at Marvel Studios) and he gave some updates on Thor and The Avengers.

On Thor:

“We will probably be having cast announcements in the next month or so on Thor,” he told us. “We’re looking to cast Loki and Odin soon, and the main female role. And we’ll also hopefully have lockdown shortly, gearing towards the beginning of production, which will be early next year. So I think there will be a lot of announcements between now and then.”
“But [director Kenneth] Branagh’s here, we’re prepping, and he’s put together some spectacular animatics already for our first action scene. We’re digging into the second and third now, and we are just embarking on a rewrite of the draft.”

On The Avengers:

“Zak Penn is already on board The Avengers [as writer] and he’s spending a lot of his time looking into what we’re doing with Iron Man, Thor and Captain America, seeing how we’re tying it all together. And he’s beginning to outline the script now – he’ll be doing that over the summer.”
“All of the Marvel movies leading up to The Avengers will be based in our new facility in Manhattan Beach, in LA. There will be location work that will take us out occasionally, but our home base will always be here. “

ComingSoon.net also got news that The First Avenger: Captain America will start filming in the summer of 2010 for a July 22, 2011 release. Next year is looking like it will be an interesting and exciting year for both fans and Marvel.

Zak Penn Writing The Argonauts

Liam — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 14:35:15 +0000

X-Men: The Last Stand and The Incredible Hulk writer Zak Penn is writing and will produce The Argonauts for 20th Century Fox, according to Variety.

This is yet another Greek mythology film that joins Louis Leterrier’s Clash of the Titans, War of Gods, Brett Ratner’s God of War, Peter Berg’s Hercules movie and a 300 sequel. All of which are currently in development.

The Argonauts is based on Penn’s original take on the classic Greek tale. In Greek mythology, the Argonauts were a band of heroic sailors who, in the years before the Trojan War, accompanied Jason to Colchis in his quest to find the Golden Fleece. The Argonauts name comes from the sailors’ ship, the Argo.

Last years 300 proved that movies involving men in sandals and wielding swords can be cool again. It can also make money. Could we see a repeat of the comic book movie phase? First came X-Men in 2000 and then came Spider-Man, Batman, Superman, Fantastic Four, Iron Man etc. Some were good, however others are best forgotten. I am thinking the same will happen with this surge in Greek mythology movies, some will be great, however there is chance others will suck. At this moment in time am currently looking forward to seeing all of them (until the trailers are released anyway).

Edward Norton Not Given Writing Credit For The Incredible Hulk?

Liam — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 21:39:36 +0000

According to IESB, Zak Penn has been given the sole writing credit for The Incredible Hulk, despite the fact that Edward Norton re-wrote his draft. It is well known that one of the only reasons Norton agreed to do Hulk were if he had creative input, in this case re-writing the script.

The IESB contacted Zak Penn’s office to ask about the credit. They confirmed Penn will be receiving sole writing credit on the film.
Universal reps are saying, “WGA determined the writing credit not Zak or Edward or Universal or Marvel. WGA always determines final writing credit for our films right before the film comes out. Up until that time, we include the writers on the project to date.”
A call to the WGA got this response, “Zak Penn is receiving sole credit for story and screenplay.”
Apparently, there was arbitration, which is quite common since two screenwriters were listed. The WGA sided with Zak Penn.

In my opinion it wouldn’t be hard just to give them both credit. I’m not a WGA script expert but it would seem the logical and fair thing to do. It’s not as though the script had input from many writers such as Catwoman (14+ writers in total). In cases where there are lots of writers then I suppose this process of choosing is better, but when only two writers have worked on the script it would see, fair to credit both.

If everyone from the catering ladies to the lighting guys get credited than surely one of the writers should get credit somewhere.

Gossip Girl And OC Writer Josh Schwartz Work On X-Men Script?

Liam — Sat, 03 May 2008 00:20:36 +0000

Well this news is a bit random and out of the blue. Black Book Magazine sat down with Josh Schwartz to speak to him about The OC, Gossip Girl and Chuck. Nothing really interesting there. Fairly average interview. That is until we get to this:

Something he can talk about, however, is news that he will pen the screenplay for the next installment of X-Men, a prequel of sorts. “I’m very well aware that I’ll be bludgeoned by purists, but I love its mythology, and it comes with a pretty hefty paycheck.” Of the project, he beams with excitement about the opportunity to involve lesser known X-Men characters who haven’t yet been portrayed on film. It will center on teenage characters at the Xavier Institute for Higher Learning. “It’s not like I’m adding new characters like Toaster Head, or anything like that.” Despite his enthusiam, he’s cautious, given the double-edged sword inherent in the seemingly inexhaustible renaissance of the genre. “The Hulk looks like it’s going to be terrible. And why does he look like he’s fighting against the monster from Cloverfield? I mean, with Transformers, it’s not like fans were going to come back saying, ‘You used the wrong car.’ This, however, is a different story. Of his predecessors and their successes (or failures), he says, “Brett Ratner didn’t have a lot of credibility going in to the third X-Men movie, but I think Bryan Singer [who directed the first two installments] got a free pass on Superman Returns because of his work on X-Men.”

Wow! We have heard X-Men 3 writer Zak Penn talk about writing a young X-Men movie, but that all depends on the outcome of X-Men Origins: Wolverine. It seems FOX have thought that the original cast were getting a bit expensive, as were the production costs. The best thing to do business-wise was to wait a few years, and then relaunch a new trilogy or set of movies featuring younger and less expensive actors. The fact that is has X-Men in the name will ensure that it is a box office favourite, as long as they do things right.

Now Marvel are making their own movies and not selling anymore of their characters, it seems studios like FOX are going to milk the comic book franchises they have already got. The Fantastic Four franchise is pretty much dead, so X-Men is really the only franchise that can benefit FOX.

Is going the OC and Gossip Girl route the right way for the X-Men franchise? Will it turn into a trilogy of teen problems, or do you think Josh Schwartz has something up his sleeve?

Zak Penn Talks Captain America And Young X-Men!

Liam — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 18:42:38 +0000

For the past 5 years Zak Penn has been a writer on X2, Elektra, X-Men 3 and upcoming The Incredible Hulk. After doing all of those comic book movies he decided to do something different, and has written and directed a comedy called The Grand. However, during interviews people only care about his work on comic book movies. During a recent interview, Zak Penn revealed that he was attached to the Captain America movie, and he also talked about a young X-Men movie.

CMix: Do you have anything to do with the other movies? Captain America for example?
ZP: I’m attached to it. I’m also supposed to write and direct one of the X-Men spin-off movies for Fox, but that’s not a Marvel film. It’s not a pure Marvel movie. It’s a Fox thing.
CMix: One of the X-Men spin-off movies? Any one in particular?
ZP: Yeah, it’s like a young X-Men. It’s a pretty cool idea, actually. I can’t sell you the whole idea, but it involves a younger group of X-Men at the beginning.
CMix: You mean, like an X-Men: First Class kind of thing?
ZP: It is a little bit like that. I don’t want to give away the concept of it, but it is a good idea. It is a little bit more of getting back to the classic X-Men. Some of the complaints we’ve talked about, it would address those directly.
CMix: Will it be all Wolverine’s story?
ZP: Right, well that’s the thing. It wouldn’t involve Wolverine.

An X-Men movie without Wolverine? Thank the heavens!

I like Zak Penn but Marvel need to realise that there are other writers out there. His movies are good but not great. X-Men 3 could have been better and Elektra wasn’t all that. I guess we will have to see if The Incredible Hulk is any good.

To read the whole interview click here!