Posted in: Movies, Warner Bros | Tagged: Luca Guadagnino, Sgt. Rock

Luca Guadagnino's Sgt. Rock Isn't In Development Anymore

Director Luca Guadagnino's adaptation of Sgt. Rock is no longer in active development, but it sounds like the project isn't dead in the water.

Talk about burning bright and fast. The Sgt. Rock movie seemed like it came out of nowhere last year, and people were eyeing it simply because of the creative team. We even had a major casting rumor, but that ended up not panning out. At the beginning of the year, we got an update that the film was still in the works and they were trying to get casting off the ground. It seems they might have even gotten the ink dry on a few contracts too, but now the film has been shelved, according to The Hollywood Reporter, the Sgt. Rock movie is no longer in active development, once again sending this possible adaptation back into development hell.

It sounds like Sgt. Rock is not dead in the water, however, since THR's sources said, "that the project was not going away, and would be reassessed at the end of the year for a possible summer shoot in 2026. Another source raised the possibility that Guadagnino remained untested in the realm of action movies, and even though the budget was in the $70 million range, a paltry sum for comic book movies, higher ups may have wavered in their confidence."

The Sgt. Rock movie reportedly already had some big names attached. We heard reports that Colin Farrell was set to star, and it sounds like that was true. There are also reports that Mike Faist was a possibility for the cast, and the "role of a female French Resistance fighter" was also cast, but no names were cited. So maybe we'll hear some more about this one once we see how the Summer of Superman pans out.

Sgt. Rock: A WW2 Comic Book Hero With A Long Stint In Development Hell

Sgt. Rock, or Franklin John Rock, was first introduced in Our Army at War #83 in June 1983 from DC Comics. He was created by writer Robert Kanigher and artist Joe Kubert. He has been popping around the DC Universe as a member of various teams, including the United States Army, Suicide Squad, and the Creature Commandos. People have been trying to make a Sgt. Rock movie for as long as some of you who are reading this article have been alive (the late 1980s/early 1990s). Arnold Schwarzenegger was set to star at one point because, of course, he was, and the film went through multiple different screenplays over the years. Eventually, Schwarzenegger was dropped, but there was some movement on the project in the early 2000s with rumors saying Bruce Willis might star and Guy Ritchie would direct, but nothing ever really came from it. The project continued to shift directions, including what time period it could potentially take place in, heading into the 2010s before the project faded into the depths of development hell.

Sgt. Rock is now in the new DC Universe, and that seemed to be the thing that brought all this back to the forefront. He appeared in a flashback in Creature Commandos, voiced by Maury Sterling, and we all know that the DC Universe is supposed to be pretty interconnected these days. Last September, we got word that Luca Guadagnino, of all people, was going to direct a Sgt. Rock movie with Justin Kuritzkes set to write the script. Guadagnino and Kuritzkes worked on Challengers and Queer in 2024, the first of which has gathered some critical acclaim and the latter of which was painfully overlooked by all of you. In November, it was reported that Daniel Craig was in talks to star, thus reuniting the team from Queer, but it sounds like the ink was never officially dry on any contracts. The last update we got was back in March.

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