Posted in: Movies, Warner Bros | Tagged: constantine, keanu reeves, movies, Warner Bros

Warner Bros. Greenlights a New Constantine Film Starring Keanu Reeves

Published Fri, 16 Sep 2022 17:11:12 -0500

Well, maybe there is a single functional brain cell over at Warner Bros. Discovery after all. For the last month, Warner Bros. Discovery has been doing a very good job of showing everyone that they have no idea what they are doing. Whether or was pivoting away from streaming when everyone else seems to think it's the way of the future to canceling and writing off mostly completed movies just for a small tax break to laying off large groups of people, to say that things have been a mess would be the understatement of the century. If you're a comic book fan, you're even more worried as it looks like DC movies could be in a lot of trouble. There was just another round of delays, and no one has any idea what will actually make it to the big screen and what won't. There are fantastic television shows over on HBO Max just hanging out and waiting to see if they are worthy of getting another season. It's a mess. Someone decided to give life to the single functional brain cell over at that company, sees that Keanu Reeves is bigger than ever, and offered him enough money to reprise a role. According to Deadline, a new Constantine film is in development. Not only is Reeves set to return, but so is director Francis Lawrence with Akiva Goldsman set to write the screenplay and produce along with Bad Robot's J.J. Abrams and Hannah Minghella.

Warner Bros. Greenlight a New Constantine Film Starring Keanu Reeves — Credit: Warner Bros.

Constantine was released seventeen years ago in 2005 and was part of the second wave of comic book movies becoming mainstream, which helped make the genre as dominant as it is today. While X-Men, Spider-Man, and Blade were the 1-2-3 punch that kicked things off, it was things like Hellboy in 2004, Constantine and Batman Begins in 2005, and X-2 in 2003 that really cemented that foundation. Hellboy and Constantine, doing well, proved that there was an audience beyond superheroes, much in the same way Blade did in 1998. Constantine brought in $230 million worldwide on a budget of $70-$100 million, which is pretty damn solid, and it has garnered an extremely loyal cult following over the years. People have been begging for a sequel for years, and it has been rumored that one has been in the works for a long time. It took until now for someone to finally pull that trigger. It's sort of amazing that it took this long. At the moment, we have no other details about this project, but that the word is out, Warner Bros. will probably fast-track this. They could use an easy win, and this should be an easy win.