Filmmaker James Mangold has tackled many genres over the years. From biopics such as Ford v Ferrari and A Different Man, to action blockbusters like Logan and Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, the man has range.
As well as a Star Wars movie exploring the origin of the Jedi set 25,000 years in the past, DC Studios has tapped Mangold to helm Swamp Thing. The character starred in a short-lived TV series, but this would mark a big screen return for a character—following the 1982 effort—who fits well into the latter part of James Gunn's "Gods and Monsters" slate.
Like Waller and The Authority, Swamp Thing seems to be going nowhere fast. It was recently revealed that the filmmaker has signed an overall deal with Paramount Pictures to develop, direct, and produce feature film projects. While he supposedly remains attached to his non-Paramount projects, it's hard to imagine them being a priority after signing such a lucrative new deal.
Rolling Stone recently spoke with DC Studios co-CEO James Gunn and asked if Mangold's partnership with Paramount means Swamp Thing is "dead."
"No, no, it doesn’t. No," the Superman helmer said before being asked if he's still hopeful the movie will become a reality. "Yeah, I mean, yeah, totally. Absolutely. Yeah. We’ve talked to him. He’s still invested. So we’ll see. Some things take a long time. We’ll see what happens."
Swamp Thing may not be dead, but it doesn't look likely to happen anytime soon.
In January, Mangold shared some insights into his plans for the character. "With Bob [Dylan] you have known quantities, yes, but there are ways to interpret them," he explained. "With other kinds of IP, it gets to a religious level. Swamp Thing at DC, it's just a matter of - do we find a way on the page to say something original?"
"While I'm sure DC views Swamp Thing as a franchise, I would be viewing it as a very simple, clean, Gothic horror movie about this man/monster," Mangold continued. "Just doing my own thing with this, just a standalone."
"I've been afforded the chance [to work] in different genres, because people will finance it. If I was just a horror director and people only wanted to pay for my horror movies, that would be a different problem," the director later acknowledged. "But part of the joy is that you learn a lot when you are changing genres or the vernacular in some of the way you communicate in your art."
"I've learned a lot, whether it's making an action film, or whether it's making a Western and bringing those energies to a kind of superhero film or Marvel film. You not only learn things making one genre, but then you learn how to carry over lessons from that genre into another one that you might not expect."
Gunn does have a plan for the DCU, but it seems that's primarily going to play out in the projects he's closely involved with (such as the upcoming Man of Tomorrow). That leaves room for standalone stories, Clayface and Swamp Thing, for example, to flesh out this world in different ways.
Swamp Thing will investigate the dark origins of its title character. A release date hasn't been announced by DC Studios, and it's unclear whether Mangold plans to start work on this or Star Wars: Dawn of the Jedi first.