Jungle Book: Origins

If there’s one thing I can’t stand it’s when children’s movies are appropriate for a child audience. Bright colors? Happy messages? Reaffirming the innocence of youth? Pshaw! Children’s movies should be grim and gritty and adult!

Not to be confused with Jon Favreau’s The Jungle Book, which hits theaters next week, Andy Serkis’ Jungle Book: Origins — aka That Other Jungle Book Movie — is still very much in development at Warner Bros. On the heels of today’s news that the studio is scaling back the number of blockbusters they put out each year, Serkis’ film has been pushed back from 2017 to 2018.

Just yesterday we learned that Benedict Cumberbatch of 'The Hobbit' and 'Star Trek Into Darkness' fame was the first to sign on to 'Jungle Book: Origins,' the directorial debut of the great motion-capture artist Andy Serkis. While Disney's competing 'Jungle Book' movie already solidified the majority of its cast, Warner Bros. was quietly doing the same, and now we have the names of seven other stars joining Cumberbatch and Serkis.

Yes, we live in a world where there are dueling 'Jungle Book' adaptations and, no, neither project appears to be backing down. For whatever reason, two separate movie studios have decided that Rudyard Kipling's iconic stories about Mowgli and his animal allies and adversaries deserve a reboot, and the latest shot fired in this showdown is the casting of Benedict Cumberbatch as the voice of the villainous tiger Shere Khan in 'Jungle Book: Origins.'

While Disney has set their live action version of 'The Jungle Book' to hit theaters in 2015, Warner Bros. has just announced an official title and release date for their own 'Jungle Book' project: Officially titled 'Jungle Book: Origins,' the new live action movie from motion capture master Andy Serkis will hit theaters just a little over a year later.