You can blame Marvel Studios for Hollywood’s current fascination with shared universes, with Warner Brothers and DC Comics on its way to building it’s own, and the likes of Hasbro Godzilla/Kong, and Hanna-Barbera waiting in the wings. Now, The Hollywood Reporter brings word that a Robert Ludlum shared universe is on the cards at Universal, Ludlum of course being the late author of the Jason Bourne series of novels. What’s more, Dwayne Johnson will be helping to make it happen with the long in development The Janson Directive, the tale of a government operative forced to go rogue after a mission gone wrong, receiving a script polish from The Amazing Spider-Man’s James Vanderbilt to make it shared universe ready.
With Johnson responsible for re-energising so many franchises, it’s a no-brainer to have him start his own, and there’s plenty of milage for the character with there more Janson novels out there, written after Ludlum’s death. The man himself is even pumped about the idea, taking to Twitter to let us know as much.
The real question is how Jason Bourne will figure in these shared universe plans. Will the previous Bourne movies be retroactively manoeuvred to take place in this new universe, or are we talking an eventual meeting between Janson and Bourne that’s been teased over several movies? It’ll be interesting to see how this project develops.
With Johnson responsible for re-energising so many franchises, it’s a no-brainer to have him start his own, and there’s plenty of milage for the character with there more Janson novels out there, written after Ludlum’s death. The man himself is even pumped about the idea, taking to Twitter to let us know as much.
Pumped to play this character and help Universal produce and build out this bad ass universe. #TheJansonDirective https://t.co/Pn23Oo578k— Dwayne Johnson (@TheRock) May 19, 2016
The real question is how Jason Bourne will figure in these shared universe plans. Will the previous Bourne movies be retroactively manoeuvred to take place in this new universe, or are we talking an eventual meeting between Janson and Bourne that’s been teased over several movies? It’ll be interesting to see how this project develops.
