Image Credit: Jason Kempin/Getty ImagesNearly a decade after Tim Burton brought the sci-fi classic to the big screen (the stomach-churning twist at the end was the realization that you actually spent money to see it), the latest entry in the Planet of the Apes saga actually seems to be shaping up pretty well. Andy Serkis, whose simian credits include playing Peter Jackson’s King Kong, has joined the prequel project, titled Rise of the Apes. He’ll play the chimp who leads the titular uprising, and I for one couldn’t be happier that he’s got his paws on this damn, dirty role.
Hopefully his motion-capture emoting will help make sure this entry in the series isn’t as bad as the last one, but no production news for this film will truly appease until they announce that they’re doing it as a musical. I’ve been waiting for years to see the bigscreen adaptation of Stop the Planet of the Apes, I Want to Get Off! What say you, PopWatchers? Excited to see the man who brought Gollum to life (along with 843,003 animators) in Rise of the Apes? Tell us what you think below, or take this opportunity to correct me on the fact that a chimpanzee isn’t actually a monkey. It’s up to you!
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‘Planet of the Apes’ prequel? I’d rather see Troy McClure’s ‘Planet of the Apes’ musical!
I love you Dr. Zaius!
I hope this unoriginal flick fails, although I like Serkis. I wonder why Hollywood wants to make another “Apes” movie…?
I concur. It feels sometimes that Hollywood execs ran out of ideas years ago and just keep remaking or sequalizing the same movies over and over again.
from chimpanA to chimpanZ!
No you’ll never make a monkey out of me…
Oops, I was wrong it was earth all along. Looks like you made a monkey…out of me
Dr. Zaius, Dr. Zaius, rock me Dr. Zaius. Love it, can’t wait to see it.
I go bananas over Planet of the Apes movies.
I said it before and I’ll say it again, ‘No good ever came from putting the word ‘rise’ in a title.’
“Going to Pieces: The Rise and Fall of the Slasher Film” and “Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon” disprove your point.
Doesn’t disprove anything. I’m not familiar with these films, but if they are good it is despite the crappy titles.
Actually it does disprove your comment that “no good EVER came…” Or maybe we should have consulted with you
Dr. Zaius, Dr. Zaius. Dr. Zaius, Dr. Zaius. Dr. Zaius, Dr. Zaius, Oooh Dr. Zaius
“I want another opinion.”
“YOU’RE ALSO LAZY.”
“Can I play the piano anymore?”
“Of course you can.”
“Well I couldn’t before.”
That line has always bothered me. Why would he say “anymore” if he couldn’t before?
What’s that from?
Any time Tim Burton does a movie remake he ruins it… Take Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. It was horrible. Tim should stick to original films not remakes or sequils to other older films.
Andy is a great addition to any cast and sure he will rule.
To be fair, Tim Burton’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory was NOT a remake. It was an adaptation of a wonderful, very popular children’s book by Roald Dahl. Also, the film with Gene Wilder strayed pretty liberally from the source material, even going as far as changing the title to Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. I, for one, as a fan of both the book and the older film, LOVED Burton’s take, and Johnny Depp’s performance as Willy Wonka was marvelous, and a complete embodiment of Dahl’s Wonka.
Tim Burton’s charlie was a much better version of the story ttold in the book. It was the differences that made me dislike the older version so much.
As said abovwe Charlie isn’t a remaake.
You’ll also find that the Apes moie is a weird Hybrid of a remake of the film AND a new adaption of the original Book. Even so far as to making the film’s Ultimate ending the same as the first ending in the book.
Oh and I thought that everyone knew that Fox ruined Burton’s Apes by cutting the budget and forcing the film to stick to a release date that meant the film was vrtually being written as it was being shot. Many of the good ideas and the plans for the movie got pushed asside as the studio picked release date became more important than the quality of the film. Burton said it was his worst experience of all time and he’ll never get suckered into anything like that again.
But without the changes, we wouldn’t have the absolutely classic scene in Wonka’s office. And truer to the text is not the same as truer to the book — Depp’s take on the character is awful.
I’m with the previous posters, Burton is much better with original work (Pee Wee, Beetlejuice, Nightmare, Ed Wood) than with derivative works (Alice, Sleepy Hollow, Apes, Wonka). The exceptions being Big Fish and Batman.
The Tim Burton version was a HUGE disappointment. Last quality film he did was Big Fish.
This one looks like it has all the ingredients, and adding Andy Serkis only further whets my appetite. Hopefully he’ll be able to appear as himself, not as a CGI Gollum or King Kong, even though he should have been nominated for his work as Gollum.
Love the reference to the Troy McClure’s broadway shpow on The Simpsons. One of the funniest lines in show history: “I hate you all, from chimpan-a to chimpanzee.”
Phil Hartman is missed.
as long as marky mark’s not in it, it stands a chance LOL
To the makers of this film…STOP messin’ with the apes! DAMN YOU! DAMN YOU ALL TO HELL!
Actually it’s “I hate every ape I see, from chimpan-a to chimpanzee…”
Takes me back when every Simpsons episode was brilliant not like today,or though it hasn’t sunk as low as new Family Guy.
I couldn’t agree with you more. Funny, neither could my kids. They catch new episodes when they remember, but watch the first 10 seasons ALL THE TIME. My daughter told me once that “different people must be making it now, since it’s not as good as it was in the old days”. Which, of course, both pleased me and made me feel, at the ripe old age of 25, very, very old. One of the consequences of having kids at a young age, I guess.
Keith, I want to have your babies now. THANK YOU for mentioning that chimpanzees aren’t monkeys! I know nobody else cares, but as a biological anthropologist (and that field includes primatology) it’s a huuuuge scientific pet peeve of mine to hear people improperly classifying chimps, particularly because in English, “monkey” describes what you might call a less intelligent type of primate (though still smarter than the vast majority of other animals). Chimps, like humans, gorillas, orangutans, bonobos, gibbons, and siamangs, are APES. Apes apes apes. Oh my god I’m just so excited that you actually pointed this out.
I know it’s really sad, but that has kind of made my evening. Aaaand I’ll just stop babbling now before I embarrass myself further.
You must hate Curious George.
Homer Simpson; “Ooh, I love legitimate theater.:
Spoilers alert, if you want to read the original book at some point:
So, what a lot of people don’t realize is that it was a book first, and in the original book, it’s not “Earth all along”. The writer sets up a universe where different worlds have humans on them and apes taking over is just what happens when the humanity of a planet starts to get lazy and tries to get the apes to do all the dirty work. Eventually the apes rise up, take over, and make humans feral creatures. The reason we get the astronauts as “fish out of water” is because they’re travelling at the speed of light, so time on the planets pass more quickly than time on the ship. It’s actually a very clever novel, and uses some real science (general relativity, etc.) to explain what’s happening and why time is moving as it is.
Where Burton’s movie failed is in trying to incorporate the twist ending of the book (the astronaut comes back, with a wife and kid, to find that apes have taken over Earth now, just as in the planet they just escaped from!) without ever explaining how time works when you travel at the speed of light. Even if you’re aware of the original premise and science of it all, it still makes no sense to put in a “Ape Lincoln” in the Lincoln Memorial!
Hopefully this movie will be smart or at least just a dumb action popcorn flick. Trying to make a clever twist is something that is very easy to do very wrong (as Burton demonstrated).
A lot of sense in there but Burton’s movie did explain the time travel elements. You see it in the fact that Whalberg’s astronaut arrives on the planet of the apes well before the chimp he was following. If people didn’t notice that then we also had the fact that the “mothership” arrived centuries before Whalberg’s character. It was all there for people to see without professor exposition turning up and explaining everything like The Prof had to in Back To The Future pt II.
they did it they really did it the damn fools!
god, is everyone on here an argumentative nitpicking douchebag or what?
You literally made me laugh so hard! I was thinking the exact same thing. I never understood why people are SO negative. I could see if they came to our homes, stole are food and killed the dog, but folks this is entertainment! Love more & hate less!
Because it’s an anonymous forum and they can be “big men” unlike in real life where they’d never actaully even open their mouth to disagree with someone.