Johnny Depp Is A Very Busy Man

 

It's funny.  I remember back in the mid 90's or so when Johnny Deep was seen as an actor who avoided big budget films.  He was known for serious roles and art house films like Dead Man, What's Eating Gilbert Grape or Benny & Joon.  I always liked the guy back then too, he played Edward Scissorhands and Ed Wood afterall.  And that was cool enough in my book.

 

Then, over time, his films started to get a bit bigger and bigger.  Sleepy Hollow, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, etc.  But even still those could be seen as roles he did because he loved the director or the role itself.

 

Then came a little film called Pirates of the Caribbean.  That thing exploded into something massively huge.  Follow that up with two even bigger sequels, and suddenly Johnny Depp is one of the biggest leading men in Hollywood.  And it doesn't look like he's going back to small arthouse films anytime soon.

 

Disney has announced a number of projects that will be starring Mr. Depp going forward, and they're all big films.  First up is a rather strange choice, Johnny is going to be saddling up to play Tonto, the sidekick to the Lone Ranger.

 

Johnny Depp has been cast in the upcoming Jerry Bruckheimer produced adaptation of the classic old-time radio and early television show The Lone Ranger created by George W. Trendle. The series followed a masked Texas Ranger in the Old West who rights injustices with the aid of his native American assistant, Tonto. He gallops along on his white horse Silver. The character’s signature quote is “Hi-yo, Silver, away!” Depp will play Tonto. Pirates of the Caribbean writers Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio have been writing the script. No start or release dates have been announced.

 

 Nevermind the fact that Johnny Depp IS NOT a Native American.  Nor is he usually playing a sidekick role.  That's definitely odd casting if you ask me.  There was no word in the article as to who will be playing the Ranger himself.  After that, Mr. Depp will be working yet again (for like the billionth time) with director Tim Burton to play the Mad Hatter in what will probably be Burton's total raping of the Alice In Wonderland story.

 

Depp must have signed a multi-picture deal with the studio, because it was also announced that the actor would play The Madd Hatter in Tim Burton’s 3D part live-action, part computer animated adaptation of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Principal photography is set to begin in November, with a March 5th 2010 release date previously announced. Concept art from the film was shown, showing the classic Alice in Wonderland scenes done in Tim Burton style, complete with curved and slanted corners. Everything is really stylized. Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dumb have huge heads, and are shaped like upward missiles. None of the characters look like a dramatic departure from the traditional designs.

 

The sentence in there that really scares me is that the concept art shown shows, "the classic Alice in Wonderland scenes done in Tim Burton Style".  Let me translate that for you.  Everything is going to look like the Nightmare Before Christmas and wonderland is going to be all fake looking and it's not going to be anywhere near the awesomeness of the original Disney animated movie.  Do I have to remid you what the "Tim Burton style" did to poor old Willy Wonka?  Yeah, I thought not.

 

Lastly, the one piece of news that actually made my bitter and jaded geek heart happy is that last little announcement.  Depp will be starring in a tiny little low-budget film called...Pirates of the Caribbean 4!!!

 

At the conclusion of the presentation, Walt Disney Studios Chairman Richard W. “Dick” Cook announced “How about another pirates movie!?” signaling that Depp was now signed for Pirates of the Caribbean 4.

 

Admittedly, the last Pirates movie was on crack, but I can't help but love big-budget pirate movies.  I don't care who's in them, or what the story is about.  I just love to see big ass pirate ships firing off cannons at each other and swordfights with guys who are also firing off muskets at the same time.  I will always geek out over such things.  So I'm stoked that we'll get to see more of Captain Jack Sparrow and the man who (in my opinion) is the cooler pirate...Captain Barbossa.

 

Also, hopefully, now that they've closed out the annoying Orlando Bloom/Kiera Knightly storyline those characters won't be returning at all and the story can focus solely on the Pirates.  Because, let's be honest, that's all the audience really cares about anyways, am I right?