Harbinger Movie Heads to Paramount, Squashing Sony’s Valiant

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Harbinger Movie Heads to Paramount, Squashing Sony’s Valiant Universe

BY MAX EVRY ON SEPTEMBER 12, 2019

Harbinger movie heads to Paramount, squashing Sony’s Valiant Universe
According to The Hollywood Reporter, the cinematic adaptation of Valiant Entertainment property Harbinger is setting up camp at Paramount Pictures, vacating Sony Pictures where a crossover with their upcoming Bloodshot was in the works.

TV director Justin Tipping (Dear White People, The Chi) moves to Paramount with the project, as does the script he co-wrote with Joshua Beirne-Golden from an original draft by Academy Award-nominated writer Eric Heisserer (Arrival). Bloodshot producer Neal Moritz, whose first-look deal moved from Sony to Paramount in 2018, will remain on to produce Harbinger with Toby Jaffe and Valiant Comics’ Dan Mintz. Actors Dylan O’Brien and Noah Centineo were at one time circling the project, but now that it is no longer on the fast track they are not attached. Paramount will put Harbinger back in development with the currently-attached behind-the-scenes team.

However you shake it, this move is not exactly a vote of confidence in Sony’s Bloodshot, which is currently in post-production with Blur Studios’ Dave Wilson making his feature debut from a script by Heisserer and Jeff Wadlow. Vin Diesel is playing the title role of Ray Garrison/Bloodshot, and when the film opens on February 21, 2020 it was hoped to launch a crossover franchise that would ultimately lead to a Harbinger War film featuring the title team and Bloodshot. Those plans now appear to be scrapped, according to the trade. However, Valiant still retains the rights to popular original characters like X-O Manowar, Eternal Warrior and Archer & Armstrong, which could now form a Valiant Cinematic Universe at Paramount.

Plans for the Bloodshot/Harbinger team-up at Sony were originally announced in 2015, with Bloodshot at that time to be directed by John Wick duo David Leitch and Chad Stahelski. The plan was to produce two films for each series then have them both collide in a fifth film, Harbinger War, based on the 2013 crossover comic.

Created by Kevin Van Hook, Don Perlin and Bob Layton, Bloodshot tells the story of a former soldier killed and brought back to life with technological upgrades. This allows him to be the perfect soldier by healing from injuries, shapeshift, and even interact with technology. Harbinger on the other hand was created by Jim Shooter and David Lapham and centers on a group of teenagers with varying superpowers and the Harbinger Foundation that hunts them down, hoping to use them for world control.

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www.hollywoodreporter.com/heat-vision/paramount-picks-up-comic-book-movie-harbinger-sony-1238972

Paramount Picks Up Comic Book Movie 'Harbinger' From Sony (Exclusive)
SEPTEMBER 11, 2019 3:01PM by Borys Kit

The project moves with its current creative team, including director Justin Tipping and producer Neal Moritz, intact.
Harbinger, the adaptation of a superhero comic published by Valiant Entertainment, has been scooped up by Paramount from its initial home, Sony Entertainment.

Making the crosstown segue are also filmmaker Justin Tipping and the script by Tipping and Joshua Beirne-Golden working off an original draft by Eric Heisserer (Arrival). Also remaining involved is producer Neal Moritz, who was key in the transfer and who moved his first-look deal from Sony to Paramount in 2018. Moritz will produce with Toby Jaffe and Valiant Comics' Dan Mintz.

Harbinger tells the story of a group of superpowered teens who rebel against the corporation that tried to harness their abilities for its own ends.

The project was to have shot this summer or fall, and had actors Dylan O’Brien and Noah Centineo circling, but is no longer on the fast-track, say sources. The plan is to have Harbinger undergo a short development process at Paramount before moving forward with the same creative team.

The move has several potential repercussions.

First, Valiant is a notable publisher of comics not gobbled up by a media corporation but now owned by DMG Entertainment, which fully acquired the comic publisher in January 2018 after having an initial stake. It stands apart from other indie companies such as Image or Boom! in that it maintains and continually expands a cohesive narrative across its titles, like Marvel and DC.

With designs of building its own cinematic universe — a VCU, if one will — the company was already hitching its wagon to Sony, where it set up several of its titles, including Bloodshot. The latter is Valiant’s first produced movie and stars Vin Diesel. Sony is hoping it launches a franchise when it opens Feb. 21, 2020.

Harbinger was to have been the second title to go, also a potential franchise-starter, and Marvel Studios-like, was to have connected with Bloodshot for a cinematic universe, and even led to a crossover event titled Harbinger Wars after the 2013 comic book series of the same name.

That crossover is now unlikely to happen, nor is a VCU with those characters. With the Paramount deal, Valiant now finds itself in the situation similar to 1990s Marvel, with licensed characters at more than one studio. And it could, down the line, even find itself in a similar scenario of a Spider-Man-style divorce battle.

Project insiders say, however, that Bloodshot is less integral to the VCU than, say, Spider-Man, with the company focused on keeping together its core characters such as X-O Manowar, Eternal Warrior and Archer & Armstrong, whose rights it retains.

Sources say the initial deals with Sony were made by a set of entrepreneurs who took over Valiant in 2012, relaunching the publisher for the 21st century. Mintz, the CEO of DMG who now runs Valiant, hopes to keep most of characters together as he builds a cinematic universe. Mintz is trying to position the company as a content engine ready to find a proper partner in the current shakeup of media companies, which are looking to join the streaming wars and find their place in the new Hollywood landscape where those with known and popular intellectual property have an upper hand.

The move also robs Sony of a potential movie franchise as it seeks to build its armory with content. With the terms of the deal undisclosed, it’s unclear what kinds of loss, if any, Sony could feel. The company has made building its Spider-Man brand its top priority and is working on furthering Ghostbusters and Jumanji, among other franchises. It clearly figures it can weather letting Harbinger go.

Paramount — which, like Sony, is also furiously building out its franchises — is about to start shooting Snake Eyes, an action-thriller it hopes will resuscitate the G.I. Joe property.