10 Movie Dreams That Died In 2019
4. Universal's Dream Of Building A Dark Universe
The ultimate poster boy for "how not to handle a cinematic universe" is definitely Universal's Dark Universe, a proposed series of interconnected movies revolving around the studio's roster of classic monsters.
We all remember that famous picture of Tom Cruise, Sofia Boutella, Russell Crowe, Javier Bardem and Johnny Depp lounging about in a room together, with each actor intended to play a major role in the franchise. It was a sign that Universal had the utmost confidence in what it was doing, but announcing plans for a cinematic universe before the first movie had even come out only resulted in the studio looking like complete morons when the whole thing fell apart.
Tom Cruise's The Mummy was intended to kick-start the Dark Universe, but it underperformed financially and was ravaged by critics. From here, talks about future movies in the series started to peter out, and the whole enterprise became more of a "maybe" than the "let's push ahead!" attitude that Universal had started with.
And then, inevitably, the Dark Universe finally died in 2019. Reports that Leigh Whannell had been hired to work on a standalone Invisible Man movie also contained the news that Universal had decided against the whole cinematic universe idea, and would pursue distinctive solo movies for their famous horror characters instead.
The writing had been on the wall for the Dark Universe for several months before this, but this was the first true confirmation we got of its demise.