8 Upcoming Comic Book Movies You Should Be Concerned About
2. Gambit
The Gambit movie is currently the poster-child for 'development hell'.
The film appears to only have been put into motion because of producer Lauren Shuler Donner's desire to see Channing Tatum tackle the role. Gambit was never motivated by a cool idea, it was motivated by the fact that it had a big star attached. And that's a mistake.
Consequently, the project just can't hold a director. Rupert Wyatt and Doug Liman have both jumped ship, and with a movie that has basically zero story-driven substance behind it, who can blame them? Like Shazam, Gambit has been built around its leading man from day one - it's Tatum's favourite superhero - and it's no surprise that both directors struggled to work within the confines of a vanity project.
Gambit was initially supposed to come out in 2016, but it just ended up fading from the movie news spectrum and we don't really know anything about it. It's not been formally cancelled however, and when it does see the light of day, it's banking on a character that nobody cared about last time he was on-screen and a star whose genre films - Jupiter Ascending, The Eagle, G.I. Joe - never turn out great.