Millennium Films is making another push to bring a newRed Sonjamovie to the big screen, nearly a decade after it first started developing the remake. The production company has enlistedAshley Miller(X-Men: First Class) to write the screenplay, although no director is attached at this time. Millennium Films' Avi Lerner is putting this on the fast track to production, after the massive success of Warner Bros.‘Wonder Woman, which over performed at the box office last summer taking in $412.5 million domestic and $821.8 million worldwide. Here’s what Miller had to say in a statement about coming aboard to writeRed Sonja.
“It’s an exciting opportunity to faithfully adapt theamazing Hyborean world Robert E. Howardcreated, and inject it with Sonja’s intelligence, ferocity, and fearless humanity. I want people to love Sonja the way I love her, and walk out of the theater understanding why she’s so popular and enduring. Sonja is an icon.”
The original incarnation ofRed Sonja, called “Red Sonja of Rogatino,” first appeared in the 1934 short story The Shadow of the Vulture byConan the Barbariancreator Robert E. Howard. In 1973, Marvel Comics writer Roy Thomas and Barry Windsorcreated a new versionofRed Sonja, based on the Red Sonja of Rogatino character and another character Robert E. Howard created, Dark Agnes de Castillon. The Marvel Comics version ofRed Sonjadebuted inConan the Barbarian#23 in February 1973, with the character getting her own comic book in 1975.
Dynamite Comics began publishingRed Sonjain 2005 and continue to do so to this day.Red Sonjawas previously adapted in the 1985 big screen movie of the same name, starring Brigitte Nielsen as the title character.Millennium Films has been tryingto get a newRed Sonjaoff the ground since 2008, when the company announced that Rose McGowan was set to star as the title character, with Douglas Aarniokoski directing from a script by David White, with Avi Lerner, Boaz Davidson, Joe Gatta and George Furla producing and Danny Dimbort, Trevor Short, Luke Lieberman and Nick Barrucci executive producing. That project did start production but it came to a halt after Rose McGowan suffered nerve damage while doing stunts on the set.
Millennium tried a few more times to get the film off the ground, with Simon West coming aboard to direct with talk that Amber Heard was being eyed for the title character, while Megan Fox was also rumored for the project. The last update we had on the project was back in 2015, when Millennium hired Christopher Cosmos to write the script, althoughthat incarnation never got off the groundeither.Deadlinenow reports that Millennium is producing alongside Mark Canton and Courtney Solomon of Cinelou, Christa Campbell & Lati Grobman and Luke Lieberman, the latter of whom holds the rights toRed Sonja. Ashley Edward Miller’s film credits includeX-Men: First Class,Thorand the upcoming remake ofBig Trouble in Little China
