Animal Logic And New Line Team Up For ‘Astro Boy’ Reboot

Animal Logic, the Australian animation/vfx studio responsible for The Lego Movie, is moving forward on a vfx-heavy live-action reboot of Osamu Tezuka’s Astro Boy, which first debuted as a manga 64 years ago.

New Line announced today via Hollywood Reporter that it is negotiating to pick up the rights to the film, and has also hired Andre Fabrizio and Jeremy Passmore (San Andreas) to write a script. The film will be produced by Animal Logic Entertainment, Tezuka Productions, and Ranger 7 Films.

Animal Logic announced a major expansion last May, with plans to build a 300-person facility in Vancouver, Canada, to produce three animated features for Warner Bros. The company’s 500-person Sydney, Australia studio is currently working on LEGO Batman and Ninjago, both due for release in 2017.

A $65 million Astro Boy CG-animated feature arrived in theaters in 2009 from the Hong Kong studio Imagi, which previously had been a producer of artificial Christmas trees. Its weak $41 million global gross accelerated Imagi’s demise as a feature film maker.

More recently, French animation studio Caribara Animation announced a reboot of Tezuka’s android boy for television in a 26 half-hour 2D/CG hybrid series.