Universal Putting Their Classic Monsters Into A Shared Movie Universe

Marvel Studios has shown that there is much success to be had in allowing their various films to crossover with one another to create a bigger fictional universe. And other studios have noticed that success and have started working on emulating it. Warner Brothers is hard at work setting up their own shared superhero universe with their DC Comics heroes while Sony is working to expand what characters they have in their rights to Spider-Man into a multi-film franchise. And now Universal is looking to get into the act with a plan to merge their various classic monster characters such as Dracula, Frankenstein, the Wolf Man, the Mummy and more into a shared universe.

Deadline is reporting that the studio is hoping to kick off this crossover initiative with their 2016 The Mummy reboot. Writers Alex Kurtzman and Chris Morgan will be spearheading the project for the studio and they’re strong choices. Morgan has provided the scripts for the studio’s Fast And Furious franchise starting with the franchise’s third installment Tokyo Drift, the point that pretty much redefined the series. Kurtzman has a strong track record himself with credits in the Transformers, Star Trek and The Amazing Spider-Man franchises.

Reportedly the pair have already started –

to put together an interconnected slate of Monster films, and the first will be a reboot of The Mummy, which will be released April 22, 2016. Part of their duty will be to work closely with production, marketing, promotions and consumer product to support the revival. They will also reevaluate projects which have preexisting attachments, and bring it under one cohesive strategy.

Of course, this isn’t the first time that the studio had their various monster characters interacting. But the previous time was back in the 1940s, when the studio’s first big cycle of monster films was starting to wane with titles like Frankenstein Meets The Wolfman and Abbott And Costello Meet Frankenstein. The studio has recently tried to bring some of their classic monster characters back to the big screen over the past several years, but the results have never been that great. Here’s hoping that Morgan and Kurtzman have better luck.