Exclusive: Christian Bale In Talks For Reign Of Fire Reboot
According to our trusted and proven sources, Christian Bale is up for a reboot of one of his biggest flops, Reign of Fire.
This article is more than 2 years old
Christian Bale is one of the world’s most acclaimed and successful actors. He has an Academy Award, two Golden Globes, a couple of Screen Actors Guild awards, and a whole bunch of other, lesser awards (sorry, Satellite Awards). He has also starred in some of the highest-grossing movies of all time, including Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy and (probably) Thor: Love and Thunder. And according to our trusted and proven sources, Christian Bale is in talks to reboot one of his biggest failures, Reign of Fire.
All the way back in 2002, Christian Bale starred in a huge flop of a film called Reign of Fire. The movie co-starred Matthew McConaughey before he sank beneath the waves of terrible romantic comedies and emerged, resplendent, with the McConnaissance. It also co-starred a pre-fame Gerard Butler as Christian Bale’s best friend and, briefly, the Borg Queen herself, Alice Krige as his mother. But most importantly of all, Reign of Fire starred a whole bunch of dragons, who emerged from an eon-long hibernation below London to drive humans to the point of extinction.
We will be clear about this: despite the presence of talents like Christian Bale and Matthew McConaughey, Reign of Fire is a truly terrible movie. However, the actual premise of desperate humans fighting fire-breathing dragons in a dystopian future is undeniably awesome, like something you might find airbrushed on the side of a van somewhere. The failure of the movie is not in the idea itself, but in the execution; it wasted the once-in-a-lifetime charm of Matthew McConaughey by turning him into a fanatical, whispering militia member and did not do much better by Christian Bale’s desperate beard.
However, the time could be right for Christian Bale to return to the world of Reign of Fire. For one thing, he has previously said that the movie was well-positioned for a sequel with Scott Moutter (who played his ward in the film) emerging as a new leader of the surviving humans. While the original movie closed with the dragons apparently headed for extinction themselves (with millions of the flying, scaly beasts being singlehandedly fathered by a single male), having another secret source of survival is pretty easy reboot stuff.
It is actually remarkable that even without Christian Bale or Matthew McConaughey, Reign of Fire has yet to spawn any sequels or reboots. After all, a movie like Dragonheart (that only had one dragon, as opposed to millions) managed to spin off four sequels. Why not even one for Reign of Fire?
Christian Bale could be looking into rebooting Reign of Fire as a new franchise to lock onto. While he recently appeared in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, a villain role in that particular field does not usually mean longevity. Christian Bale has never shied away from popcorn movies and, if nothing else, Reign of Fire is potentially kind of ultimate popcorn entertainment. Maybe this time around, they could get the simple and beautiful idea of Christian Bale fighting dragons right.
