Most Anticipated Sci-Fi / Fantasy Movies of 2015, 2016 and 2017.

It has been a strong few years for Epic (depending how you judge Avatar & The Hobbit), Urban and Dystopian Fantasy movies. It probably stemmed from the Harry Potter and The Lord of the Rings franchises, but has been taken to a whole new level by Twilight and Marvel’s array of hits.

To be honest, it’s not all that surprising (to me at least). Fantasy and Science-Fiction lend themselves well to the movie-going experience that our cinemas try to promote. If you are going to pay £10 / $20 to watch a movie you want it to be a memorable experience that you couldn’t replicate in the comfort of your own home. So, whereas Gone Girl, for example, I feel I could have enjoyed the twists and turns just as much sitting at home as I did sitting in the cinema, I don’t feel the same way about the wild ride and mesmerising effects found in Guardians of the Galaxy, The Hobbit and even Mazerunner.

I guess that when something is digitally created and is impossible based on understanding of the physical constraints of our universe / the current state of technology: being able to see it life sized and in a way that sounds real is ‘an experience’ and one that I’m happy to pay for.

Anyway, onto the point of this article / news piece: this week there has been a number of exciting trailers and announcements regarding release dates and movements from ‘script phase’ to ‘into production phase’ for highly anticipated movies. In addition, we thought this would be a great time for us to do a top ten list of movies we are waiting for in 2015 and a top 5 for 2016 and 2017.

Movies JUST given release dates:

We all wanted to know where our favourite card-throwing X-man was when Marvel first released the X-Men movies, right? Well, the studios have listened and the Gambit spin-off movie that stars Jump Street’s Channing Tatum has been given the release date of October 7, 2016.

Another Planet of the Apes movie has been announced and it is confirmed to continue the events of Dawn of the Planet of the Apes. We will be seeing it on July 14, 2017.

Yet another Marvel entry, this time a sequel to a movie not even released yet: The Fantastic Four 2. The sequel to the movie that is expected to be Marvel’s first flop (you know, like Guardians of the Galaxy was expected) has been set at June 2, 2017.

Another anticipated movie is the big screen adaptation of one of video game’s biggest franchises: Assassin’s Creed. The release date is set for December 21, 2016, the Wednesday before Christmas.

Ghost In The Shell to move into Production:

Last year we brought you news that Ghost In The Shell was very likely to get made and it seems our suspicions were correct because Hollywood’s ‘hot right now’ Scarlett Johansson will play our favourite badass cyborg. The fact that this movie will be made by Dreamworks, has been pushed to the top of the pile by Steven Spielberg – a big fan of the original anime – and has managed to sign such a big star in Johansson has us pretty excited. If this project is given the right budget (which evidence suggests it will) this could be huge… I guess the only downside to this news piece is that we don’t have any idea as to when production will start, just that it’s scheduled.

A casting call that came earlier this week for Spider-Man 3 seems to suggest that the movie is back on and will come before the Sinister Six, Spider-Woman and Venum movies. Also, rumours that Opera will be the lead villain in DC’s Suicide Squad continues to fly about the net. The film, due in 2016, already has a star studded cast  (Jared Leto will play the Joker, Margot Robbie his brutal sidekick Harley Quinn, Will Smith as masked assassin Deadshot, Jai Courtney as Captain Boomerang, Cara Delevingne as Enchantress, and Tom Hardy as Rick Flagg), but Opera would be the icing on the cake for DC. Just like Justice League/Avengers, It will be interesting to see how this one compares to Marvel’s similar super-villain experiment.

Of course, there are many, many more movies confirmed for 2015, 2016 and 2017 that we are looking forward to – but we thought we’d better put some kind of restriction on things (10, 5, 5 seemed about right). How about you guys, anything you are particularly excited about? 🙂

P.S. Our ‘Top Fantasy Movies of 2014’, ‘Top Fantasy Video Games of 2014’, ‘Top Fantasy Novels of 2014’, ‘Most Anticipated Video Games of 2015’ and ‘Most Anticipated Fantasy Novels of 2015’ posts are well underway – keep checking back! 🙂

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