Warner Bros. Drops “Akira” Rights, Taika’s Movie Not Happening

This just in-

after what feels like an eternity in development hell, the live-action “Akira” movie is once again not happening.

Warner Bros. Pictures has reportedly “given up” rights to the property. The rights have reverted back to Kodansha, publishers of the original manga the landmark anime was based on.

Oscar winning filmmaker Taika Waititi had been tackling an “Akira” movie, which was being written by novelist Charles Yu (“Interior Chinatown”).

Waititi had been on the docket to direct “Akira” since 2017. Then, in 2019, Leonardo DiCaprio‘s Appian Way was awarded upwards of $18.9 million from Warner Bros. Pictures to make the film. They were all set to start shooting in California, but, the Covid 19 pandemic kinda put a stop to that. Waititi left the project indefinitely to shoot “Thor: Love and Thunder” for Marvel Studios, and shortly thereafter, he was confirmed to be writing and directing an untiled “Star Wars” film.

But then in 2023, Waititi offered a surprising update on the project, confirming it was still in the works. “Obviously, I think people who loved the film, I want to make sure that they’ve also read the books because there’s a lot more in the books than there are in the film,” Waititi told Inverse. “And some people are very protective over the film, which is not quite the same as the books. So we’re drawing a lot from the books.”

This story is developing…