Universal Studios haven’t been having the best of times when it’s come to certain movies within recent years, and the attempts to reboot their old Dark Universe series haven’t necessarily gone well. However, the release of The Invisible Man in 2020 might have just put them back on the right track – let’s take a look.
Before delving into that, it’s worth looking in the rear-view mirror to find out where the origins of Universal’s return to form lies. The idea of The Invisible Man looked to have been dead in the water following previous disastrous attempts from the studio, mainly the 2017 release of The Mummy starring Tom Cruise and Russell Crowe, despite even that star-studded of a lineup.
With this, Universal looked to bring back their old universe of villains that hadn’t been seen in a proper capacity for decades. The exceptions being at their theme park attractions, such as mazes and scare zones at their highly popular Halloween Horror Nights at their Orlando theme park. However, even if the film was slated by critics and the public alike, it still reignited a discussion surrounding villain movies.
The release of a movie adaption of The Invisible Man, previously a H.G. Wells novel from 1897, had been in development from 2006. The plan to cast movie star Johnny Depp was also brought up in 2016 as a result of the Dark Universe revival. However, The Mummy’s poor performance meant that the initial idea was shelved, and Universal went back to the drawing board. Within a couple of years, the studio had reformed the idea of their collective universe, and The Invisible Man was back on – without Depp’s involvement.
Intriguingly, despite the film’s topsy-turvy nature in development, the original H.G. Wells novel has also been adapted into other mediums, as opposed to just the 2020 Universal movie. There’s been no shortage of other examples, such as the 1933 adaptation that starred Claude Rains, with James Whale as a director. This iteration was also produced by Universal and formed part of their original villain’s universe some decades prior.
The book has also been name-dropped in other ways throughout entertainments history. For example, it acted as the name of a song on prog rock band Marillion’s 2004 Marbles album, and also on Generation X’s debut record from 1978. Furthermore, in the gaming industry, The Invisible Man has also been adapted into online casino games. For example, you can check out bonusfinder/uk/ evaluation of UK online casinos, to see that many popular sites host the game, which illustrates the expansive popularity of the character and his story.
All of these examples portray the enduring popularity of the book, and shows that the reinvention of this classic piece of literature is a tried and tested technique utilised to keep modern audiences interested. It’s interesting to see that a story that is nearly a century old can continue to have such an impact, and be so cinematically flexible that it remains one of the best-told stories in cinema history.
