There are rumors swirling around that the long gestating live-action adaptation of Akira, which has been in the works for several years now, will be moving forward as a trilogy and that Christopher Nolan (Batman Begins, Inception) has met with a previously attached filmmaker to discuss the project.
This information comes from Den of Geek, who are positing that Nolan’s next film, which is set for a July 2017 release, could very well be the first of these three films.
The project is being handled by Leonardo DiCaprio’s production company Appian Way and the script is being written by Marco J. Ramirez (“Sons of Anarchy”).
Akira was originally a six-volume manga written by Katsuhiro Otomo, so a trilogy would really allow the movies to dive into the stories rather than try to squeeze everything into one film.
With all the rumors and stories swirling around this project since the rights were bought back in 2002, I’m highly skeptical of anything moving forward. However, I can’t deny that I’d be thrilled to see this move forward as Akira has been one of my favorite films for a very long time.