Colin Trevorrow only made his feature directorial debut less than a decade ago, but he’s already managed to helm one of the highest-grossing movies ever made, get fired or walk away from the project that eventually became Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker depending on who you believe, and deliver the hilariously terrible The Book of Henry.
Once he wraps up his stint in the dinosaur sandbox next summer, once Jurassic World: Dominion hits theaters, the world is his oyster. And in this instance, he’ll be heading underwater … sort of.
In June 2020, it was revealed that Trevorrow was developing a new high concept blockbuster set in and around the mythical kingdom of Atlantis, but with a twist.
In the filmmaker’s version, Atlantis will be a technologically advanced civilization that exists on an undiscovered island in the middle of the Indian Ocean, not the sunken ruins that people have come to imagine it being. In an interview with Empire, Trevorrow offered the first update on the project we’ve heard for a while.
“For a generation right now to be able to enter a world that is not unlike their world – where their elders have basically gifted them a civilisation that is dying – I think it is the right moment for that story,” civilisation with its own advanced technology. I’m fascinated with it.
It’s the only thing that equals dinosaurs for me. I guess I tend to go back to the past. But, you know, it was the first time that we had technology. And it’s at a time when we had other kinds of creatures that aren’t around anymore There are just so many things about it that are fascinating to me. So yeah, I’m a deep nerd for it.”
On a base level, that sounds like it exists squarely in the middle ground between Aquaman and Black Panther. While that’s no bad thing, considering those two epics combined to earn close to $2.5 billion at the box office, Trevorrow and his team will need to make sure their film stands out on a design, narrative, and spectacle level to avoid comparisons.