Robert Rodriguez Explains ‘Jonny Quest’ As A Legit Action/Adventure Film “That Just Happens To Have A Kid In It”
Robert Rodriguezhosted two panels for the Television Critics Awards today on behalf of hisEl Rey Network, speaking about his interview seriesThe Director’s Chairand season two ofFrom Dusk Till Dawn: The Series. He even showed a clip of his chat with Michael Mann aboutHeat. After the panel, Rodriguez stayed to answer follow-up questions, so I asked him about his plans for the live-actionJonny Quest.
“I thought it’d be really cool to do a legitimate action/adventure film that just happens to have a kid in it,” Rodriguez said. “Not a kids film; theSpy Kidswere more like kids films, this would be like a real action-adventure film because that’s what the original series was like. It was a hard hitting, kickass action-adventure series. That’s what enticed me to go do it. My own series had already played out. That was a cool property still that the studio had. I thought I would go see what they thought of it and they were really into it.”
Spy Kidswas sort of James Bond-meets-Roald Dahl, with surreal Willy Wonka-esque characters like the Thumb Thumbs. Rodriguez saysJonny Questwill be something new for him.
Rodriguez is usually outspoken about how he prefers to work independently with lower budgets he can control. He even spoke on the panel about how he follows the advice of mentors like George Lucas, to create original stories instead of working on other people’s franchises.
Rodriguez succeeded in turning three of his ideas into franchises:El Mariachi,Spy Kids, andMachete. (There’s alsoFrom Dusk Till Dawn, which he created with Quentin Tarantino and has spun into a TV series.) But withJonny Quest, Rodriguez sees an opportunity to complement his own skill set.
Rodriguez said,
There are just so few properties that are interesting. I’ve always wanted to do one because you learn a lot. Doing a studio project like that, you would learn something that you would bring back to something that you do on a smaller scale. You have a bigger budget than I would normally work with. So I was always looking for a franchise. I knew Dan Lin a long time. He didLego Movie, he’s a producer, he did a movie with me calledShorts. Years and years ago he brought meJonny Quest. I was like, ‘You know, I have my own series. I’m doing theSpy Kidsmovies.’ Once those played out, he came back again recently and said, ‘What aboutJonny Quest?’ I’m still a hugeJonny Questfan. My kids still watchJonny Quest. They’re still so into it. I turned them onto it when they were little and now they’re 17, 18, and 12 but they still love it.
Jonny Questmay delay another of Rodriguez’s long-developed film projects, the live-action remake ofFire and Ice. Or it may not. Rodriguez is a multi-tasker, so he may just do both.
“Fire and Icemight go at the same time, I don’t know,” he said. “Fire and Iceis also being turned in at the same time so I’m not sure which one is going to go first.”
Rodriguez has said in the past thatFire and Icewould take aSin Cityapproach, using visual effects and green screen to create a live-action comic book. “We’re still working on exactly how we’ll do the whole thing but we’ve done tests that are pretty amazing.”
We haven’t heard a lot about Rodriguez’s proposedHeavy MetalTV series in a while. At Comic-Con 2011 Rodriguez announced the series, and has been soliciting submissions from animators. I asked if he’d collected all the content for the series, and Rodriguez simply said, “Almost, almost.”
