Back in August of 2015, I shared the news that Jeff Pinkner had been hired to write the remake of THE CREATURE OF THE BLACK LAGOON, and what I said at that time still stands – although various people have tried and failed to bring the Gill-Man back to the screen at different points over the last few decades, the project has a better chance of happening now than it ever did before, thanks to Universal's determination to build a modern Cinematic Universe for their classic monsters.
They just need to crack the script. A new screenwriter has been hired for the job: fresh off of writing director James Wan's upcoming AQUAMAN film, Will Beall is moving on to writing about another aquatic character, becoming the latest person to craft a script for a new take on THE CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON. In their report on Beall's hiring, Deadline makes it sound like he will be starting from scratch rather than working from a draft written by anyone else.
It seems odd that so many scripts have been written for a concept so simple:
A scientific expedition searching for fossils along the Amazon River discovers a prehistoric Gill-Man in the legendary Black Lagoon. The explorers capture the mysterious creature, but it breaks free. The Gill-Man returns to kidnap the lovely Kay, fiancée of one in the expedition, with whom it has fallen in love.
If Beall writes a script that satisfies Universal and producers Chris Morgan and Alex Kurtzman, who are overseeing the Universal Monsters Cinematic Universe, the Creature from the Black Lagoon will be added into the mix of characters that includes the likes of the Mummy, Frankenstein's Monster, the Invisible Man, the Wolf Man, Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde, monster slayer Van Helsing, and more. It's cool that the Gill-Man is being included this time around, since he missed the monster mash action Universal had going on back in the old days – the Gill-Man came along too late for crossovers like FRANKENSTEIN MEETS THE WOLF MAN, HOUSE OF FRANKENSTEIN, HOUSE OF DRACULA, and even the "Abbott and Costello Meet the Monsters" series.
The new Cinematic Universe kicks off with this summer's release of THE MUMMY, which Kurtzman directed himself.