The movie version of Science Ninja Team Gatchaman will have bitchin car chases as well as space battles with the evil organization Galactor, judging from some concept art from creative director Felix Ip. But the movie's look is being pushed away from an earlier "photorealistic" version and back towards its anime roots, he adds. With a script by awesome Batman writer Paul Dini, the story of a team of bird-like superheroes who fight science-criminals in space could rock our universe. Click through for a gallery.



The Gatchaman movie is being done by Imagi, which did a motion-capture Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles film and is working on Astro Boy. Original director Kevin Munroe (who worked on Turtles) is off the Gatchaman project, and Ip says in the comments on his blog that the concept drawings Munroe unveiled last year aren't being used any more. Instead, the look of the film is being pushed to be more anime and stylized, and less photorealistic. (Actually, I'm not 100 percent sure if the image above is part of the film's new look, or part of the discarded concept art. It's still on the Imagi website, and it's not one of the batch of images that Ip specifically disavowed. It's just such a cool image that I wanted to show it off. The three newest images, from Ip's blog, are in the gallery.) The Gatchaman team works for the International Science Organization, preventing Galactor from taking control over the Earth's resources. Because of the plot element of villains wanting to misuse our precious natural elements, the original Gatchaman has a bit of an environmentalist bent to it. So if the remake wants to include a green message, it won't seem as shoehorned as the eco-message in the new Day The Earth Stood Still seems like it'll be. [Felix Ip and Imagi, via NowShowing]