News Of The Week: Courtney Cox Returning To 'Scream,' 'New Mutants' Opening Scene

Hollywood was on temporary pause but productions are gearing back up, release dates continue to be tweaked in preparation for theaters reopening, and things are slowly starting to return to normal – or at least, our temporary new normal. Entertainment news has once again begun to drop with regularity. In case you missed it, here’s all the best news and tidbits from the last week.

Let’s hop to it.

Disney Scrapping ‘Mulan’ Theatrical Release, Will Debut On Disney+ Labor Day Weekend

Womp, womp. The hits continue for theaters. On their recent earnings call, Disney CEO Bob Chapek announced that the live-action Mulan, pulled last month from the release calendar, will not be getting a theatrical release at all. Instead, it’s moving to Disney+ where it will debut on September 4th (Labor Day weekend) as Disney’s first experiment with a premium VOD offering. It will cost $29.99 (atop the Disney+ subscription fee). However, unlike previous films we’ve seen move from theatrical to PVOD during the pandemic, that price is not for a one-time rental. That $29.99 purchase will enable a person to watch Mulan as many times as they want, provided they still have an active Disney+ subscription. Now our eyes turn to Black Widow as we await its fate.

‘Aladdin’ Star Naomi Scott Lands Her Next Role In Sci-Fi Thriller ‘Distant’

Rising star Naomi Scott has landed her next role with Distant, Amblin’s upcoming sci-fi movie. The Marvelous Ms. Maisel star Rachel Brosnahan was originally set for the co-lead role that Scott is now claiming, but COVID-19-related scheduling conflicts forced Brosnahan to bow out. The project, directed by Blades of Glory team Will Speck and Josh Gordon, had previously cast Hamilton and In the Heights star Anthony Ramos in the other lead role. The original story centers on an asteroid miner who is stranded on an alien planet after a crash. Running out of both oxygen and time and pursued by hostile creatures, he has to cross the harsh terrain in order to find the only other survivor, a woman who got trapped in her escape pod during the crash. No release date is set yet but the script is finished and it’s well into pre-production.

‘Dune’ Director Denis Villeneuve Hustling To Finish Post-Production By December

Delivering an epic, VFX-heavy tentpole movie is no easy feat at the best of times and it becomes a nightmare when something puts it behind schedule. That’s the situation Dune director Denis Villeneuve currently finds himself in after the pandemic shutdown forced him to delay reshoots and pickups by almost six months. In an interview with CCTV, Villeneuve revealed the shutdown “crushed” his schedule, and though post-production on the movie continued, it was slowed down considerably with everyone in different locations. With those reshoots now not scheduled until this month and a release date still set for December 18, it will be a race against time for Villeneuve and his team to make the movie they intended to make. It’s entirely possible that Warner Bros. will bump its release date back, but until then, we don’t envy the pressure he’s under to finish on time.

Courtney Cox Is Reprising Her Role As Gale Weathers In The ‘Scream’ Franchise Relaunch

Some good news for horror fans. The long-awaited sequel/reboot/relaunch/whatever we’re calling it of the Scream franchise just added another OG cast member to the project. Courtney Cox will be reprising her role as journalist Gale Weathers in Scream 5, directed by Ready or Not‘s Matthew Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett. She’s not the first old-school actor to return to the franchise, either – it had previously been announced that David Arquette is also on board to reprise his role of Dewey Riley. We don’t know much about the relaunch yet, other than that it will involve a woman returning to her hometown to discover who has been committing a series of crimes. It’s not known whether or not Gale Weathers will be that woman, but in any case, we’re excited to see Courtney Cox back in the beloved horror franchise.

Samara Weaving Jokes About Acting With Keanu Reeves, The Man Who ‘Killed’ Her Uncle

Bill & Ted Face the Music is (for now) heading to theaters on September 1st. It’s been almost 30 years since the last Bill & Ted movie. Bill Preston, Esq. and Ted ‘Theodore’ Logan are all grown up and have kids of their own now, which means bringing in a younger generation of actors to fill those roles. Those actors are Samara Weaving and Brigitte Lundy-Paine. During the movie’s virtual panel for Comic-Con@Home this year, just how young they are was driven home when Samara Weaving reminded host Kevin Smith that she only knows Keanu Reeves as John Wick and Neo, not as Ted Logan or Johnny Utah or John Constantine or from any other of his classic movies. Beyond the generational divide, working with Reeves was weird for her in one very specific, personal way, too: As the niece of Hugo Weaving, Samara Weaving grew up watching Reeves kill her uncle again and again on screen in the Matrix movies. Talk about a crazy connection.

‘The New Mutants’ Reveals Opening Scene During Comic-Con At Home Panel

Long-delayed The New Mutants is the little movie that could and right now, it’s still chugging along to its (hopefully, maybe, fingers crossed) final release date on August 28th. During its own virtual panel for Comic-Con@Home, the cast and director Josh Boone poked some self-aware fun at the post-production hell they’ve been trapped in since wrapping production on the movie three entire years ago. But they brought with them a first look at the opening scene of the movie that led into some new footage, and honestly? It looks pretty great. The opening scene drops us right into the middle of the action and the new footage showed off some flashes of the mutants’ powers. Here’s to hoping it keeps its August 28th date.

The Best Highlights & Trailers From This Year’s Virtual San Diego Comic-Con At Home

Speaking of this year’s Comic-Con, here’s a roundup of the best highlights and trailers from this year’s virtual event. Movie studios may have largely skipped the con this year, but that doesn’t mean there wasn’t still some cool stuff in store. From video game news, to highly-anticipated new TV series to Keanu Reeves being wonderful as always, hit that link above for what we think was the most interesting news to come out of Comic-Con@Home.

Dave Franco Is Playing Vanilla Ice In A Biopic, Which Is Peak 2020 Honestly

In what should be extremely weird news but is exactly on-brand for 2020, Dave Franco is playing Rob Van Winkle, a.k.a. rapper-turned-hardcore artist-turned house flipper in a biopic about Van Winkle’s life. Titled To The Extreme, the project is based on the Black List screenplay from Phillip Van and Chris Goodwin. It chronicles Vanilla Ice’s rise to fame as a young artist and the struggles that fame brought with it. While you might have the urge to make a joke, the biopic doesn’t intend to make Vanilla Ice the butt of the joke, but rather, to treat him with sympathy. Franco explained it’s similar to the heartfelt approach they took with The Disaster Artist. “With that movie, people expected us to make a broad comedy where we make fun of Tommy Wiseau,” said Franco, “but the more real we played it, the funnier and heartfelt it was — that’s the tone we want for this one as well.”

Last but not least, check out our new Quick Hits column, which rounds up all the bits and bobs of news that don’t quite make the cut for a full article but are still interesting updates: