The Hollywood Reporter notes that UTA has taken on Voltron's US rights holder, World Events Productions, and plan to exploit the anime character throughout different media as much as possible. According to the report, video games and toy deals are in the works, but the priority is an animated series and the previously-announced movie project, which UTA will now help shop around studios. Is America ready for Voltronmania in 2011?

Voltron off to UTA [Hollywood Reporter]

Titan Maximum, which will premiere on Cartoon Network's Adult Swim on September 27, follows Titan Force Five, a once-proud team of pilots who defend Saturn's moon Titan. Military budget cuts force the team to disband, and one of the pilots, Gibson "Gibbs" Giberstein (voiced by Seth Green), takes the news especially hard, vowing to destroy his former teammates and the whole of Titan.

Advance word on the show is that it's a send-up of classic science fiction, with a Robot Chicken twist. In other words, we can expect plenty of sex jokes and bathroom humor sprinkled in with our mecha-powered space battles.

[Sci Fi Wire]

GALLERY

Hollywood Reporter's Risky Business blog reports that the live action reboot of the popular Japanese cartoon that was being worked on by 20th Century Fox — which had a completed script, courtesy of Justin Marks — is no more, thanks to rights reversion.

Once the rights became available, Atlas Entertainment — namely Dark Knight producer Charles Roven and his Get Smart producing partners Richard Suckle and Steve Alexander - quickly snapped them up, and are developing a brand new version of the character along with Wanted producer Jason Netter. Ted Kopler, another producer involved in the project, admitted that the success of Michael Bay's Transformers movies helped with the decision to grab the movie rights, but described their take as something different:

[U]nlike other robotic action movies, 'Voltron' is the personification of the human spirit, a quality that will set this movie apart.

Wait, "personification of the human spirit"? This is the same Voltron that's a giant robot made up of other robots, right...?

No studio has been announced as being involved with this project yet.

Voltron comes together again [THR Risky Business]

Cartoon Network has ordered nine episodes of Titan Maximum, a new series from the Robot Chicken creators as part of the network's Adult Swim programming. The show - a continuing story, as opposed to Chicken's sketches - follows former members of a Voltron-esque team whose vehicles formed the eponymous Titan as they try to reunite to save the universe from one of their own, voiced by Green himself. Producer Root explains the appeal of the show:

There were always teams of extraordinary young people with the fate of the universe in their hands... In reality, that would end terribly. The last thing you want when giant monsters attack is a bunch of teenagers in charge of defending you. 'Titan Maximum' is about what would really happen if a team of idiot kids was in charge of a 6-story-tall robot.

Even if the premise doesn't appeal to your inner cynical six-year-old, the writing staff might; amongst their number is Green Lantern's Geoff Johns and Amazing Spider-Man's Zeb Wells. The series launches in September; the Voltron revival has been postponed indefinitely as a result.

Adult Swim orders 'Titan' [Variety]

io9 pal Ed Grabianowski has the news over at Robot Viking:

The Voltron license is pretty brilliant. Instead of just one monster, you've got an iconic hero force and an assortment of genetically engineered robeasts . . . How will they tie the Voltron mythology into the Monsterpocalypse timeline? The current adventures of G.U.A.R.D. do not take place in "days of long ago." The Galaxy Alliance was based on Earth - maybe Alliance representatives will come to Earth and offer Voltron's help defending against "a new horrible menace." One also wonders if we'll just get the lion Voltron (which is specifically mentioned in the official press release), or if the vehicle Voltron will be along too. The Galaxy Alliance faction will need two robots, so I'm guessing both.

I, for one, welcome our monstery overlords. Just thought I'd say that before everybody else.

via Robot Viking

Like Voltron, a number of vehicles (here, five) combine to form an imposing, laser-sword-wielding robot. Said metal-man was constructed by a scientist-spouse earthing duo named Dr. Ned Armstrong and Dr. Mary Ann Armstrong—three of the Volt Machines are piloted by their kids—to fight a gang of horned aliens called the Boazanians bent on taking over…THE WORLD!

Now, some important details which will also explain why Voltes V was never released in the States and is arguably way more powerful than Voltron:

1. Early on in the series, the trio of kids witness mom Armstrong dying by sacrificing herself in battle. This leaves the fighter-pilot sibs more or less orphans, seeing as how their father was kidnapped by the Boazanians and is pretty much a tortured prisoner of war.

2. There are a pair of evil twin satellites named Sodom and Gomorrah. No word on their sexual proclivities, but they were skilled at using an electric storm to trap their prey in compromising positions.

3. Another roguish alien, Draco, committed suicide rather than surrender to the Voltes gang.

4. The aliens are itching to deploy a nuclear bomb on our Japanese heroes.

5. Voltes V attacks its enemies rather spectacularly by cutting a V into its enemies by using a single-edged sword. In other words: It slashes the foe, slowly twists the sword in the baddie’s gut, then cuts him again back upward. Need a visual? Witness this (go to 3:40) or this (go to 3:47).

Enough talk—check out episode one here and some other installments from season one here.

Image from http://flickr.com/photos/coolmel/114286427/

Who is this Max Makowski? Latino Review claims he's the new hotness in Hollywood right now. Makowski is supposed to direct an adaptation of the 1970s TV series Kung Fu, which warms my heart for his version of Voltron. Plus, he also directed One Last Dance which screened at Sundance and has produced Queer Eye for the Straight Guy. I'm optimistic, because not just anyone can take on a Voltron movie. You really have to understand and love the whole complicated franchise. So I'd rather a newbie with something to prove take this on, than see some sort of Hollywood warhorse film it.

[Latino Review]

Even with a zillion dollar budget, the morphing robots in Transformers looked kind of lame, so I don't have high hopes for a low-budget version. But Voltron's new production company, Relativity, has also worked on 3:10 to Yuma, which is a good sign. The movie was written by Justin Marks, who has also worked on the as-yet-unreleased movie versions of He-Man and Green Arrow.

According to Variety: Marks' take is described as a post-apocalyptic tale set in New York City and Mexico, where five survivors of an alien attack band together and end up piloting the five lion-shaped robots that combine and form the massive sword-wielding Voltron that helps battle Earth's invaders. I love me some Voltron, but I'm starting to get a little tired of this whole post-apocalyptic New York thing. Can't we set it in New Mexico or something? That's where aliens always attack.

Voltron Facing a Relativity Reboot [Variety]

First off, the movie is set on Earth which is great, because I need to see giant robotic lions being piloted with the New York City skyline behind them. But the world may be a little messed up, because this story is set in the post apocalyptic world, 5 years after a huge battle with the Robeasts.

Robeasts (giant sky-scraper tall beings) have taken over the planet. They're like a hydra: if you cut off one of its appendages a new one will grow out, but Robeasts pull from their surroundings, using magnets or science or something. But still, it's not as cool as cat-face hands.

The main character is a hardened, tattooed fellow named Keith Kogan. And you know whose rules Keith plays by? His own. Keith and his African American buddy, Lance, are busy scraping out a living in war-torn New York.

Lance and Keith drive around in their tank (random?) and come across sexy Allura and her body guard Hunk. Allura is, of course, some sort of secret government type, and she needs Keith and Lance's help to defeat the Robeasts. (Oh yeah, somewhere along the way they pick up the kid Pidge, but it doesn't say how. I assume they bought him or something.)

But Allura is really an alien, and she gives everyone their own super powerful lion machine and together they form VOLTRON...and the battle commences. There is an epic battle, but at this point you're really just watching to see things explode. And according to the script, they do indeed.

So there you have it good guys win, bad guys lose. And the cat hands robots lives to fight another day.

[Cinema Blend]

Let's start with the most fun book of the week: Harper Collins' Method Man graphic novel, written by and starring the Wu-Tang rapper as Mosely Paine, a Hellboy-esque monster hunter in a city known only as "One Bad Ghetto, USA." I smell potential movie deal...

Oddly enough, this isn't the first Wu-Tang comic - that would be 2002's The Nine Rings of Wu-Tang - nor will it be the last. GZA and Ghostface Killah are both working on their own graphic novels.

It's a big week for Devil's Due Publishing. They're releasing the first issue of a new Voltron series, Voltron: A Legend Forged as well as the alien abduction book NYE Incidents, which we've written about before. More mysterious alien lifeforms can be found in Boom! Studios' virus-from-beyond-the-stars Dominion trade paperback.

Wanting more zombie fiction? Then check out Red5 Comics' ZMD: Zombies Of Mass Destruction series, where the undead are used as the last resort in our ever-ongoing war against terrorism. As you may expect, things don't quite go to plan. If your taste for the undead leans more towards vampires, then IDW probably invite you to sample their new Spike: After The Fall series, showing you just what James Marsters' alter ego has been up to post-Angel season 5.

I know, I know; you're wondering what Marvel and DC are doing with themselves during this indie-heavy week. DC is playing it cool, with its flagships both being the work of Geoff Johns: His very enjoyable Superman And The Legion of Super-Heroes storyline gets a hardcover collection, bringing Clark Kent back to his 31st Century teenage hangout, while Final Crisis: Rogues' Revenge sees him return to the world of the Flash and attempt to redeem the villains therein (much to the gratitude of those of us who've read Countdown to Final Crisis). Marvel, meanwhile, is pretty collection-centric in terms of interest, with World War Hulk's spin-off series, Warbound, getting a paperback collection and Steve Gerber's classic run on Howard The Duck finally getting the oversized hardcover it's always deserved.

Just like every other week, you can read about each and everything hitting comic stores on Wednesday right here, and then go and find out where your local store is by clicking on this here link. Just remember that, like the Wu Tang Clan, comic book stores are not, in fact, not something to fuck with.

Devil's Due is a publisher that doesn't get the most play here on io9, but its 304-page Voltron: Defender of the Universe Hardcover Omnibus may change that. Collecting the complete Voltron series — including the never-published final 12th issue - this fairly-weighty hardcover has work by 52 and Flash's Mark Waid, Ultimate Spider-Man's Mark Brooks, Dan Jolley, Kaare Andrews (the man who gave the world Spider-Man's radioactive spunk, about which more below), and many, many more, and may be the nostalgia purchase of choice for many of you this week.

For those of you who have more of a Batman fetish, this week also sees the re-release of Alan Moore and Brian Bolland's "seminal" The Killing Joke, in a newly recolored, hardcover format. If a beautifully-illustrated comic that cripples one of DC's most well-known superheroines in an offhanded manner and then lets you see her breasts later (We'll see if that detail makes it into the remastered version) isn't enough to entice you to spend $17.99 alone, then I may as well mention that the new hardback also includes a short back-up story written and illustrated by Bolland alone. If you'd rather have more kid-friendly DC superhero fare, you might want to try the first issue of Super Friends, a new series aimed at the under-10s, where superdeformed versions of the Justice League show that — hey! — friendship may be the greatest superpower of all. Or, if you don't want to patronize your kids, give them the first collection of cartoon tie-in Legion of Super-Heroes In The 31st Century instead.

Marvel is having a bit of an off-week, by way of comparison. People who want to see uncomfortably realistic older versions of favorite characters have an unexpected choice, however. On the one hand, there's the Earth X Trilogy Companion (a collection of sketches and rarely-seen work relating to Alex Ross's future Marvel universe). On the other, there's the paperback version of Kaare Andrews' Spider-Man: Reign, which rewrites Frank Miller's Batman: The Dark Knight Returns into a Spider-Man story most notable for including the fact that Spider-Man killed off his wife by having sex with her and poisoning her with his radioactive sperm.

No, seriously.

Yes, yes, I know. There's nowhere to go from there. That's why I'm telling you that that stroke of "genius" (or should that be "stroke" of genius?), along with everything else shipping this week, can be found here, and that you can find out where your nearest comic book store may be by clicking here.

Now, go and wash your mind out to stop thinking about radioactive spider sperm. You know you want to.