Although the massive success of the Twilight franchise turned Taylor Lautner into a star seemingly overnight, the young actor seems acutely aware that it's only a matter of time before that particular gravy train runs out of track. The two-part Twilight finale, Breaking Dawn, may be the final word on everyone's favorite jean-shorts-wearing, tribal tattoo-sporting shape shifter - but Lautner is already laying the foundation of his post-Jacob career.
The actor has already completed work on John Singleton's upcoming thriller Abduction and has a Stretch Armstrong movie in the pipeline as well. Now Deadline is reporting that Lautner is also attached to star in Incarceron - an adaptation of Catherine Fisher's acclaimed sci-fi/fantasy novel.
The film is being written by Adam Cooper & Bill Collage, who previously penned Accepted and the upcoming Brett Ratner comedy Tower Heist. Lautner would play Finn - a seventeen-year-old trapped inside of a futuristic prison society.
Here's the synopsis of Incarceron from Fisher's official site:
Imagine a living prison so vast that it contains corridors and forests, cities and seas. Imagine a prisoner with no memory, who is sure he came from Outside, even though the prison has been sealed for centuries and only one man, half real, half legend, has ever escaped.
Imagine a girl in a manor house in a society where time has been forbidden, where everyone is held in a seventeenth century world run by computers, doomed to an arranged marriage that appals her, tangled in an assassination plot she both dreads and desires.
One inside, one outside. But both imprisoned.
Imagine a war that has hollowed the moon, seven skullrings that contain souls, a flying ship and a wall at the world's end. Imagine the unimaginable. Imagine Incarceron.
Incarceron is the first in a series (the second book, Sapphique, will be released later this month) so there's no doubt this is being viewed as a potential franchise. It's an interesting premise and the blending of genres is certainly intriguing, but it remains to be seen how well Lautner performs outside of the Twilight arena.
His popularity certainly isn't in question and I'm sure Twilight fans will continue to support all of his endeavors, but Lautner has never had to carry a film squarely on his shoulders before. He seems like a decent enough guy, but I've never found him to be all that charismatic on the big screen.
Is he up to the challenge? I'm not convinced - but he definitely has no shortage of opportunities to prove me wrong.
We'll keep you updated on Incarceron as it develops.
Source: Deadline.