A Beyblade live-action movie is officially in development at Paramount Pictures with Pirates of the Caribbean producer Jerry Bruckheimer. Originally developed by Takara Co., Ltd., the Beyblade franchise first launched in 1999 as a line of spinning-top toys in which players launch their Beyblade into a designated area or arena and clashes with another in an effort to get the other to stop spinning or be knocked out of the arena. Since its launch, Takara would begin licensing Beyblade out to other countries for selling, most notably that of Hasbro in Western countries.
The Beyblade franchise has expanded to various other mediums including a manga that ran for five years and an anime series adaptation that aired for 51 episodes in 2001. Producer Madhouse would order two sequel anime series while several spinoffs would be produced in the years since, including the four-season Beyblade: Metal Saga, two-season BeyWheelz, a standalone BeyWarriors series and the ongoing Beyblade Burst series. Development on a potential live-action Beyblade film was first explored in mid-2015 when Paramount acquired the rights to the property and years of radio silence, new progress is being made on the project.
Deadline has brought word that a Beyblade live-action movie has officially entered development at Paramount with Pirates of the Caribbean producer Jerry Bruckheimer attached. Though in the early stages of development, sources report that the studio behind the Transformers franchise is looking to potentially build a new franchise around the hit toys. Plot details are being kept under wraps for the film, though it has been confirmed Neil Widener and Gavin James are attached to pen the script.
Given the studio's renewed success in the Transformers franchise thanks to the soft reboot/prequel Bumblebee, it may not come as much of a surprise that Paramount is looking to develop another popular toy franchise for the big screen. Additionally, the first news of the Beyblade film's development came on the heels of Transformers: Age of Extinction's major box office haul of over $1.104 billion, which set it as the highest-grossing film of 2014 and the only film of the year to cross that threshold. Though it's unclear how far the previous effort got in its development, it does seem likely that time was spent determining a proper story to translate the toys to the screen.
The announcement of the Beyblade live-action movie also comes as Hasbro continues to build its film library since acquiring Entertainment One some of which include a potential Snake Eyes sequel, multiple new Transformers films and the Dungeons & Dragons film. Unlike the prior attempt, the new live-action adaptation has writers set with Widener and James, who are also attached to pen an adaptation of Hourman for Warner Bros. and Now You See Me 3 at Lionsgate. With the Beyblade live-action movie still in early development, only time will tell if the project can properly get off the ground.
Source: Deadline