Corona | Coming Attractions

The world's most well-known and successful filmmaker is thinking about taking a trip back in time to when the dinosaurs were kings of the planet. Steven Spielberg, director of the first two Jurassic Park films, is in talks to executive produce a new science fiction/drama for Fox Television called Terra Nova, one that derives its action from time travel.

In the pilot's story, written by Kelly Marcel and Craig Silverstein (from an initial idea thought of by Marcel), Terra Nova begins when a family living 100 years into our future travel back in time 150 million years. There in the distant past the family have adventures.

While Fox won the rights to the project last summer, they've been considering what to do with the property. The most probable plan (if Spielberg were to sign a deal and become a producer) would be for the network to greenlight the series and not just a pilot. As Variety mentions, the cost of producing the sets and special visual effects for the Terra Nova pilot is outrageously expensive; it would actually cost Fox more to make the pilot first, then store the sets (both digital and real world) and wait for word on a series pick-up. By ordering an initial number of episodes before the network execs could see the pilot Fox is betting that, should Terra Nova strike ratings gold, they'll be saving money by having fresh episodes ready for broadcast right away.

The other as-equally important person to this project is Peter Chernin, the former Fox movie president-now-producer. He's also involved in discussions to produce Terra Nova through his Chernin Entertainment company.

After deals with Spielberg and Chernin are closed, then Fox will turn its attention to finding a showrunner to get Terra Nova running up to full speed.