We’ve not heard much movement on Spielberg’s adaptation of Daniel H. Wilson’s ROBOPOCALYPSE for quite some time now, and the problem looks to have been the sheer size of the thing if this news is anything to go by. Seems rival studios Dreamworks and 20th Century Fox have put aside their differences to announce they are joining forces to co-finance Steve’s (hopefully) epic vision of a future Robot Uprising!*

Daniel H. Wilson’s novel was only released this summer, so there’ll be a lot of people out there unfamiliar with the story (including myself, but I’m already sold on that goofy title to be honest), so I went and dug up the official synopsis for us to read…

“In the near future, at a moment no one will notice, all the dazzling technology that runs our world will unite and turn against us. Taking on the persona of a shy human boy, a childlike but massively powerful artificial intelligence known as Archos comes online and assumes control over the global network of machines that regulate everything from transportation to utilities, defense and communication.

In the months leading up to this, sporadic glitches are noticed by a handful of unconnected humans—a single mother disconcerted by her daughter’s menacing “smart” toys, a lonely Japanese bachelor who is victimized by his domestic robot companion, an isolated U.S. soldier who witnesses a ‘pacification unit’ go haywire—but most are unaware of the growing rebellion until it is too late. When the Robot War ignites—at a moment known later as Zero Hour—humankind will be both decimated and, possibly, for the first time in history, united…”

Ok, so that might not have been the movie I envisioned having that title (and doesn’t it all sound like very familiar sci-fi territory – Skynet, The Matrix mythos, etc?) but we’re sold on ideas such as “a lonely Japanese bachelor who is victimized by his domestic robot companion.” I’d see a feature based on that premise alone!

Expect the ROBOPOCALYPSE to kick-off sometime 2013. We’ll keep a close eye on this one, folks!

* In the year two-thousand! (That one’s for you, Conchord fans!)

Have you read ROBOPOCALYPSE? Will it make for a good feature? Are you excited by the prospect of Spielberg returning to sci-fi? Let us know in the Comments or on Twitter @Starburst_Mag