‘Flash Gordon’ Movie To Be Directed By ‘Overlord’s Julius Avery

The long-delayed Flash Gordon movie project just showed new signs of life, as Fox just announced that Julius Avery has hired to direct.

Avery just finished up his new film for Paramount, the J.J. Abrams-produced Overlord, and will now set about helming the Flash Gordon movie. Matthew Vaughn was originally thought to take on the director’s role, but now he will produce the film alongside John Davis and Hearst (via Deadline).

Aside from Overlord scoring good early reviews (it officially releases on November 9th), Avery is a big fan of the character, as he evidently grew up in Australia reading the Flash Gordon comic series. That love of the franchise showed itself in his pitch to Fox, a pitch the studio loved and one that helped get the movie moving again.

ComicBook.com had the chance to speak to the star of the original Flash Gordon Sam Jones, who gave a bit of an update on the project.

“It’s common knowledge that FOX Studios, it’s been there for I think going on for three years in development,” Jones said. Usually, that’s a term in the movie business when they use “in development’ it means they don’t really have the money, but we’re talking about FOX. I hope it happens. They brought in John Davis as the senior producer. I talked with him a couple of months ago and it’s still in development.”

Fans will have to wait a bit longer to see their favorite hero hit the big screen it seems, but they can soon see Jones on the small screen thanks to his Life After Flash documentary.

“The original concept was the influence that the character Flash Gordon had on the world before the movie,” Jones said, “and of course, after the movie came out the influence the movie has had on myself and on the world. It’s the first time in my life that I’ve had an unrestricted platform to just be myself. I’m not worried about where the camera is or what I’m saying. It’s about my life with failures and successes. It’s going to be very rewarding and uplifting. There’s pieces of gold and nuggets from people in my life who have influenced me and I just want to pass that on.”

No release date for Flash Gordon has been revealed, but Overlord hits theaters on November 9th.