Get your hard hat and tools ready, a new Bob the Builder animated movie is officially in development at Amazon MGM Studios, with Jennifer Lopez’s production company, Nuyorican Productions at the helm.
According to Deadline, Amazon reportedly won the bidding war for Mattel’s animated feature, beating heavy hitters such as Netflix and DreamWorks Animation. The film will be produced by Nuyorican Productions and ShadowMachine, the folks behind Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio, and will star Anthony Ramos (Transformers: Rise of the Beasts, Twisters) as its titular character.
In the movie, Roberto aka Bob travels to Puerto Rico to take on a major construction job, while also dealing with issues affecting the island and learning what it means to build along the way. In addition to voicing the lead hero, Ramos will also serve as producer and was the one who proposed the idea for the film to be set in Puerto Rico.
Also producing the movie are Elaine Goldsmith-Thomas and Benny Medina from Nuyorican, along with Alex Bulkley and Corey Campodonico from ShadowMachine. Mattel’s Kevin McKeon, Ivan Sanchez and Arturo Thur De Koós will oversee the project alongside Natalie Haack Flores for Nuyorican.
The original Bob the Builder was a British animated children’s television series that ran from 12 April 1999 to 31 December 2011 and spanned 18 seasons and over 250 episodes. The show used stop-motion animation for the majority of its episodes and featured the voice talents of Rob Rackstraw, Kate Harbour, Neil Morrissey, Lorelei King, and Alan Marriott, becoming a massive success and household name worldwide, especially known for Bob’s catchphrase: “Can we fix it? Yes, we can!”
Amazon’s acquisition of Bob the Builder comes almost 10 months after the project was first announced back in January this year, and will be part of a larger collection of Mattel IPs getting the big-screen treatment following the success of the Barbie movie. These upcoming projects include the Matchbox Cars, American Girl, Polly Pocket and Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots toylines, all set to receive their movie adaptations.
It is currently unknown if the Bob the Builder movie will be released in theatres or direct to Amazon’s streaming platform, and no release date has been revealed as of yet.
Kevin is a reformed PC Master Race gamer with a penchant for franchise “duds” like Darksiders III and Dead Space 3. He has made it his life-long mission to play every single major game release – lest his wallet dies trying.
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