Weekly news round-up: Indy 5, Han Solo spin-off casting and The Crow loses its director

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by Phil de Semlyen |
Published on

This week in news: Harrison Ford to don Indy's fedora again, Han Solo spinoff gets close to casting, Spielberg taps Pegg, The Crow gets grounded and Miss Peregrine’s Home For Peculiar Children gets a trailer.

Spielberg and Pegg to make sci-fi magic

Among the week’s exciting casting news - Guillermo del Toro picking Sally Hawkins and [Octavia Spencer](http://www.empireonline.com/people/Octavia Spencer) for his new project, and Game Of Thrones' Finn Jones becoming Iron Fist - word of [Simon Pegg joining Steven Spielberg’s Ready Player One](http://www.empireonline.com/movies/star-wars-force-awakens/simon-pegg-steven-spielberg-ready-player-one/) really piqued our interest. The pair have plenty of history, from Tintin to Band Of Brothers, and enough passion for sci-fi between them to ensure the on-set conversations on Ready Player One are really, really geeky. Oh yes… and Pegg’ll be playing a VR genius called Ogden Morrow. Probably worth mentioning.

The Crow gets re-hatched

There’s not a lot of room for sentiment in Hollywood. Even so, Corin Hardy’s departure from The Crow this week seemed like particularly scant reward for many months' careful guardianship of one of the most beloved, but fragile properties in the comic-book canon. Under new ownership, [the resurrected Relativity Media has returned to the drawing board again to find a new vision for its reboot](

http://www.empireonline.com/movies/crow/crow-remake-loses-director-corin-hardy/). Cursed? No. Unhappy? Definitely.

Han Solo casting? It’s complicated

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Smuggle, scoundrel, hero and one-time Jabba wall mount, Han Solo has lived enough lives for several cocky space cowboys. He’s about to live another one, with Disney narrowing its search for his younger incarnation down to three actors. [Alden Ehrenreich, Jack Reynor and Taron Egerton are the lucky three now vying for the keys to the Millennium Falcon](

http://www.empireonline.com/movies/star-wars-force-awakens/star-wars-han-solo-harrison-ford-casting-alden-ehrenreich-taron-egerton/). But as a wise Highlander once said, there can be only one. Who will it be?

Mr Burton's trailer of wonderful weirdness

While James Bobin tackles Alice’s latest adventures, former Wonderland-er Tim Burton is busy bringing another complicated child to life in his adaptation of Ransom Riggs’ Miss Peregrine’s Home For Peculiar Children. [The film’s new trailer landed this week](

http://www.empireonline.com/people/tim-burton/miss-peregrine-home-peculiar-children-trailer-tim-burton/ ) offering plenty of Burtonesque weirdness along with a vague tang of Addams Family ghoulishness. We liked it and we think you will too.

Harrison Ford to whip crack away again

While even Harrison Ford’s acting skills don’t stretch to playing a young Han Solo, Steven Spielberg thinks he’s more than capable of cracking a whip, donning a fedora and rampaging (carefully) through the perilous world of antiquities. Yes, after years of speculation, Indiana Jones is back in a fifth - or fourth, depending on how absolute your stance on The Crystal Skull is - instalment of the matinee hero’s adventures. [It’s official](

http://www.empireonline.com/people/harrison-ford/harrison-ford-back-hat-disney-makes-new-indiana-jones-official/).

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