The fun thing about projects that exist adjacent to the usual Hollywood system, as opposed to fully inside it, is that we often get casting notices for them late in the game. One such turn of events is this gem: Fast & Furious franchise star Michelle Rodriguez is in Alita: Battle Angel. While the upcoming manga adaptation is very much a Fox project, it is also a Robert Rodriguez film, which means he’s calling the shots on it down in his home territory. As a result, leaks are less likely and near everything is reliant on announcements.
It seems that Michelle Rodriguez has taken on the role of a cyborg named ‘Gelda’. I have no real knowledge of the source material, but I can only assume that is a name that will be familiar to fans of the original manga series by Yukito Kishiro. The upcoming movie is supposed to be drawing from the first few volumes in that series.
The actress joins a cast already comprised of Rosa Salazar as ‘Alita’, Keean Johnson as ‘Hugo’, Mahershala Ali as ‘Vector’, Christoph Waltz as ‘Dr. Dyson Ido’, Lana Condor as ‘Koyomi’, Leonard Wu as ‘Kinuba’, Ed Skrein as ‘Zapan’, Elle Lamont as ‘Screwhead’, Sam Medina as ‘Stinger’, and Marko Zaror as ‘Ajakutty’. Jennifer Connelly, Jackie Earle Haley, Eiza Gonzalez, and Jorge Lendeborg Jr. also appear, although their specific roles have not yet been disclosed. The adaptation was scripted by James Cameron and Laeta Kalogridis, and is produced by Jon Landau and Cameron. This will mark Michelle Rodriguez’s third collaboration with Robert Rodriguez and her second with James Cameron. She previously appeared in the Machete films and Avatar, respectively. She will next be seen in Universal’s The Fate of the Furious and Walter Hill’s (Re) Assignment.
Alita: Battle Angel is slated to arrive in cinemas on July 20th, 2018.
