Johnson Excited By Hercules; Lobo Film Is "Dead"

Out promoting Summit Entertainment's actioner Snitch actor Dwayne Johnson talked with MTV about his upcoming role as the ancient Greek hero in director Brett Ratner's adaptation ofHercules: The Thracian Wars.

"The next shoot, I'm really excited about, a passion project I've had now on my mind ever since I got into Hollywood, over 15 years now, Hercules. I can't wait. We're going to shoot that in Croatia and Budapest. I've been preparing for this role now for the good part of a year. Understand, for me when I was a kid, Hercules was always a hero of mine, from Steve Reeves to the multiple guys who have played Hercules, but the idea and the notion of this man. When I first got into movies, I thought, 'Gosh, I would love to do that one day.' I always thought that the version of Hercules that I want to play was one that was more dramatic and survived in barren lands and not necessarily slick in any way or anything like that. It's been around and been on my mind for some time."

An adaptation of the Steve Moore penned comic, the story follows Hercules years after he carried out his twelve tasks and has turned his back on the Gods. He discovers a higher calling as he defends the mythical Mount Olympus from an evil army.

Ryan Condal and Evan Spiliotopoulos penned the adapted script

Ratner, Beau Flynn and Barry Levine will produce.

Johnson also says that the long gestating live action film adaptation of the DC Comics title "Lobo" is dead...

“It was [there] for a minute, but then it kind of just went away. As things happen in Hollywood sometime. For a minute I was interested in it then it went away.”

In the comics, Lobo is an alien interstellar bounty hunter. The seven-foot tall, blue-skinned, indestructible and heavily muscled anti-hero rides a pimped out motorcycle, and lands on Earth in search of four fugitives who are bent on wreaking havoc. Lobo teams with a small town teenaged girl to stop them.

Johnson would have reunited with director Brad Peyton--they worked together on "Journey 2: The Mysterious Island".

Joel Silver, Akiva Goldsman and Andrew Rona were set to produce the pic.

The project has been in development for several years--It stalled again when Guy Ritchie left the pic for the "Sherlock Holmes Sequel and over the not-so-hot reaction to "Jonah Hex"