WIRE Buzz: Paramount Animation adopts Stray Dogs; Candyman delayed until 2021; Sega and Nintendo get their war on

Paramount Animation is looking to adopt some stray dogs. Wait. We misread that. Paramount Animation is looking to adapt the horror comic Stray Dogs. Okay. That makes far more sense.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, the animation arm of the venerable studio has bought the film rights to the soon-to-be published comic book by Tony Fleecs and Trish Forstner that the media outlet is describing as “Silence of the Lambs meets Lady and the Tramp.” Wait. We did not misread that. Okay. Wow.

Mark Perez, the writer behind Game Night, is on board to pen the script, with Gary Dauberman, the writer of It and It: Chapter 2 and director of Annabelle Comes Home, set to produce through his Coin Operated banner for Paramount. No word yet as to whether Dauberman will direct. 

In a statement issued to THR, Dauberman said that he wants to use the format of animation to take “something innocent” and “twist it into something terrifying.”

“So much of what makes horror work is taking something innocent and twisting it into something scary,” he said. “And that’s what we want to do in Stray Dogs -- take animation and twist it into something terrifying by using it to explore a really dark story. For me, the project combines a lot of my passions: animation, horror and … well, dogs.”

Although the film rights were just acquired, Image Comics will let the Dogs out in comic book form next year. 

Up next, look in the mirror and say his name five, six, as many times as you want, but the Candyman isn't coming for you anytime this year. Amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, the release date for Nia DaCosta's Candyman has been pushed back yet again.

Credit: Universal Pictures

Variety is reporting that the film won't get a theatrical release until sometime in 2021. This news immediately follows the announcement that Warner Bros.' Wonder Woman 1984 won't be released until Christmas.

Back in June, Universal and MGM delayed the horror film's release by three weeks to Oct. 16 (this after the film had been pushed to September after initially being slated for a June release).

Being promoted as a “spiritual sequel” to the original 1992 film of the same name directed by Bernard Rose, the film centers on a struggling artist (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II) who discovers an urban legend about the Candyman, a murderous man with a hook for a hand who can be summoned if one looks in a mirror and repeats his name five times.

DaCosta, who's set to direct Captian Marvel 2 next, weighed in on the decision to delay the film on Twitter. 

And finally, get ready for the battle of the decade. The decade, of course, being the 1990s, then the battle for which video game console would rule the world. Nintendo vs. Sega! Mario vs. Sonic! Brother versus brother! Console vs. console!

CBS All Access has released the trailer for Console Wars, a new documentary following the war games between Sega and Nintendo for who gets to rule the '90s. The Official Selection of the 2020 SXSW Film Festival goes back to 1990, when fledgling arcade company Sega decided to take on the then-Goliath of video game companies, Nintendo. Sure, Nintendo was the biggest gaming company in the world, and it had a megastar princess-saving Italian plumber in its corner. But Sega, the little-company-that-could, had guts, grit, and gumption. It also had a secret weapon in the form of a speedy little blue hedgehog in its corner.

In Console Wars, directed by Blake J. Harris (author of book of the same name) and Jonah Tulis, the folks who fought on the front lines for Sega and Nintendo reveal the details behind the generation-defining battle. Check out the trailer below.

Console Wars will available to stream Sept. 23 on CBS All Access.