I’m reticent to trust any significant news scoop on today, the silliest of news reporting days. However, LR swears this is for real, so let’s run with it.

They say that screenwriter Stuart Beattie has written a new Halo movie script called Halo: The Fall of Reach, based on the Halo novel of the same name by Eric Nylund. Stuart Beattie is a fairly significant Hollywood writer, most recently he wrote the scripts for upcoming blockbusters like G.I. Joe and Baz Luhrman’s Australia. He wrote Collateral, 30 Days of Night, and has had a hand in writing nearly a dozen other recent high-profile Hollywood projects.

Hold on though, don’t get excited. This doesn’t mean the Halo movie is back on. Apparently this is something Beattie just did on his own. He’s a Halo fan and he wants a movie. It didn’t seem to be happening, so he wrote his own script between commissioned writing assignments. I’ve read “Fall of Reach”, and it’s not a terrible dimestore novel to use as source material, maybe he’s scripted something good out of it. Unfortunately, right now it’s sitting on his desk somewhere not being made. He’ll have to get someone to buy it for anything to happen with it, and judging from the quagmire the Halo project was in last time we heard anything from whoever it is that owns it now, that seems unlikely, whether or not Beattie’s script is any good.

Still, it’s nice to know that someone out there in Hollywoodland with a little clout still cares about making this thing happen. Now if only Beattie also had a couple hundred million in cash to pour into the project, or if he could convince Peter Jackson to give up on Neil Blomkamp, then maybe we’d have something.