Tobey Maguire may be trading in one geek property for another. While rumors continue to rumble around whether or not Maguire will show up for a fourth Spider-Man film, HR says he’s considering a role in a new Warner Brothers film based on Robotech.

For those who don’t already know, Robotech is another one of those giant robot franchises lurking out there waiting to pick up Transformers’ scraps. Except unlike Transformers, the giant robots in Robotech are more like fighting vehicles, piloted by humans in a distant future where man must use giant robots to fight off an alien invasion. It’s kind of like the poor man’s Mechwarrior.

Like Transformers, Robotech was a cartoon in 80s. It originated in Japan, but was re-edited and re-aired in the United States. Unlike Transformers, it was never very successful. The show was watched only by a few hardcore geeks, and the subsequent role playing games, comics, toys and ancillary Robotech products it generated were loved only by a few niche fans. It just doesn’t have the built in American audience that Optimus Prime, or even other giant robot franchises like Voltron have.

Maguire is connected to the effort to turn Robotech into a movie through his production company Maguire Entertainment. Tobey is producing the movie for Warner Brothers, and because of that is also considering playing the movie’s lead. It’s somewhat surprising that he’d even entertain the notion of piloting a giant fightin robot, Tobey has always seemed pretty disinterested in the whole blockbuster movie thing and I’d always thought most of the will he won’t he talk concerning Spider-Man was in large part because Maguire wanted to get back to making more artsy movies. Apparently not.