Director David Fincher’s latest project, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea has finally fallen through and won’t be happening. Does this mean he can focus on the recently rewritten Girl Who Played with Fire?

As Fincher was working with Disney on 20,000 Leagues, it isn’t exactly surprising that the film is dead. After two major blockbusters in consecutive years flopping (John Carter and Lone Ranger), both which used material that was over 50-years-old, we imagine Disney doesn’t want to risk yet another $100+ million on material that might not resonate with its audience.

The Lone Ranger and its poor box office numbers might have scared Disney away from Fincher’s latest project, as Lone Ranger was primed to be a hit. With Johnny Depp starring, Verbinski directing, and Pirates of the Caribbean producer Jerry Bruckheimer as the glue holding it all together, they were expecting a solid box office hit.

Disney is certainly scared of “old” material not taking with current audiences. Ever since it was announced that David Fincher was going to be directing 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, fans were a bit disappointed that he wouldn’t be following up The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo with its sequel, The Girl Who Played with Fire.

After actress Rooney Mara portrayed one of the most incredible female roles ever written, Lisbeth Salander, we were dying to see her with a black mohawk and dozens of piercings up on the big screen again.

But it seems that Fincher plans on focusing on the thriller, Gone Girl. Ben Affleck will be taking on the lead role, Nick Dunne, a man whose wife, Amy, goes missing during their fifth anniversary. An interesting bit of news is that Reese Witherspoon’s production company will be producing the film.

Affleck’s character ends up becoming the prime suspect in his wife’s disappearance. The role of Amy, who would be playing Affleck’s wife, has not yet been cast. The film is based on the bestselling thriller by Gillian Flynn, who also penned the script for the film.

So while we’re a bit disappointed that Fincher doesn’t appear to be working on a Dragon Tattoo sequel, his latest project looks equally as exciting.

What’s interesting is The Playlist is reporting that 20,000 Leagues has been dead for months, so why are we now just hearing about his departure and the film being dropped?

Apparently the funding for the film was a “desperate bid” by the Australian government in an attempt to bring the filmmaking their way – injecting millions into their film industry and local economy.

Collider reports that the real problems began when Brad Pitt passed on the lead role in 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. Fincher would later approach Daniel Craig and Matt Damon, but the reported 140 day shoot in Australia proved to be too much time away for the actors.

Rumors swirled that Disney wanted Thor’s Chris Hemsworth, but David Fincher disagreed and left the project entirely. This lead to the final nail in the coffin of the 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea film adaptation. Not many seemed excited about the project other than Fincher, so dropping the film may have been Disney’s goal all along.

It seems Fincher is focused solely on Gone Girl, which is supposedly planned to shoot this fall. There aren’t many solid casting details known as of yet, but THR reports that actress Rosamund Pike is ahead for the lead female role, which was also offered to Emily Blunt, Natalie Portman, and Charlize Theron.

We still hope that David Fincher will find time in the next few years to work on The Girl Who Played with Fire, as Rooney Mara and Daniel Craig developed an incredible chemistry on set, and while the film only saw a worldwide box office total of $232 million, it was still a massive hit with audiences and critics.

The script for The Girl Who Played with Fire was also rewritten recently by Andrew Kevin Walker, who interestingly enough worked with Fincher on his 1995 hit, Se7en, with Brad Pitt. So while we may not get Fincher as a director, there still may be some hope for the sequel getting made.

While some would argue that the Swedish film versions of the books are better, it’s hard to say unless we saw what Fincher would have done with the other two films. More importantly, Fincher’s version of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo was something that American audiences had simply never seen before.