Although Edgar Rice Burroughs (1875-1950) is justifiably famous as the creator of Tarzan of the Apes, that uprooted Englishman was not his only popular hero. Burroughs's first sale (in 1912) was A Princess of Mars, opening the floodgates to one of the must successful -and prolific - literary careers in history. This is a wonderful scientific romance that perhaps can be best described as early science fiction melded with an epic dose of romantic adventure. A Princess of Mars is the first adventure of John Carter, a Civil War veteran who unexpectedly find himself transplanted to the planet Mars. Yet this red planet is far more than a dusty, barren place; it's a fantasy world populated with giant green barbarians, beautiful maidens in distress, and weird flora and monstrous fauna the likes of which could only exist in the author's boundless imagination. Sheer escapism of the tallest order, the Martian novels are perfect entertainment for those who find Tarzan's fantastic adventures aren't, well, fantastic enough.

This project has been bouncing around a while now in Hollywood before landing up at Pixar. It began life as A Princess of Mars (named after the first book in the series), a $100 million Robert Rodriguez project at Paramount. (Interestingly Rodriguez hired famous fantasy painter Frank Frazetta to do some designs for the flick.) Then it moved on to Kerry Conran, who had just finished Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow (2004). In 2005, Conran left and was replaced by Jon Favreau, the Zathura and Iron Man director. Paramount however got cold feet and sold the rights to Pixar.

If all goes according to plan it will be Pixar’s second live-action movie. Yup, Pixar is venturing into the scary waters of live action film-making. We will see how it all turns out. Their first such film will be Brad (The Incredibles, Ratatouille) Bird’s 1906, a crime drama set in that year on the eve of the huge fire that practically destroyed San Francisco.

Andrew Stanton, fresh from his WALL-E triumph, will direct John Carter of Mars.

In January 2009 Stanton told Sci-Fi wire that "[I'm] deep into it... I'm on my next draft of it. We're in preproduction art-wise, and we're starting to talk to actors. So it's full bore."

He also confirmed that it will be live-action: "I think that's the only way. I mean, there are so many creatures and characters that half of it's going to be CG whether you want it to be [or not], just to realize some of these images that are in the book. But it will feel real. The whole thing will feel very, very believable."

Will John Carter of Mars actually happen? After all, costs will be prohibitive (especially those four-armed Martian warriors!) and Pixar won’t be the first studio get cold feet at first sight of the bill. Personally we believe that it will make for an excellent Saturday matinee adventure flick for boys, the sort of thing that Ray Harryhausen did with his Sinbad flicks. It’s a pity that 2D animation is out of favor because then Disney can give it the same treatment that it gave Burroughs’ Tarzan. And save on costs in the process.