See The First Look At The New Planet Of The Apes

Kingdom of the Planet Apes has cast Freya Allan in the lead and the first image is of an ape riding a horse in front of a dystopian city

By Doug Norrie | Updated

planet of the apes

Planet of the Apes is heading back to the movie theaters and from the early look at things, we are getting another dystopian addition to the franchise. The first image from the film was released in anticipation of the flick and on the back of some bigger casting news that is starting to have Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes taking shape. In the image we see an ape riding a horse rather confidently with a long-since decimated city in the background. It’s already starting to look every bit like a worthy entry into the franchise.

Deadline had the first image release which came from 20th Century Studios. And in addition to this first teaser image of what’s to come for Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes, we also got word that they’ve added a couple of folks to star in the movie. Freya Allan (The Witcher) has joined on as the lead human though her specific character isn’t known at this point. They are still fairly early in that process.

In addition to Freya Allan, we also know that Owen Teague and Peter Macon are part of the cast as well. Teague will play the lead ape, which could be the analog for what we saw with Andy Serkis in the previous trilogy of movies. In those, Serkis played Caesar, the leader of the tribe of apes who’ve, well, made it their planet. Plenty of others got into these roles from the movies, so we should see more casting news along this front in due time. It’s not known who (or what) Macon will be playing.

Apparently, Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes will follow along in the same universe as the three previous films, Rise of the Planet of the Apes, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, and War for the Planet of the Apes which came out between 2011 and 2017. In those, we got the full story of how the apes became genetically enhanced and ultimately took over the world. This movie will be set years (though it’s not known how many) after the conclusion of the third film in that previous trilogy.

Along with the casting news for Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes, we also know that Wes Ball will be directing. He’s helmed all three movies in The Maze Runner trilogy before, so he’s gotten a taste of this relative genre at least. The script was penned by Josh Friedman, Rick Jaffa, Amanda Silver, and Patrick Aison. 

There currently isn’t a set timeline on when we will see Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes though the studio is hinting that it should be sometime in 2023. With the creatives and the leads ironed out for the film, some of the production schedule should get rolling downhill here shortly. It could be set up to be another blockbuster with the previous three all hitting around $500 million at the box office each. Stay tuned for how this movie starts to take shape.