Robert Rodriguez is about to go back to the future - or, to borrow the spin from the Grindhouse publicity, go “back to back” to the future. Quite obviously, he’s not preparing a remake of Robert Zemeckis’ unparalleled time travel trilogy but instead, prepping a pair of future-bound movies of his own. First up is Nerverackers, now in pre-production and then, confirmed to MTV as his next project, is the long brewing live-action adaptation of The Jetsons. Yet another delay for Sin City 2, the promised sequel that I’m personally most doubtful we’ll ever get to see. Details on Nerveracker and The Jetsons to follow.

Nerveracker has been on the boil at least since 2001. The official press release described it like this:

Nerveracker is set in the year 2085 and centers on the character Joe Tezca, part of an elite unit who is sent in to stop a crime wave amongst a perfect futuristic society. In the process, he discovers that “Nerverackers” are on a rampage for control of the city. Tezca consequently sets forth on a mission to reveal the cover up by the ruling class and stop the “Nerverackers” before time runs out. Nerveracker is set for an April 16, 2010 release.

That’s all well and good but… what on earth is a Nerveracker? Why does it want to take control of “the city” and why do the ruling class want to cover it up? I guess we’ll know pretty soon.

The very same press release confirmed that The Jetsons was still in development, though gave no indication of when it would shoot. Rodriguez has now told MTV that “We’re writing the script right now”, which probably means the widely distributed Adam F. Goldberg draft will likely have little resemblance to the produced picture. It wasn’t a terrible script, but it had almost nothing to say and I would exactly be sad to see it hit the shredder.

With two future metropolises (Metropoli? Metropolodes?) to conceive, I’m hoping Rodriguez and his designers have got the stuff to make each of them distinct, immersive and compelling. Perhaps he can get Sid Mead on the blower and buy a bit of that Blade Runner pixie dust.

It might be timely to recall that, for a good while, Robert Rodriguez was in the frame to direct the Land of the Lost motion picture. He seems a good fit for some of the Kroft properties, if you ask me. Lidsville, maybe? Just imagining that makes me smile. Throw in Johnny Depp as Weenie the Genie and I’ll pre-order the DVD now.

Okay, there’s one little assumption at the heart of this story that might just be plain wrong. Rodriguez told MTV that The Jetsons would film “next year”, and I have assumed that this procludes any other film of his going before cameras in the meantime. Judging from his typical turnaround times, I’d say that’s most likely right, and particularly so with producing projects like Predators tapping into his time too.