Sharkslayer (lost early draft of "Shark Tale" DreamWorks CGI animated film; 2002)

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The poster of the finished film.

Status: Lost

Shark Tale was an animated comedy film released by DreamWorks Animation on October 1st, 2004, in the United States. It was directed by Vicky Jenson, Bibo Bergeron and Rob Letterman and featured an all-star cast including Will Smith, Angelina Jolie, Robert De Niro, Renée Zellweger, Martin Scorsese and Jack Black. While the film would become a box office success, it did not fare well critically, though it has developed a cult following in the nearly 20 years since its release.

The film was first announced as DreamWorks' next film called "Sharkslayer" in December 2001 by USA Today after the success of Shrek the same year^[1] and it wouldn't be until April 2002 that the film was confirmed to be in production with the screenplay being written by Letterman and Michael J. Wilson^[2]. The film originally was going to be more serious and dark than the family-friendly comedic tone it would eventually have. Despite being halfway completed, the title of the film was changed to "Shark Tale" in September 2003 due to producer Bill Damaschke feeling that the new title sounded less violent and more family-friendly than the original title^[3]^[4]. The tone of the script would later be changed to match its more family-friendly title and a character named Willie the Orca (voiced by Vincent Pastore) was dropped.

Despite several casting changes and its release date getting changed numerous times, the film met its release without any further troubles.

The film's original title was used in several newspaper and magazine advertisements, but the original script with its more darker and serious tone has yet to surface.