The History of the development of the new Planet of the Apes film is one of constant change and little is known for sure about what exactly this project will be like in the end. By the title "The Visitor" one can assume that the film will involve at least one astronaut visitor from Earth's past encountering a world of Earth's future ruled by Apes. The movie is not planned as a sequel or continuation of the previous movie storyline established from the preceding 5 Planet of the Apes movies, TV series, or animated series. To put it simply that means old rules and notions of what Apes can and can not do probably will not apply in this new film. That means the film could have more Ape species than just the familiar gorillas, chimpanzees, and orangautauns. Many other aspects of Ape society could be different as well.

It is interesting that Linda Harrison the original Nova is planned to have a planned cameo role in the new film. Charlton Heston the original astronaut and talking human Taylor is also rumored to have a small cameo role as an Ape possibly a gorilla soldier. Considering Heston's cameo appearance in the second film, Beneath the Planet of the Apes as a favor for 20th Century Fox it seems logical that Heston would want to be in this revival also being handled by 20th Century Fox to possibly relaunch the Apes saga as well.

Makeup for this movie has been slated to be done by Rick Baker a makeup artist known for his work in Star Wars, Nutty Professor and other movies. Tim Burton has signed on as the director of this film. Burton is famous for his directing of the Nightmare Before Christmas movie, and Batman Returns. Hopefully this Apes sequel will not be as poorly directed as the second Batman movie which so denegrated from the first.

With a planned release in July 2001, much can change between now and then. The lead astronaut character to be played by Mark Wahlberg has a clause in his contract for a sequel so if this movie proves a success then he could be placed in a second one much how Charlton Heston was placed in the first two Apes movies. During the production so far which began in October 2000 a background scene artist, Paul Trachtenberg has died during production after falling from a distance off the ground while painting a backdrop.

Before things became more or less finalized as to the chief star and director for this movie, the big rumor was that director James Cameron and actor Arnold Schwarznegger would be in this movie. While that no longer is the case it still makes one ponder just what a Planet of the Apes with Arnold would be like. Would he have made a better human or gorilla?