Ridley Scott, Paul Mescal collaborate for 'The Dog Stars'

Ridley Scott and Paul Mescal team up for apocalyptic thriller The Dog Stars, set for release in 2025.

Filmmaker Ridley Scott and actor Paul Mescal are set to collaborate again on The Dog Stars, a thriller following their work together on Gladiator II, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Mescal is currently in talks to star in Scott’s next film, with shooting scheduled to begin in 2025.

The Dog Stars will see Scott working alongside Steve Asbell and 20th Century Studios. The project, based on Peter Heller’s 2012 apocalyptic thriller, is being adapted by Mark L. Smith. Set in a near future where an unknown disease has ravaged American society, the story follows a civilian pilot living a solitary life on an abandoned Colorado airbase with his dog and a tough ex-Marine.

According to a synopsis from the producers, the two men, though mismatched, are forced to rely on each other to fend off roaming invaders. When a faint transmission crackles through the pilot’s 1956 Cessna’s radio, it sparks hope for a better life, prompting him to follow the static-broken signal’s trail.

Smith, Cliff Roberts, and Scott Free are producing The Dog Stars, which follows Scott’s highly anticipated Gladiator sequel. In Gladiator II, Mescal plays Lucius Verus II, the nephew of Joaquin Phoenix’s character, Commodus, from the first film. Lucius, having been forced into slavery, returns to Rome not as a ruler, but as a gladiator seeking vengeance and power, determined to restore the grandeur of Rome to its people.