Hopefully their new flick Book of Eli (which opens this weekend) will make them relevant with the youth again. But, hold up. After interviewing the brothers in our latest issue (click here to read the extended Q&A), we did a little digging and found out that they had the opportunity to make a bunch of cool movies throughout their career. Movies that would have kept their names more than relevant. Hit the jump to see what we’re talking about…

Jimi Hendrix
• After the success of Menace II Society, Allen and Albert were hit with a number of directing offers, but there was only one project they had their eyes on: a Jimi Hendrix biopic. Around the same time, Laurence Fishburne was attempting to make his own adaption of Hendrix’s biography. Last we heard about this project, the brothers were in negotiations with the Hendrix Estate. We’re guessing it wasn’t the side of the family that licensed the Jimi Hendrix Liquid Experience Energy Drink.

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Pimp
• Also on their list of dream projects was a film adaptation of Iceberg Slim’s gritty classic Pimp. This one seemed to be a go, until they found out that the rights to the movie were already spoken for. No matter, they said fuck fiction and made a documentary on the Pimp/Ho lifestyle called American Pimp.

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Hide and Seek
• After 2001’s From Hell the brothers decided to take a much needed personal and professional break from each other. In doing so, they each pursued separate projects. One of which was this story that follows a father and daughter after their wife/mother passes away and the daughter attempts to deal with the grief by thinking up an imaginary friend. It all sounded like a mix between Drop Dead Fred and The Sixth Sense.

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Art Con
• When Hide and Seek didn’t pan out, Albert made another attempt at going solo with this art crime caper that was to be produced and starred in by Michael Douglas. Mike should have taken this one instead of making The In-Laws and You, Me and Dupree.

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Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides
• While promoting Book of Eli, the brothers let slip that they were personally offered the directors chair by Johnny Depp for the upcoming fourth installment of the stupid successful Pirates of the Caribbean series. They turned it down to continue editing Eli, saying that it would have felt akin to “cheating on your girlfriend”. To that we say: Have an affair, act like an adult for once.

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Lone Ranger
• After they passed on Pirates, Disney, for some reason, went ahead and offered them the task of directing their upcoming Lone Ranger flick which is also set to star Johnny Depp. Which is basically saying, “No, we don’t want millions of dollars, thank you, though.”

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The Dark Knight Returns
• Before Chris Nolan rebooted the Batman franchise and changed people’s perceptions of what a comic book movie can be, the Hughes Brothers were offered the opportunity to bring Frank Miller’s comic-noir classic “The Return of the Dark Knight” to the silver screen. But get this: according to a recent interview with MTV, they wanted Clint Eastwood to play Bruce Wayne! Can you imagine Dirty Harry in a Batman suit? Unfortunately, the executives thought if they made they movie they wanted to make, it would bring an end to the franchise. Which is weird because we thought the franchise was over when George Clooney threw on the suit, and now look we were are.

RELATED: COMPLEX’S UNCUT INTERVIEW WITH THE HUGHES BROTHERS

While “Part IV” usually indicates that a film will bite harder than a great white, there’s some reason to believe that this latest swashbuckling episode won’t swallow sword. Check out five popular franchises that actually came correct four deep…


HARRY POTTER AND THE GOBLET OF FIRE
Finally, Hermione takes an interest in dudes. We’re still dying to see her master the magic stick, but it’s a start.

THUNDERBALL
Is it really possible to grow tired of James Bond saving the world with neat gadgets like that special “spy cam” he’s always using to gather intel on hot chicks’ cervixes?

ROCKY IV
Decades of animosity between the U.S. and U.S.S.R. and all it takes to end the Cold War is Rocky Balboa enduring a beatdown and knocking out the original poster boy for steroids, Ivan Drago (who we hear got his juice from Sylvester Stallone).

ALIEN: RESURRECTION
An alien/human hybrid clone of Ellen Ripley fights aliens. We feel slightly cheated that we didn’t get to see some cross-species coitus, but at least we got to see what their love child would look like.

LIVE FREE OR DIE HARD
John McClane fights cyber-terrorists, preventing the full-scale anarchy that would ensue from streaming porn coming to a screeching halt.