"[3] On November 4, 1998, it was reported that Laura Bickford would serve as producer on an upcoming Che Guevera project that McQuarrie planned to write and direct.
[11] On March 25, 2002, IGN reported that McQuarrie was being sought to perform rewrites for the historical epic Men of Destiny, directed by John Woo and initially written by Tom Vaughan and previously revised by Mike Werb and Michael Colleary.
[11] McQuarrie had written the action thriller screenplay Iron Curtain in 2003,[13] and by March 2004 was attached to also direct and produce the project for Intermedia,[14] before the rights later transferred to the Resurgence Media Group.
[18] In February 2005, McQuarrie was hired to rewrite the screenplay of a remake of Logan's Run (1976), to be directed by Bryan Singer and produced by Joel Silver.
[21] On November 16, 2008, it was announced that McQuarrie would co-write and co-produce with Guillermo del Toro a film adaptation of the 1960s television series The Champions for United Artists, with Tom Cruise and Paula Wagner also producing the project.
[24] On January 4, 2011, it was announced that the project had moved to Fox 2000, with George Clooney now attached to star as Douglas Preston and McQuarrie now co-writing the script with Nathan Alexander.
[35] The film was eventually released on Netflix on December 10, 2021, under the title The Unforgivable, with Peter Craig, Hillary Seitz, and Courtenay Miles credited for the screenplay.
[39][40] On October 14, 2011, it was announced that McQuarrie would write, direct, and produce Rubicon, a new multimedia property which was to be centered around United States Navy SEALs and would additionally be developed as a video game and graphic novel.
[41] On August 7, 2012, it was announced that McQuarrie would write and produce a film adaptation of the Tom Clancy novel Without Remorse for Paramount Pictures, with an eye towards directing the project.
[43][44] On May 6, 2013, it was announced that McQuarrie had been set by Warner Bros. to write and direct the action thriller Ice Station Zebra, a remake of the 1968 film of the same name and itself adapted from the 1963 novel by Alistair MacLean.
[45] On November 20, 2013, it was announced that McQuarrie would direct an adaptation of the Jean-Patrick Manchette novel Three to Kill for Andrew Lauren Productions, with Colin Firth set to star in the project and Howard A. Rodman writing the screenplay.
[48] In April 2018, it was reported that McQuarrie and Henry Cavill had discussed ideas for a Man of Steel sequel during production of Mission: Impossible – Fallout.