No gods or kings, only Hollywood creatives
Streaming giants Netflix have aBioShockmovie to make and, after pointing their golf club at various directors, they’veselectedFrancis Lawrence. He’s best known for overseeing three of The Hunger Games movies and is working on the prequel coming out next year, The Ballad Of Songbirds And Snakes.
Netflix have also hired screenwriter Michael Green for the BioShock flick. Green wrote the Kenneth Branagh versions of Agatha Christie’s Murder On The Orient Express and Death On The Nile. I guess that means he’s got experience of period settings.
Netflixrevealedthey were planning a BioShock movie back in February, and seem to want it to become a cinematic universe. Pirates Of The Carribean director Gore Verbinski was the first directorattachedto a possible movie based on Andrew Ryan’s undersea shenanigans only a year after the game was released, but that fell through. Ken Levine said that he personally killedanother attemptby 28 Weeks Later director Juan Carlos Fresnadillo a few years later.
Along with the BioShock developments, Netflixannouncedthat they’re setting on The Umbrella Academy’s Michael Blackman as showrunner for their upcoming TV series based onHorizon Zero Dawn. Asked whether game protagonist Aloy would be the main character, Blackman said that she’ll be “a main character in our story”. Going to fill in the gaps there and take that to mean the show will be an ensemble.
The red streaming service has quite a few game adaptations in the works or already plopping onto people’s devices. I’ve covered Netflix’s live-actionResident EvilTV show already, which might end up shoving inmore charactersfrom the games than just Albert Wesker. I’m hoping for a Barry and Moira Burton sitcom, personally.
They’ve also adapted BioWare’s fantasy series for animationDragon Age: Absolution, have released another season ofDota: Dragon’s Blood, and are prepping season two of League Of Legends animation Arcane. CD Projekt’s spin-offCyberpunk: Edgerunnersis due to start streaming in September too. Oh, and then there’s another season ofThe Witchercoming.
The BioShock movie isn’t earmarked for a release date yet. Let’s hope it doesn’t turn out to be BioSchlock.
