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Netflix to face down the Locust Horde with ambitious plan to bring 'Gears of War' to film and TV
Start stocking up on ammo for your Mark 2 Lancer Assault Rifle!
Time to stock up on that Lancer ammo, folks. Not content to rest on its video game laurels with a long-awaited feature adaptation of BioShock, Netflix has already set its sights on another beloved franchise. The streaming giant announced Monday that it will join forces with Microsoft-owned video developer The Coalition to produce a live-action film and an adult-oriented animated television series based on Gears of War, which arrived on the Xbox 360 platform 16 years ago this week.
To date, the property spans eight titles and over 40 million copies sold worldwide. As expected, Netflix hopes to launch an entire multimedia empire on the basis of this well-known brand, although The Hollywood Reporter (which first broke the news) notes that "no filmmakers or producers are attached to the multi-adaptations" right now.
Check out the official announcement below:
Reminiscent of James Cameron's Aliens, the third-person shooter follows a group of macho, futuristic soldiers led by the gravely-voiced Marcus Fennix (John DiMaggio), who wage a bloody war against a subterranean race of horrific beings known as the Locust Horde.
Hollywood has had its eyes on Gears of War since 2007 when New Line Cinema scooped up the blockbuster rights. Of course, a movie never materialized and the project fell into the dreaded pit of development hell, fluttering between studios and suffering creative setbacks. It's pretty much the same story with BioShock, a film adaptation of which languished for years before landing at Netflix earlier this year.
Speaking with G4TV in 2006, Cliff Bleszinski (lead designer at Epic Games, which developed the title before Microsoft acquired the rights in 2014) described the game as "Band of Brothers with monsters. There's no space aliens, there's none of that typical sci-fi cliche in it," he added. "It's got its own unique look and feel to it."
Looking for more sci-fi TV? Check out shows like Resident Alien, Brave New World, Project Blue Book, Eureka, Heroes, Intergalactic, and more streaming now on Peacock. Looking ahead, SYFY has the new series The Ark in the works from original Stargate film producer Dean Devlin, as well as Stargate SG-1 producer Jonathan Glassner.
