Tag: Westworld

Posted on in Television News

Chloe Grace Moretz To Lead Amazon’s Sci-Fi Mystery Series ‘The Peripheral’ – Based On Novel By William Gibson

A while ago it was announced that Westworld’s Lisa Joy and Jonathan Nolan would be producing a brand new science fiction series The Peripheral, based on the William Gibson novel for Warner Bros. Television and Amazon Studios that will air on Prime Video with Scott B. Smith and Greg Plageman set to showrun.

Variety reports that Chloe Grace Moretz (Kick-Ass, Let Me In) has nabbed the role of Flynne Fisher in the show.

The series centers on Flynne Fisher (Moretz), a woman trying to hold together the pieces of her broken family in a forgotten corner of tomorrow’s America. Flynne is smart, ambitious and doomed. She has no future – until the future comes calling for her.

It’s certain one of the upcoming adaptations at Amazon I’m very interested in seeing come together.

William Gibson is credited as creating the cyberpunk genre as we know it starting with his seminal novel Neuromancer and his work has gone to influence things like The Matrix franchise, Altered Carbon, and the upcoming video game Cyberpunk 2077.

Chloe recently joined Miramax’s upcoming sci-fi flick Mother/ Android that will be written and directed by Mattson Tomlin (The Batman, Project Power).

SOURCE: VARIETY

Posted on in Television News

Michael Crichton Sci-Fi Film ‘Sphere’ Getting A Series Reboot At HBO – ‘Westworld’s Denise Thé To Showrun

HBO has had some moderate success with its modern series adaptation of the Michael Crichton film Westworld as the series moves into the fourth season (expected to have six seasons). 

Variety has learned that HBO will develop a series based on Crichton’s novel Sphere with Westworld’s Denise Thé set to write, showrun, and produce the new sci-fi show. 

The novel was adapted into a feature film directed by Barry Levinson (Wag The Dog, Toys, Rain Man, Sleepers) film that was released in 1998 starring Dustin Hoffman, Samuel L. Jackson, Sharon Stone, Liev Schriber, Queen Latifah, and Peter Coyote. 

SPHERE – When psychologist Norman Goodman (Dustin Hoffman) wrote a report for the government on how to deal with extraterrestrial life forces, he didn’t expect his recommendations to be used. Now that a secret government agency is investigating what may be an alien spaceship that has been discovered partially buried on the floor of the Pacific Ocean, Norman finds that the plan he outlined is being put into effect and that the team he named in his report has been assembled.

I’ll be honest, it wasn’t the most impactful sci-fi film as movies like The Abyss and Event Horizon had previously tread similar ground. It was pretty much one of those films from the 1990s you would just forget was made. I revisited the film recently and the CGI effects didn’t age well, weren’t great for the era either.

Dustin Hoffman had led the studio’s box office hit Outbreak in 1995, which is likely behind the thinking of Warner Bros. to cast him as the film’s lead. A huge miscasting.

Sphere would end up becoming a big flop for Warner Bros. as it barely earned it’s budget back and wasn’t able to turn a profit. It doesn’t hurt that the twist and ending were more than just a little anticlimactic when it’s revealed the ship isn’t alien, but actually from the future and built by humans. 

Certainly, a property that could be improved upon with a new series exploration. 

SOURCE: VARIETY

Posted on in Television News

‘Fallout’ Series Officially Coming To Amazon – Produced By ‘Westworld’s Lisa Joy and Jonathan Nolan

Another high-concept and potentially expense series is coming to Amazon Prime Video.

Today, game developer Bethesda announced that they’re partnering with Amazon Studios and Kilter Films to bring to life a live-action series based on the beloved post-apocalypse video game franchise Fallout.

They’ve hired Westworld series co-creators and showrunners Lisa Joy and Jonathan Nolan to develop the show for the streaming service via Kilter Films and will act as producers. Nolan is also known as a screenwriter working on his brother Christopher Nolan’s films such as Interstellar, The Prestige, The Dark Knight, and The Dark Knight Rises.

Here is the press release.

Amazon Studios has licensed the rights to the worldwide best-selling game franchise Fallout, with acclaimed producers Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy’s Kilter Films attached to produce the project, currently in development with a series commitment.

The world of Fallout is one where the future envisioned by Americans in the late 1940s explodes upon itself through a nuclear war in 2077. The magic of the Fallout world is the harshness of the wasteland set against the previous generation’s utopian idea of a better world through nuclear energy. It is serious and harsh in tone, yet sprinkled with moments of ironic humor and B-movie-nuclear-fantasies.Fallout games have achieved record-setting sales and received hundreds of awards, including dozens of Game of the Year awards, while its mobile game, Fallout Shelter, has been downloaded more than 170 million times.

Fallout is from Amazon Studios and Kilter Films in association with Bethesda Game Studios and Bethesda Softworks, with executive producers Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy, and Athena Wickham for Kilter Films, Todd Howard for Bethesda Game Studios, and James Altman for Bethesda Softworks.

The pair’s Kilter Films is also in pre-production on their series adaptation of the William Gibson cyberpunk novel The Peripheral.

Lisa Joy recently made her feature film directorial debut with her sci-fi thriller Reminiscence for Warner Bros. starring Hugh Jackman, Rebecca Ferguson, and Thandie Newton.

This is yet another high-profile series in development at Amazon Prime Video as they’re about to resume production on their fantasy shows such as The Lord of The Rings and The Wheel of Time.

If successful, I’m curious if Amazon Studios will also attempt to license the rights for Doom and Skyrim in the future to give those properties series adaptations as well.

SOURCE: BETHESDA

Posted on in Film News

Claire Foy Stars In Period Horror Flick ‘Dust’ – ‘Westworld’s Karrie Crouse Penned Script and Co-Directs

Deadline has news of another interesting film project coming out of the Cannes Virtual Market. British actress Claire Foy will star in an original psychological horror film titled Dust that will be set in Oklahoma during the 1930s.

Westworld writer Karrie Crouse penned the script and will co-direct the film with William Joines. The project from MadRiver is seeking international partners this week with Mad Dog Films and Secret Engine producing.

Foy will play a young mother in 1930s Oklahoma who is haunted by her past and trapped in horrifying dust storms. She becomes convinced that her family is threatened by a mysterious presence and takes extraordinary measures to protect them.

Foy is best known from her work on the Netflix series The Crown. She recently starred in Damien Chazelle’s First Man and attempted to take over the Lisbeth Salander mantle from Rooney Mara in Sony’s soft-reboot The Girl In The Spider’s Web.

Dust sounds like an interesting concept and we’ll have to wait to hear when they plan on starting production on the horror movie.

SOURCE: DEADLINE