Once came sequels, then came reboots. Now it’s the season for video game adaptations, with FX bringing yet another one!
With the success of Fallout and the debates about Borderlands and Halo, it’s not too surprising to learn that another popular video game franchise adaptation is in the works. Rob Mac (formerly McElhenney) is teaming up with Noah Hawley to bring us a Far Cry TV series.
The first Far Cry adaptation
As Variety points out, this is the first time the Far Cry games have been adapted for TV. There were some direct-to-video adaptations, and there was an animated series inspired by Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon, but this is the first time since the Far Cry games were first released in 2004 that a live-action TV series has been adapted.
Over the course of the last 21 years, there have been numerous spinoffs and sequels to the main game. Far Cry 6 was the most recently released in 2021.
It’s not clear if Mac and Hawley will choose to adapt a specific story or if there will be an attempt to amalgamate or just create a whole new story. One of the reasons Fallout was so successful is that it set itself in a different timeline from the video games, but it kept all the mythology the same. Likewise, one of the reasons Borderlands failed so much was due to the mismatch of characters from the various games and the decision not to really follow the universe already set up.
Each game is an anthology
When it comes to the Far Cry games, each one is a standalone story. The series of games has created an anthology of storytelling, and it’s something Hawley loves. He shared that it offers him something similar to what he’s done with Fargo, in the sense that that crime series has a variation on a theme.
The series is expected to have an anthology element to it, though. Each season is set to have a different cast and setting, which will follow similar themes to the games.
If anyone can create a successful adaptation, its these two. Not only does Hawley have Fargo under his belt, but he’s also developed the recently renewed Alien: Earth and the three-season series Legion, which gained high praise. Mac is famous for creating the longest-running live-action sitcom in American history, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, while also developing the docuseries Welcome to Wrexham.
Far Cry will debut on FX, but it will also stream on Hulu and Disney+ in the U.S. and internationally, respectively.