Rawson Marshall Thurber, director of Netflix’s upcoming Red Notice, is taking over the reins of the long-gestating video game adaptation.
Mentioning that a film adaptation of the popular ‘loot-em-up’ game franchise The Division, is on the way is certainly not new news. In fact, the long-gestating adaptation seems to have been in traction for some years now, pretty much ever since the first game itself released in 2016.
With its haunting (and undoubtedly cinematic) post-civilisation setting featuring a deserted New York in quarantine due to virus, a film adaptation could hardly be more timely. However, despite having the likes of Jake Gyllenhaal and Jessica Chastain attached to the project, The Division has run through a series of directors without ever seeming to fully grind into motion.
Netflix acquired the rights to the project in 2019 and it finally seems like the film may finally be moving towards production. As a result, the project’s previous director, David Leitch, has had to step down as his commitments to Sony’s Bullet Train, the upcoming action movie starring Brad Pitt and a host of other exciting talent.
Instead, Rawson Marshall Thurber, director of big budget action films such as 2018’s Skyscraper and Netflix’s upcoming Red Notice, starring Dwayne Johnson, Gal Gadot and Ryan Reynolds, will helm the film.
Unlike other films that bear the author’s name in the credits, Tom Clancy’s The Division (to use the game’s full title) wasn’t written by Clancy in any way, shape or form. Ubisoft, the developers of the game franchise, purchased Clancy’s software development company Red Storm Entertainment in 2000, and then the author’s actual name in 2008, allowing it to badge its games with Clancy’s name, despite the late author’s lack of input into the titles themselves.
Nonetheless, The Division franchise remains very popular and could make for a spectacular action franchise. As the project now seems to have found some traction, we’ll keep you updated as we hear more.
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