There have always been murmurs of a possible American remake of Kinji Fukasaku’s masterpiece Battle Royale, which is based on the novel by Koushun Takami, but luckily it has never materialized. Thanks in part goes to the recent adaptation of Suzanne Collins’s The Hunger Games, which is a ripoff of the same basic story. However, there is now a possibility for the remake’s resurrection on another medium.
The Playlist is now reporting that talks have begun between the television network CW and the people behind the supposed American remake to bring the story to the small screen.
In case you’re not familiar with the story of Battle Royale, it takes place in the not too distant future of Japan where the economy has collapsed and students have started boycotting school. In order to deal with the latter problem, a random lottery takes place that chooses a middle school class, which is then taken to a deserted island, given weapons, and then told to kill each other off until only one is left. The winner of the battle is the one who gets to go home.
The film version is brutal, violent, chilling, and as I pointed out earlier, a masterpiece. As I mentioned in my Blu-Ray review of the film, the story uses violence “to discuss human nature and how far we are willing to go to survive.” This is the very reason why I must object to the possibility of it becoming a TV show on CW.
I can see this possibly happening if it were brought to a network like HBO, who have brought us such great and gritty shows like Game of Thrones and Rome, but if it were to be brought to CW (whose programming includes shows like Gossip Girls and Vampire Diaries), then the violence aspect would have to be toned down considerably, in short, losing the whole point of the story.
However, the other side of this is that it simply doesn’t need to happen. The film has already been made, and it was made perfectly, getting every point of the story across, so why bother tinkering with the same story again?
Luckily, the novel’s original author gets final say as to whether or not the project will move forward, and that’s if CW decides to go through with it . You can bet that he won’t give the go ahead unless the project will be able to respect the material fully.
The funny thing is that CW also has a similar show lined up as another possibility called The Selection, so apparently their execs are really interested in seeing something along this storyline on their network.
Let’s just hope that Battle Royale is not the one that ends up getting chosen should they decide to follow through with this sudden need to see kids hunting kids.
Do you guys want to see this brought to TV? Why or why not? Let us know what you think in the comments!
