Teen Wolf is drawing to a close over at MTV after six seasons, and the network is keen to fill the void by teeing up a new collaboration with series creator Jeff Davis and writer Andrew Cochran.
It involves repackaging another established property, according to Deadline, now that David and Cochran are on board to reboot War of the Worlds as a live-action TV series. First adapted for the screen in 1953 by director Byron Haskin, before Steven Spielberg and Tom Cruise – hot off their work on Minority Report – engineered a modern redo some five decades later, it’s understood this fresh take will circle back to H.G. Wells’ indelible sci-fi novel.
One of the frontrunners of the alien invasion sub-genre, Wells’ classic imagines a scenario in which extra-terrestrials seek to seize control of Earth, first burying massive war machines deep beneath the planet only to activate them generations later by beaming energy capsules into our atmosphere. What follows is a full-blown war against the aliens wherein humanity is hopelessly outgunned. Pushed to the brink of extinction, it’s only when the invading aliens breath in Earth’s natural microbes that they fall.
MTV didn’t disclose exactly when it will begin its casting spree – providing it hasn’t already – but we do know this particular version of War of the Worlds has enlisted The Firm’s Jeff Kwatinetz and Josh Barry to executive produce, the latter of whom has a long-time connection with the genre classic after his grandfather, Gene Barry, starred in the 1953 adaption.
In what is fast becoming a bankable trend, War of the Worlds now joins an ever-expanding list of movies being overhauled for television – even if this one had its tentacle-like roots in literature first. Earlier this week, for example, we learned that Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind was headed down a similar route.
