Netflix takes over Gears of War movie, animated series projects

Netflix now holds the torch for the adaptation of Gears of War to a big-screen blockbuster movie. The Hollywood Reporter reported Monday that Netflix will develop both an animated series and a feature film.

Netflix is now the rights-holder after “long months of negotiations” with many competitors, THR said. Netflix will partner with Gears’ developer, The Coalition, on getting the movie and cartoons onto the screen. According to THR, no directors, producers, writers or stars have been attached so far to adaptations.

“The video game franchise [is] getting a fresh start after several big-studio attempts,” THR said, which is putting it mildly. Gears of War, which was released as an action movie in 2007, has been discussed with distributors New Line Cinema and Universal Pictures. Its writers include Billy Ray.The Hunger Games) and Stuart Beattie (G.I. Joe: Rising of CobraDirector Len Wiseman is another exampleTotal Recall 2012), all of them were involved at some time. The moviemaking effort has straddled Gears’ eras under original publisher Epic Games and Xbox Game Studios, which acquired Gears of War in 2014 and handed off it to The Coalition.

This news, according to THR, comes as a 16-year anniversary Gears of War’s launch on Xbox 360 — Nov. 7, 2006. Last week, series creator Cliff Bleszinski sat for an interview with IGN, in which he said Epic, his former employer, “didn’t really know what to do with the franchise,” after he, producer Rod Fergusson, and gameplay designer Lee Perry left the company.

That said, Bleszinski said the income Epic realized from Gears’ sale — and it had always been exclusive to Xbox/Games for Windows Live — probably helped Epic into its latest phase, as the publisher and developer of breakout battle royale hit FortniteThe Epic Games Store owner.