Summary
- After years of delay, Netflix has hired David Leitch to direct the Gears of War film.
- Leitch, known for action films, has experience with popular franchises like the MCU and John Wick.
- A Gears of War adaptation may finally come to fruition with a straightforward action story.
Bring out your Lancers and Hammers of Dawn, because the Gears of War film is back on track. Well, they've found a director to helm the adaptation, at least, which is more than they've had for years.
A film adaptation of the Gears of War franchise has been kicking around for nearly two decades now, with New Line Cinema first bagging the rights way back in 2007. Since then, numerous directors and production houses have boarded and left the project over the years, leaving fans wondering if the film would forever be stuck in a state of development hell. Out of seemingly nowhere in November 2022, Netflix announced they were teaming with the video game creatives at The Coalition to finally bring a Gears of War movie to the streaming masses. Well, it took two and a half years for the streaming giant to gain serious traction on the film, but a director was just attached to the project, and it's a major name that action fans will be excited about.
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According to an exclusive from The Hollywood Reporter, David Leitch has signed on to direct Netflix's Gears of War film adaptation. Leitch and his wife/producing partner Kelly McCormack are set to produce the film, which is being written by Dune co-writer Jon Spaihts. Given that all this news is just coming out, it's clear that the Gears of War movie is years away from being finished, but after eons of no concrete updates, this is a good sign for fans of the gaming franchise. With Gears of War: E-Day coming to consoles and PC sometime in the relatively near future, it's clear that the Gears series as a whole is back in a big way.
Nabbing David Leitch To Direct Gears of War Is A Big Win For Netflix And The Coalition
Say what you want about the overall quality of David Leitch's filmography, it's clear that he helms blockbusters that people enjoy watching. After years of serving as a second unit director on huge projects like The Wolverine, Jurassic World, and Captain America: Civil War, Letich served as an uncredited co-director on John Wick. Leitch followed that up with the one-two punch of Atomic Blonde and Deadpool 2 in 2017 and 2018, respectively. Subsequently, Leitch was entrusted with the Fast & Furious spinoff Hobbs & Shaw, directed Brad Pitt in Bullet Train, and swung for the fences with The Fall Guy.
While picking quality scripts to bring to the big screen might not be Leitch's forte, the man certainly knows his way around an action sequence. Leitch has directly worked on three of the biggest action franchises of the last decade—the MCU, John Wick, and Fast & Furious— which has to count for something. It's not as if Gears of War will need a deft directorial hand to carry across complex drama or off-the-wall comedic scenes. Gears is about as straightforward as an action franchise can possibly get.
As such, Leitch seems to be a home run choice to direct a Gears of War adaptation for Netflix. Of course, this assumes that the project comes to fruition this time around.
Gears of War
Source: The Hollywood Reporter