Jerry Bruckheimer can add another title to the endless list of movies he’s got in development, as Variety is reporting that he’s lined up J. Michael Straczynski to write a film adaptation of the videogame, Shattered Union.
The game could certainly make an interesting film, as it see various US States seceding from the union after a nuclear bomb wipes out Washington DC. Civil War then rages between the different sides, with players able to choose to control one of six different groups of States, or a European peacekeeping unit sent to sort things out. It’s certainly a premise that offers an awful lot of promise for an all-out action movie.
Straczynski is a solid choice of writer, as he can turn his hand from something as low key and dramatic as Clint Eastwood’s Changeling, to the upcoming balls-to-the-walls action movie, Ninja Assassin (he’s also writing a Silver Surfer movie and a Forbidden Planet remake). However Straczynski is probably most famous as the creator of Babylon 5 and its complex mythology, which suggests he’d be a good man to build a movie about warring states into something more than just a run of the mill action flick.
At the moment plans for Shatter Union are at a fairly early stage, although it looks like Bruckheimer is hoping he can turn it into a major blockbuster franchise. It’ll be the producer’s second major videogame adpatation after next year’s Prince Of Persia: The Sands Of Time.