Three years after Netflix announced it was turning Irrational Games’ acclaimed underwater shooter BioShock into a live-action film, its producer has suggested its still some way off, confirming that work continues on its script.
The streaming service first publicly discussed a BioShock movie back in February 2022, when it was accompanied by grandiose talk of developing a whole cinematic universe around the BioShock games. After a lengthy silence, producer Roy Lee last year confirmed plans had changed and that budget cuts at Netflix meant it would now be a “much smaller” film told from a “more personal point of view, as opposed to a grander, big project.”
Another year on, and Lee is chattering again, this time offering an update on the project’s progress in conversation with The Direct. As to why it’s taking so long, he explained in part that’s down to the BioShock movie having been delayed a “little bit” so the team could do “some more script work”. Amid all this, director Francis Lawrence has been busy with the movie adaptation of Stephen King’s The Long Walk, and he’ll remain occupied helming the upcoming The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping. “So it’s just waiting for him whenever the Hunger Games is completed,” Lee added.
Additionally, Lee confirmed the BioShock movie’s script is still “being worked on right now”. But the hope seems to be it’ll be ready by the time Sunrise on the Reaping is done. As to what the movie will focus on, Lee remains cagey, saying, “Netflix wants us to keep everything under wraps”. He did, however, reveal it’ll definitely be based on Irrational’s first BioShock game.
Netflix isn’t the first company to attempt a BioShock movie. Back in 2008, Universal announced its own adaptation with Pirates of the Caribbean director Gore Verbinski onboard – but it never came to fruition. Explaining the project’s demise in 2013, BioShock creator Ken Levine revealed publisher 2K had given him the option to cancel it after Verbinski’s departure – and so he did.
A fourth BioSchock game, originally announced in 2019, is currently in the works at developer Cloud Chamber, but 2K recently confirmed it was “reducing the size of the development team” as it looks to “rework certain aspects” of the purportedly troubled project.
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