Amazon is developing a live action series based on Wolfenstein, as it continues to expand its roster of video game adaptations.
There are so many TV and film adaptations of video games currently in production it’s hard to keep up, between new seasons of The Last Of Us, animated Splinter Cell shows, another Street Fighter movie, an OutRun adaptation from Michael Bay, and many others.
There’s a chance some of them will not see the light of day (Netflix’s take on Tom Clancy’s The Division appears to be one such casualty) but Amazon, following the success of Fallout, has given the green light to a slew of projects based on video games over recent years.
And now another one has been added to the pile, with a series based on the grandaddy of all first person shooters.
According to Variety, Amazon is in development on a Wolfenstein live action series. While plot details are being kept secret, the official logline just about sums it up: ‘The story of killing Nazis is evergreen.’
The show is being created, written, and executive produced by Patrick Somerville, who has a pretty strong CV. He previously created Netflix’s Maniac starring Emma Stone and Jonah Hill, along with HBO miniseries Station Eleven, which was nominated for seven Emmys.
Wolfenstein developer MachineGames is involved too, with the studio’s co-founder Jerk Gustafsson serving as an executive producer, alongside Jonah Nolan, Lisa Joy, and Athena Wickham via Kilter Films.
Expert, exclusive gaming analysis
Sign up to the GameCentral newsletter for a unique take on the week in gaming, alongside the latest reviews and more. Delivered to your inbox every Saturday morning.
If you’re unfamiliar, Wolfenstein is a series of games set in an alternate history of the Second World War. The first two games by Muse Software were 1981’s Castle Wolfenstein and Beyond Castle Wolfenstein, which had a top-down perspective and were a very early example of a stealth game.
The games remained little known until id Software purchased the rights and made 1992’s Wolfenstein 3D – the precursor to Doom and the first widely popular first person shooter.
Today, the series is synonymous with developer MachineGames, who rebooted the series in 2014, with Wolfenstein: The New Order and its sequel Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus. These featured much more storytelling and social commentary, while maintaining a heightened sense of absurdity, and are presumably what the TV show will be based on.
A third mainline game in the series has been rumoured for some time but never officially announced, and it’s unclear what the studio is working on now following Indiana Jones And The Great Circle. Although they have hinted at a Quake reboot (also an id Software property) multiple times.
The Amazon adaptation implies there’s now a greater chance of a third game coming to fruition, if it isn’t already underway. Job listings in 2023 suggested another sequel was in the works, and Bethesda’s former head of publishing, Pete Hines, was very keen on the idea, but the poor sales of Wolfenstein 2 and its spin-offs has always left a third title in doubt.
This Wolfenstein series is one of many video game adaptations currently in the works at Amazon. Along with Fallout and Secret Level, which are both getting second seasons, the company has green-lit shows based on Mass Effect, God Of War, and tabletop wargame Warhammer 40,000 with Henry Cavill.
Email gamecentral@metro.co.uk, leave a comment below, follow us on Twitter.
To submit Inbox letters and Reader’s Features more easily, without the need to send an email, just use our Submit Stuff page here.
For more stories like this, check our Gaming page.