One of the unwritten rules of the Halo franchise is that players aren’t ever supposed to see the Master Chief’s face, but Paramount will be breaking that decades-old tradition for its upcoming live-action TV series.
The arguably long-overdue unmasking of the super soldier has been confirmed by Halo executive producer and 343 Industries’ Studio Head of Transmedia, Kiki Wolfkill, who told IGN in an interview during its Fan Fest event that Master Chief’s face would be revealed for the first time in the history of the franchise during Paramount’s Halo TV series, which is slated to begin airing on the company’s streaming service, Paramount+, on March 24, 2022.
“I think we set out to tell a character story and a personal story,” Wolfkill explained. “And once we really got into what that story was, it became clear that you really needed to see the person in the armour and under the helmet.”
“You will see his face,” Wolfkill went on to confirm. “For some people, it’s been a moment 20 years in the making, and for other people it is something that feels very hard to imagine. We absolutely respect both sides of that fence, those who really want to see Chief’s face and those who really don’t. But for the nature of this story, it felt really important to connect with the Master Chief in a different way, and that meant showing the face.”
Master Chief is being played by Pablo Schreiber, an actor whose previous credits include action films such as 13 Hours, Den of Thieves, and Skyscraper. It’s unclear how exciting John-117’s unmasking might be, being that Schreiber’s face, like most actors, is already all over the internet.
Halo TV Show Will Reveal Master Chief’s Face (IGN)
- The upcoming Halo TV show will reveal Master Chief’s face for the first time in the history of the franchise.
- Talking to Ryan McCaffrey as part of IGN Fan Fest, Halo’s executive producer and 343 Industries’ Studio Head of Transmedia, Kiki Wolfkill, said that showing the Chief’s face was important for the story the show will tell.
- While this has always meant we’ve never seen Chief’s face in the game (aside from very short glimpses of the back of his head or his eyes in cutscenes), it looks like we’ll finally be seeing a Schreiber-shaped face beneath that helmet.