Amazon announced in December that it had reached an agreement under which Crystal Dynamics will develop a new multiplatform Tomb Raider title, with Amazon Games providing full support and publishing the game globally, but the company’s plans for Lara Croft appear to go much further. According to sources with The Hollywood Reporter, Amazon is planning to turn Tomb Raider into a Marvel-like franchise with multiple projects, including not only a TV series led by Emmy winner Phoebe Waller-Bridge, but also a new feature movie, all of which will be interconnected. Details on the latter are light, but the money that Amazon has set aside for its Tomb Raider universe is reportedly only second to what it spent on The Lord of the Rings.
From The Hollywood Reporter:
The idea is to build out a connected world of Tomb Raider, with the video game, TV series and film all interconnected in a fashion akin to what Marvel has already accomplished. The Tomb Raider video game was announced in December, with additional games in the franchise considered likely.
One source with knowledge of the pact described it as being among the largest commitments at Amazon after Lord of the Rings. By comparison, Amazon is estimated to have spent $250 million on rights alone to Lord of the Rings, with that deal covering a multiple-season show (The Rings of Power) as well as spinoffs.
While Waller-Bridge is attached to write the script for the Tomb Raider TV series — as THR exclusively reported — the Fleabag Emmy winner is not involved in the film or the game. Waller-Bridge is said to be a big Tomb Raider fan and was eager to be involved with the TV series, though she is not currently attached to star in the project that has a series greenlight built into the larger Tomb Raider rights deal. Her involvement in the Tomb Raider series stems from her recently renewed overall deal with Amazon.
Discussion (6 replies)
Join Discussion →Phoebe is probably the worst person to give this to as head honcho. I'm very pessimistic about the chances of it being any good. I expect it to be just as bad as rings of power.
I know Marvel has become the go-to reference for any universe-building type things but they are not the first, but perhaps the first to do so successfully in a large-scale theatrical means. Other than that, when it comes to TV it has been done for nearly half a century between Star Trek and all the crime/medical shows. Heck, even Doctor Who has had some.
I too doubt the viability of success with this venture but we'll see. I'm just getting burnt out on how everyone and their dog references Marvel while seemingly forgetting that it's been a thing for a very long time, just rarely done successfully. However, in terms of Marvel, Feige just stopped trying to reinvent the wheel like everyone else did with comic characters and did it in such a way that the masses could consume it. The formula was already there from the get-go in Comics going back to the 30s-40s but nobody had truly attempted it on the big screen and instead committed to their one-offs. I've seen in interviews with Stan Lee where he mentioned the team's books were more about economics with the depression. It gave folks with little money to spend a chance to get a comic with all the popular characters in one book.
In terms of Tomb Raider, well I suppose they can have all the different timelines for Lara and then spinoff with her family and other characters. I just have doubts about how much interest there will be until they get that random hit with a project. There are also the recurring villains, evil organizations out to take out the world stuff too, I suppose.
It would work best as a light hearted Tomb of the week action adventure, like magnum or h5o was before that. But If Phoebe is involved it will be a messy drama about an indecisive conflicted lara helping "the marginalized" instead of raiding tombs.
A Woke Tomb Raider... Yeeyyyy!!! :rolleyes::rolleyes:
I hadn't thought of that and I agree. There was an Indiana Jones knock-off show in the 80s called Tales of the Golden Monkey that had a similar idea that I really enjoyed and barely can remember.
I'm sorry but if they do this they either need to go all in like they did for the Wonder Woman amazons and get an actual athlete to play the Croft roll, or the alternative find a lingerie model who can act to play the role. Trying to normalize the heroine here would be a mistake I think.