'Sword Art Online' News: Tomb Raider Writers To Make Live-Action TV Adaptation
It's finally confirmed that the hit anime "Sword Art Online" will be getting a live-action TV adaptation. Skydance Television has brought in "Lara Croft: Tomb Raider" screenwriters to pen the script for the upcoming series.
According to Deadline, Patrick Massett and John Zinman have been hired to adapt the anime to a live-action series. The two are best-known for penning "Lara Croft: Tomb Raider" and served as executive producers for "Friday Night Lights."
Massett and Zinman will serve as screenwriters as well as showrunners and executive producers for the series. Joining the will be "Avatar" screenwriter Laeta Kalogridis, and producers David Ellison, Dana Goldberg, and Marcy Ross.
"We're already deep in development with Patrick, John, and Laeta on our larger than life Skydance SAO series, in which we aim not only to satisfy the franchise's enthusiastic sci-fi and anime fan base but also to appeal to new TV audiences the world over," said Skydance Television in a statement.
The prospect that a live-action adaptation of "Sword Art Online" will be made by Hollywood has been known to fans for a while. However, this is the first time that a production company has confirmed it.
For those unfamiliar with the series, it follows a boy who gets trapped inside a video game along with 10,000 other players. To escape, they must defeat the final boss and if they die in the game, they will also die in real life.
Adapting popular anime has been a growing trend in Hollywood. The recent adaptations of "Death Note" and "Ghost in the Shell" series are just the most recent attempts at live-action adaptations of popular series.
"Your Name," a massively popular anime film was also announced to be getting a live-action adaptation. The film will be helmed by none other than Star Wars director J.J. Abrams.
Want to catch more SAO? "Sword Art Online The Movie: Ordinal Scale" hits Blu-ray and DVD on Dec. 19, 2017.
