Ubisoft and the cinema are anything but a great love story. However, the French publisher is ready to try the adventure again now that Hollywood has a soft spot for video games.
Video game adaptations are on the rise. In the coming months or even years, the industry’s most significant licenses will land on both the small and big screens. Prime Video’s Fallout series, expected for April 11, promises to be particularly faithful, while the Borderlands film should capture all the madness of the work if we rely on the first trailer. The list of projects is as long as an arm, so we tend to forget the ones we want… like Watch Dogs for example.
The film “Watch Dogs” is still in the works
Yes, a film is actually in the works and it’s not that much news. It’s been a long time since Ubisoft announced its adaptation without ever showing any sign of life. The bitter failure of the Assassin’s Creed film has undoubtedly tempered its enthusiasm by now, but now that video games are all the rage in Hollywood, the French publisher is ready to reboot the project. According to the website deadline reports that the Watch Dogs film has finally found a director after all these years. Cocorico, it will be the Frenchman Mathieu Turi (Gueules Noires, Lucy, Hostile), who also works on the TV series A Plague Tale. Christie Leblanc (Netflix’s Oxygen) is writing the script alongside him.
Ubisoft has clearly set the machine in motion, as discussions surrounding the lead role are reportedly at an advanced stage. This is the actress Sophie Wilde, who is known for her roles in horror films The hand and the Netflix series Everything now, which would be expected. If the talks go through, Ubisoft could very well end up with a very good headliner. The American media did not provide any further details, except that the film “Watch Dogs” will adapt the universe of the franchise, which already had its difficult beginnings 10 years ago. Without getting into it too much, we can assume that this adaptation offers an original story inspired by the themes of the main games. From there to Aiden or Marcus walking past a head, it’s just one step.
The future of the license in the world of video games is more unclear. The latest installment, Watch Dogs Legion, did not achieve the expected success when it was released in October 2020, leading the publisher to cancel the sequel less than two years later. Knowing Ubisoft’s appetite for transmedia, it’s a safe bet that a new game is being secretly developed to capitalize on this film’s potential success. Wait and see what someone else would say.