Sega has another live-action movie coming out soon, but it’s not Persona or anything you may have heard of.
With superhero movies on a bit of a decline over the past few years, Hollywood has found a new source of resources: video games. In recent years, we’ve seen more and more adaptations, such as The Last of Us, Fallout, and most recently, the very bad Borderlands movie. Of course, a big factor driving the resurgence of video game movies was 2020’s Sonic the Hedgehog, which was a pretty good movie and made a lot of money. Following its success, Sega launched a sequel and a Knuckles spin-off, with another movie coming out in December of this year, so it’s clear that Sega is very happy with its live-action movies. On top of that, Sega is also going to release a Sonic the Hedgehog TV series in October of this year. Now, according to The Hollywood Reporter, its next live-action movie will be… uh, Eternal Champions?
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I imagine if, like me, you’re under 35, then you’re probably not too familiar with this game, and I wouldn’t blame you. Originally released on the Sega Mega Drive (known as the Genesis in the US) in 1993, Eternal Champions is a fighting game made by Sega that was designed to capitalize on the popularity of Street Fighter II and Mortal Kombat. In the game, different key figures from history are pulled from their time by the eponymous Eternal Champion, each of whom was destined to die before being taken away, but are given the chance to participate in a tournament that allows them to continue living.
It definitely sounds like a fighting game plot, and it’s clearly a throwback to Street Fighter and Mortal Kombat, but the 90s were a wild time. It spawned a sequel and a few spin-offs, but nothing new has been released in nearly 30 years, so it’s a bit of an odd reference.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, the film is being adapted from Skydance’s script by Derek Connolly, whose credits include Jurassic World, Detective Pikachu, Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, and the upcoming live-action Legend of Zelda film. So, it’s a bit of a mixed bag, but it’s clearly leaning more towards the video game movie side of things.
Not much has been revealed about the film yet, so you’ll just have to wait and see. Perhaps if Sega is willing to step away from productions like this, you can still see a live-action Persona show or movie. Maybe.
