I’ve played some Gears of War, and while it’s kind of a fun game there’s absolutely nothing that pulls me into it. None of the characters snap, the story is drab, the settings well-rendered but dull. I don’t know why anyone would get that worked up about the game – I couldn’t even be bothered to finish it.
But just because the game has a shitty, boring story doesn’t mean the movie version will be just as shitty and boring. Oh wait, they’ve hired Len Wiseman to direct the film version! Never mind.
Yes, Wiseman is following up Live Free or Die Hard with Gears of War, about a planet of humans dealing with the invasion of a race of beings known as the Locust. Wiseman is going to work on the story with screenwriter Chris Morgan, responsible for Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift and enough drafts of Wanted to get WGA credit (I’m not really that clear on the evolution of that script, but I do think that the movie you see in theaters (the very good movie, for the record) in a couple of weeks will resemble what Morgan turned in). This is not exactly Scorsese and Schrader, but what else do you want from a movie about humans fighting bugs on a planet that is mostly monocolored (which color will Wiseman choose to saturate his film in this time? Let’s chart his growth with a color wheel)?
It’s worth noting that IESB reported that Wiseman was in talks for Gears of War in AUGUST 2007. The closest the shitbags at Variety get to giving them credit is ‘Fanboys have been speculating for over a year…’ In case you were wondering why I no longer provide links to the trades when I cover stories they break, now you know.
Wiseman is also working with Morgan on Shell Game at Lakeshore. It’s not clear which of the two films will go first. Gears of War is set up at the smoking ruin still kindly called New Line.