Just Cause, Avalanche’s black ops-centered actioner, has just been snagged by Eric Eisner for adaptation to the big screen for his L+E Pictures. Eisner has tapped Adrien Askarieh (who financed the Olyphant-starring Hitman) to produce and editor-turned-writer Michael Ross to pen the script about “Rico Rodriguez, aka the Scorpion, a black ops agent who carries out deadly missions for the U.S. government that come in the form of creating chaos and destabilizing rogue nations from within and turning the bad guys against each other. The character’s calling card is his grappling hook and penchant for aerial stunts with his unique parachute, putting him in unusual action scenarios like hijacking fighter jets in midair.”
Right now it’s all just talk and development and even though Askarieh isn’t afraid to put up some money (also producing the in-limbo Jamie Foxx/Bruce Willis-starring adaptation of Kane & Lynch), the basic setup of Just Cause makes it a much more expensive endeavor than something as low-key as Hitman. The games are pretty wildly popular though, with the first selling over one million copies and the sequel more than doubling that number, but with Halo, Bioshock and other huge names in gaming stalling out cinematically, one wonders what the fates have in store for the little guy. I suppose we’ll see what happens.