A few members of the creative team behind Teen Wolf are joining up with their fellow writers and producers to create a War of the Worlds series for MTV.
Criminal Minds and Teen Wolf creator Jeff Davis already has one major project on his plate in the form of TNT’s Let the Right One In, but that’s not stopping him from picking up another job.
According to Deadline, MTV is developing a “contemporary drama series” based on H.G. Wells’ novel.
The script will be written by former Teen Wolf writer Andrew Cochran, and Jeff Davis will executive produce the project. Josh Barry (Notorious) and Jeff Kwatinetz (Unstoppable) will also executive produce.
Barry seems to be the driving force behind the adaptation, as his grandfather, Gene Barry, was the star of the first War of the Worlds movie adaptation in 1953.
The synopsis for War of the Worlds reads:
The night after a shooting star is seen streaking through the sky from Mars, a cylinder is discovered on Horsell Common near London. At first, naive locals approach the cylinder armed just with a white flag — only to be quickly killed by an all-destroying heat-ray as terrifying tentacled invaders emerge. Soon the whole of human civilization is under threat, as powerful Martians build gigantic killing machines, destroy all in their path with black gas and burning rays, and feast on the warm blood of trapped, still-living human prey. The forces of the Earth, however, may prove harder to beat than they at first appear.
The first modern tale of alien invasion, The War of the Worlds remains one of the most influential of all science-fiction works.
There have been plenty of adaptations of this property, though Tom Cruise’s 2005 film (pictured above), also starring Dakota Fanning, may be the best known to modern audiences.
MTV’s take on the property could be an interesting one. Teen Wolf proved they could do a supernatural scripted show to great success, and it also paved the way for other dark shows like Scream and Sweet/Vicious.
War of the Worlds in television form will also allow for a longer, more detailed production of the novel, providing audiences with a fleshed out world the fans can really dive into.