According to Deadline, Amazon Studios is fast tracking development on a Blade Runner TV show, tentatively titled Blade Runner: 2099, with the original movie’s director, Ridley Scott, as executive producer. The project also has the showrunner of Apple TV’s Shining Girls, Silka Luisa, as lead writer and co-executive producer.
The original Blade Runner is a cult classic and remains a wellspring of inspiration for science fiction works to this day. I loved Denis Villeneuve’s 2017 sequel, Blade Runner: 2049, but it had a lackluster blockbuster performance and that seemed like the last word on big budget productions in the series, at least until it gets another inevitable studio revival however many years down the line.
It looks like that next attempt is coming far sooner than I could have anticipated. Sci-fi and fantasy streaming shows are big right now, and while Amazon has had its own success with The Expanse, that show is entering its final season, possibly helping explain the company’s eagerness to get a Blade Runner adaptation out sooner rather than later.
If you’re itching for further adventures in the Blade Runner universe, the series also has a vaunted place in PC gaming history with Westwood Studios’ excellent 1997 point-and-click adventure spinoff. Nightdive Studios’ remaster of the game seems to be on hiatus due to the disappearance of the game’s source code, but the original version is available for purchase on GOG for $9.99.
