A producer at the studio behind the long-dormant movie adaptation ofTom Clancy’s The Divisionrecently gave an update on the project, and it’s not very encouraging. Fans of the popular post-apocalyptic live-service third-person shooter were extremely excited when Ubisoft announced in 2016 that afilm based onThe Divisionwas in development. Since then, however, details have been hard to come by, and many people have even forgotten that a movie was ever in the works.
The project was set to star Jake Gyllenhaal, who already established a penchant for video game film adaptations with his leading role in 2010’sPrince of Persia: The Sands of Time.Jessica Chastain was also announced as being onboard, andThe Divisionmovie was going to launch on Netflix, though it was never clear exactly when.
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Another exciting announcement came in 2018 when it was revealed thatThe Divisionmovie would be directed by David Leitchof 87North Productions, who worked onDeadpool 2andAtomic Blonde.However, studio co-founder Kelly McCormick gave an update on the project in an interview with DiscussingFilm on December 15. Essentially, the film adaptation is on indefinite hold due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
McCormick shared that, initially, the prospect of creating a movie version ofThe Divisionwas “really amazing” because there’s a lot that could be done with a team of special agents who are sent in to save a devastated city. However, after the coronavirus outbreak, the producer admitted that the idea began to feel more like a documentary and was “no longer fun.” Recounting the real-time story of a virus and the anxiety created as it spreads ventured too close to true events, and so the movie studio “got moved away by COVID.” McCormick summarized by stating thatThe Divisionmovie project is currently on the “back burner.”
In 2021, there had been talk about perhaps rewriting the script, but that doesn’t seem to have progressed since. Unwelcome as the update will be for fans of the iconic franchise, it is understandable why it was deemed a good idea to move away from the movie adaptation, at least for the time being.
Thefirst game inThe Divisionseriestells the story of an engineered virus known as the Dollar Flu that is unleashed on Manhattan and decimates the population. The survivors are left to scrounge for themselves, with occasional air drops of resources sent in from the mainland. However, a number of rival gangs soon rise up to compete for domination and control of supplies, and a sleeper cell of specially trained agents known only as The Division is sent in to restore order.
The Divisionis currently available on PC, PS4, and Xbox One.
