Capcom’s Mega Man is about to jump to another platform! 20th Century Fox is reportedly developing Mega Man as a live-action film in conjunction with Chernin Entertainment. David Ready and Michael Finfer are slated to produce the film, with Peter Chernin, Mike Ireland and Ryan Horrigan. The new Mega Man film project doesn’t currently have a director or screenwriter attached to it.
The Mega Man video game franchise launched in 1987 on the NES, and it featured the first adventure of the title character, an android who was also known as Rock. Within the world of the game and its many, many sequels, Mega Man was created by Doctor Light and tasked to stop the evil robots built by Dr. Wily. Whenever Mega Man defeats one of Dr. Wily’s robot bosses, he gains their abilities.
Mega Man also spawned a spinoff video game series called Mega Man X, in addition to a few animated Mega Man series. Earlier this year, the writing collective known as Man of Action and Dentsu Entertainment announced a new Mega Man animated series that will debut in 2017 for the character’s 30th anniversary.
That pending anniversary may also explain why the live-action Mega Man is now moving forward five years after Mega Man 10 was released. It may also mean that Capcom is ready to revisit the Mega Man franchise in the near future, since a multi-media push would be an ideal way to sell more Mega Man games.
Hollywood has struggled to make video game movies into blockbusters for decades. Capcom has been fairly lucky that the Resident Evil movies have been well received. But a Mega Man film will inevitably draw comparisons to the Super Mario Bros. movie; which was so historically bad that it chased Nintendo away from Hollywood for twenty years. Even Capcom’s first live-action Street Fighter movie from 1994 is seen as more of a cult classic unintentional comedy instead of a real action movie.
Who knows if Mega Man can be successfully turned into a good live-action movie? Mega Man has made some tricky jumps in his long platforming career. But this one is going to be the hardest jump yet.
Mega Man fans, how would you bring the franchise to the big screen? Defeat Doctor Wily and share your opinions below!
