Since 2017, Jordan Peele, the director of Get Out and Nope, was expected to direct the live adaptation of the cult anime Akira. Has the filmmaker definitively abandoned this project? He reacts.
Old sea serpent, the live adaptation of Akira, a classic of Japanese animation, has made many directors drink the cup. From Stephen Norrington to Pitof via Albert Hughes or Jaume Collet-Serra, they all broke their teeth in front of this mountain to climb.
In 2017, it was Jordan Peele, filmmaker of Get Out and Nope, who tried to take up the challenge before abandoning the project. On the podcast mic Happy Sad Confusedhe raised this thorny issue.
“I’m relieved that I didn’t”confessed the director. “Getting away from this adaptation project led me to other artistic paths to create something new”did he declare.
“However, I still want to see Neo Tokyo”he clarified, referring to the city where the plot of Akira takes place. “But I want to see it with an all-Japanese cast, I want to be completely immersed in that world like I was with the original movie and the manga of Katsuhiro Otomo“said the director.
After Jordan Peele, another name circulated in Hollywood, that of Taika Waititi. However, despite this association, it would seem that Akira’s live adaptation project also never came to fruition.
“The whole thing was put on hold. We had to keep pushing dates back, and it interfered with the schedule of Thor Love and Thunder, which could not be delayed. Akira was therefore pushed back two years.
So I don’t know what I will be doing in two years. I don’t even know what I’m going to do in two days. I think eventually it will happen. But I’m just not sure I do.”confided the New Zealander to variety in February 2020.
Since then, Taika Waititi has gone on a mysterious Star Wars project. His next feature film, Next Goal Wins, will be released in cinemas on November 8, 2023. This great classic of Japanese animation is therefore not about to be adapted in live action.
As a reminder, the story of Akira takes us back to July 1988. A mysterious explosion destroyed Tokyo, triggering the 3rd World War. 31 years later, in 2019, Neo Tokyo is a corrupt megalopolis criss-crossed by gangs of idle and drug-addicted young bikers. One night, one of them, Tetsuo, has an accident while trying to avoid what appears to be a young boy with an old man’s face.
He is captured by the military and undergoes extensive testing as part of a secret military project to track down and train beings with predispositions to psychic powers. Tetsuo ends up running away. But when his friends, including their leader Kaneda, find out, he becomes violent and unpredictable.