Netflix is adapting another iconic video game franchise, with none other than Ryan Reynolds in talks to star in and produce a live-action film adaptation of Dragon’s Lair.
First revealed by The Hollywood Reporter and then confirmed by Netflix’s Twitter account, Reynolds is in talks to star as hero knight Dirk the Daring, the hero charged with rescuing Princess Daphne from a vicious dragon. This news comes hours after Netflix officially announced its Castlevania animated series is getting a fourth season.
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Assuming a deal is finalized, Reynolds will produce the movie through his company Maximum Effort. The movie will also be produced by Vertigo Entertainment’s Roy Lee and Underground Films’ Trevor Engelson, along with Don Bluth, Gary Goldman and Jon Pomeroy.
Originally created by Bluth and Rick Dyer, Dragon’s Lair first debuted in video arcades in 1983. Despite its limited interactivity, Dragon’s Lair was notable for taking advantage of Laserdisc technology and featuring far more detailed sprite graphics than most games of the time. Dragon’s Lair has been ported (with varying degrees of success) to numerous home consoles over the years, including recent ports for the Nintendo Switch, Xbox One and Playstation 4. The game also boosted the popularity of both Bluth and Goldman, who eventually went on to lead the creation of films like Secret of NIMH, An American Tail, All Dogs Go to Heaven, The Land Before Time, and Anastasia.
This isn’t the first attempt to adapt Dragon’s Lair to other media. ABC aired a short-lived Dragon’s Lair animated series in 1984, and CrossGen published a comic book adaptation in 2003. Bluth and Goldman previously ran a Kickstarter campaign in 2015 aimed at funding a short proof-of-concept teaser for a Dragon’s Lair animated movie. While that campaign failed, the duo were successful after shifting the campaign to Indiegogo. However, it appears that animated adaptation has been repalced by a live-action treatment instead.
Given the nature of the original game and Netflix’s previous experiments with interactive programming like Black Mirror: Bandersnatch, we could easily see Dragon’s Lair being developed as an interactive movie.
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Do you think Reynolds is the right choice for Dragon’s Lair? Do you want the movie to have an interactive component? Let us know what you think in the comments below.
Be sure to check out our breakdown of all the video game movies currently in development and get the latest update on when the perpetually troubled Uncharted movie will resume production.
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Jesse is a mild-mannered staff writer for IGN. Allow him to lend a machete to your intellectual thicket by following @jschedeen on Twitter.
Source: IGN.com Netflix's Dragon's Lair: Ryan Reynolds In Talks to Star in Video Game Movie