1) Portal/Half-Life (TBA)
Back in 2013, J.J. Abrams and Valve President Gabe Newell announced their intentions to collaborate on some feature films based on Portal and Half-Life, and fans everywhere just about lost their voices screaming in excitement. It’s been three years since, but both projects are still in the works. As recently as March of this year, Abrams told IGN that the movies are in active development, and they both have writers attached.
Bad Robot is one of the most consistently solid studios in Hollywood today when it comes to science-fiction, so Valve’s babies have certainly found the right home. While it’s easy to see the appeal of a Half-Life movie, some might question whether a Portal film would work. After all, the original game is only a few hours long and follows one dialogue-free character trapped in a building trying to escape. It’s really more a series of puzzle mini-games than anything else, with a more complex story not beginning to emerge until the sequel.
Well, look no further than Portal: No Escape to assuage those fears. The fan film by Dan Trachtenberg manages to make a simple idea so cinematic, and it was successful enough to help Trachentberg land the role of director on Bad Robot’s 10 Cloverfield Lane, a superb thriller following a female character trapped in one location for a long period of time and trying to figure out a mystery while also attempting to escape. Sound familiar?
With the rights to Portal at Bad Robot, Trachentberg is the obvious choice to direct, and he has already demonstrated his ability to bring the visuals of a video game to screen. Now he just has to do it again.