Duke Nukem is a legend in the gaming world–mostly for the wrong reasons. Now, Legendary Entertainment and the producers behind Cobra Kai are trying to make him big on the silver screen, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Legendary Entertainment has picked up the movie rights from game development studio Gearbox and paired with Josh Heald, Jon Hurwitz, and Hayden Schlossberg to bring the titular character to life. Four years ago, a Duke Nukem movie was under discussion with John Cena set to star as the Duke himself. The production stalled out, though, and this is an entirely new production with new producers.
Duke Nukem presents a unique challenge for movie adaptation; similar to Nathan Drake, Nukem is a homage to movie characters, inspired directly by 1980s action film actors like Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sylvester Stallone. Unlike Drake, though, he leans more into parody, and the character leans heavily into misogynistic tropes and jokes. While his earlier games are well-remembered, the 2011 Duke Nukem Forever was critically panned not just for its rough shape after 14 years of development, but for how stale the character felt at the time as well.
The previous production was to be handled by Andrew Form and Brad Fuller, then of Michael Bay’s Platinum Dunes production company, and the pair compared the challenge of adapting Duke Nukem to that of Deadpool.
“How do you nail that tone in the way that Deadpool nailed the tone?” Form asked. “I think we have to do that, and we don’t et the tone right, then we’re not going to make the movie.” While that production never went anywhere, Form’s words still sound right.
Duke Nukem first game to life as a sidescroller in 1991, but is chiefly remembered for his first-person shooter Duke Nukem 3D, released in 1996. The follow-up, Duke Nukem Forever, spent so long in development that it became a joke among gamers until Gearbox finally bought up the rights and released the game in 2011. Aside from the primary production houses involved, the movie yet doesn’t have any names attached to direct, write, or star.
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