It’s a different time – where video game adaptations were previously shunned upon, the genre is now brimming with life. But not all projects are on the same boat, and the fate of the live-action Streets of Rage adaptation, based on Sega’s beloved fighting game series, looks to be hanging by a thread.
Speaking to ScreenRant, director Derek Kolstad, best known for creating the John Wick franchise, revealed that the project is currently in limbo, and that he remains passionate about it.
“I spent a lot of time on it. It’s still actively inactive, like most projects in Hollywood. It’s over at Lionsgate. It’s such a cool script. And what I love about that movie, too, is I always talk about it’s 16 Blocks by way of The Raid. So, once you hit page 17, there’s no letting up until page 101. I haven’t heard anything about it for a while, but I love it.”
When the Streets of Rage movie was announced in 2022, the filmmaker wrote the script without any studio deal locked in. Kolstad was also set to share producing duties with Sega’s Toru Nakahara; dj2 Entertainment’s Dmitri M. Johnson, Timothy I. Stevenson and Dan Jevons; and Escape Artists’ Todd Black, Jason Blumenthal and Tony Shaw.
It’s unclear whether Lionsgate will still move forward with the pitch after a four-year hiatus, but cancelling it would be a pity, especially since John Wick‘s bare-knuckled action would lend itself well to the game’s beat ’em up roots. The update comes at an inopportune time, too, with the upcoming sequel to Warner Bros.’ Mortal Kombat and Paramount’s Street Fighter film feeding into the recent hype of fighting-game adaptations.
The Streets of Rage series began in 1991, centring on the efforts of several ex-police vigilantes trying to rid the fictitious Wood Oak City of a crime syndicate that has corrupted its local government. The first three titles, released in the early 1990s, were well received and have been re-released multiple times, while a fourth instalment debuted in 2020.
Si Jia is a casual geek at heart – or as casual as someone with Sephiroth’s theme on her Spotify playlist can get. A fan of movies, games, and Japanese culture, Si Jia’s greatest weakness is the Steam Summer Sale. Or any Steam sale, really.
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