‘Wild Cards’ TV Adaptation Leaps From Hulu To Peacock
by Erik Amaya
While we may not read every word A Song of Ice and Fire novelist George R.R. Martin has ever written, we are fascinated by how many of his works are in the film and development pipeline. Take Wild Cards for example. Although more of an anthology series he edited alongside Melinda Snodgrass and Vince Gerardis, it inspired a television series project at Hulu. And though dormant for sometime, Deadline reports it is moving from the Disney-owned platform to Comcast’s Peacock.
Did any of the Wild Cards writers think to write a story as wild as the Streaming Wars?
The unifying premise of the series centers on the extraterrestrial Wild Card virus and how its introduction into the world in 1946 altered the history and evolutionary development of the human race. Superpowers are involved.
As it happens, the series — which includes short story collects, mosaic novels, and full novels by a single author — began as an RPG campaign Martin ran and the desire among his players to create “grown-up” superhero tales. It grew in the telling and included writers like Roger Zelazny, Lewis Shiner, Pat Cadigan, Howard Waldrop, Edward Bryant, and Stephen Leigh. The Secret Circle creator Andrew Miller was involved in the Hulu version of the project, but has stepped aside so a new lead writer can be found to whip all of Wild Cards various ideas into a single narrative.
Martin, Snodgrass and Gerardis will be credited as executive producers.
Martin’s other projects include a myriad of Game of Thrones spinoffs and an adaptation of Zelazny’s novel Roadmarks for HBO.