Legendary Entertainment and Hasbro Entertainment are coming together to bring the mega popular Magic: The Gathering property to the big screen with a live action movie, and Deadline reports this afternoon that Matt Johnson (BlackBerry) is being eyed to direct the feature film.
The plan here is for this initial Magic: The Gathering movie to launch a cinematic universe spanning film and television, “with TV series and other content to be developed.”
Deadline notes in their exclusive report this afternoon, “We hear they’ve not yet made a formal offer to [Matt] Johnson, as it’s very early days here, but he is the choice to direct.”
Legendary’s Mary Parent said in a statement back in February, “We pride ourselves on being thoughtful caretakers of singular, beloved IP, and no property better fits that description than Magic: The Gathering. Alongside the fantastic Hasbro team, we look forward to creating a multimedia universe that thrills longstanding fans and creates a broad wave of new ones.”
Hasbro’s Zev Foreman said at the time, “This is an exciting and complementary partnership, uniting one of the world’s most iconic brands with a powerful and proven steward. Magic: The Gathering has inspired decades of epic world-building and creative storytelling. It is a perfect match for Legendary’s diversified approach to marquee IP, and we are excited to work together to build a whole new Magic: The Gathering universe.”
A tabletop and collectible card game, Magic: The Gathering was created by Richard Garfield in 1993, with the property reportedly generating $1 billion in revenue on an annual basis.
Needless to say, the recent success of a film like Minecraft suggests that Magic: The Gathering could have the same success leaping into the world of film. Stay tuned for more.
Wikipedia explains, “Players in a game of Magic represent powerful dueling wizards called Planeswalkers. Each card a player draws from their deck represents a magical spell which can be used to their advantage in battle. Instant and Sorcery cards represent magical spells a player may cast for a one-time effect, while Creature, Artifact, Enchantment, and Battle cards remain on the Battlefield to provide long-term advantage. Players must include resource, or Land cards representing the amount of mana that is available to cast their spells. Typically, a player defeats their opponent(s) by reducing their life totals to zero, which is commonly done via combat damage, or attacking with creatures. Many other sources of damage exist in the game, in addition to alternative win-conditions which do not check life totals.”
