Once the sixth entry into the Resident Evil film franchise is released next year, the franchise will have banked over $1 billion at the box office. So where do you go with the live-action adaptation of a popular video game franchise once you’ve wrapped up on the silver screen? Like so many other stars of film, Resident Evil will be making the move to television.

The details on the upcoming Resident Evil TV series are slim at the moment. Constantin Film, the film series’ rights holder and producer, says that they’ve had the upcoming series in development for the last couple of years. The only quasi-confirmed detail about the series is that it won’t debut until after Resident Evil: The Final Chapter hits theatres.

It’s not known who will be cast in the series or what the plot of the TV series will be. The movie franchise doesn’t follow the story of the Resident Evil game franchise so it’s entirely possible that the TV show doesn’t follow the movies. Of course, that could be a change forced by the availability of movie cast members as much as it is a change in media.

Coincidentally, the next game in the Resident Evil franchise, Resident Evil: Revelations 2, is going to be released in an episodic format. We’ve seen that work well for The Walking Dead which released its most recent season as five 90-minute episodes. Conveniently enough, that’s ten cable TV episodes worth of content which would be enough for a cable TV season.

Full disclosure: I’ve never played a Resident Evil game, nor have I watched a Resident Evil movie. That being said, a good TV adaptation of either the game or movie franchise will only serve to make gaming more popular in the mainstream. Part of me naively thinks more money from sources other than games will make publishers less miserly with DLC and microtransactions… I hope.

Source: Variety