Next up on the ever-expanding list of video game adaptations? A movie for Space Invaders, apparently.
Per Deadline, New Line Cinema is finally making good on its hopes to bring Taito’s shoot ’em up to life. First announced back in 2019, the studio and production company Safehouse Pictures have put comedy writers Ben Zazove and Evan Turner on script duties. Individually, they’ve written or produced for movies like Sherlock Gnomes (Zazove) and Journey to the Center of the Earth (Turner), but as a pair, they wrote the 2023 Netflix film The Outlaws and wrote an action-comedy called Officer Exchange in development with John Cena attached to star.
Developer Taito released Space Invaders first hit arcades in 1978, and has gone on to become one of the highest-grossing video games ever. Since its release, it’s become a franchise with remasters, remakes, and sequels spread across console generations, PC, and mobile phones. As of 2025, the most recent installment is the iOS and Android title Space Invaders Infinity Gene Evolve.
Space Invaders is the latest retro game Hollywood wants for the silver screen. Also on the docket are films based on Sega’s OutRun and Shinobi franchises, and Pac-Man from Bandai Namco. We’ll see if Space Invaders gets to the finish line in the next few years, or just shoots and shuffles its way to development hell.
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