US film studio Lionsgate is set to broaden its cinematic universe by bringing two of its franchises, John Wick and Twilight, to the small screen with new TV series offshoots.
Lionsgate confirmed that the Twilight series that’s being developed for TV will be an animated series.
As reported in Deadline, Michael Burns, Lionsgate’s Vice Chairman, revealed details about both projects during a Q&A session at the Morgan Stanley media conference.
‘We’re going to go out with the Twilight series, an animated series that I think will generate a lot of interest,’ Burns said.
The revelation aligns with earlier leaks from April 2023, confirming that Lionsgate had been developing the animated Twilight series for some time.
Simultaneously, Burns announced plans to transform John Wick, the film franchise starring Keanu Reeves, into a TV series. This follows the success of the prequel series The Continental, which consisted of three one and a half-hour episodes set in the world of John Wick.
Read: The Continental: From the World of John Wick – ScreenHub review
Twilight, the film franchise based on Stephanie Meyer’s novels, concluded in 2012 with Breaking Dawn: Part 2, accumulating $3.4 billion at the box office globally and catapulting the careers of Kristen Stewart, Robert Pattinson, and Taylor Lautner.
The vampire romance flicks still draw massive crowds when played during special Twilight movie nights at local cinemas across Australia.
As Amy Loughlin wrote for ScreenHub in 2022, reviewing a retrospective showing of the film in Melbourne:
It’s easy to dismiss Twilight as something frivolous – a somewhat problematic love story, a passing fad without much artistic merit that had its moment, a curio that should be left in the previous decade. But if this evening is anything to go by, it still has plenty of cult appeal, and deserves to be analysed – as it increasingly is – through a feminist lens, especially as a relatively small-budget film led by an early career female director and female screenwriter.
Read: Twilight sets the blood racing even now
In the realm of John Wick, the four existing movies have collectively grossed over $1 billion at the global box office.
No further details on plots or characters featured in the upcoming TV series have been revealed.
