It has been over four months since we’ve last heard an update about the upcoming live-action film adaptation of Keanu Reeves’ first action comic book BRZRKR, and now new details about the project have finally been revealed. Speaking with Collider, The Matrix: Resurrections star has confirmed that Netflix’s live-action BRZRKR pic is currently still on the pre-production stage, with The Batman scribe Mattson Tomlin enlisted to pen the adaptation. He also revealed that the project is being developed as an R-rated story.
“We’re working with Netflix who have been very cool,” Reeves teased. “They’re going to let us do an R-rated story which is cool. My ambition or hope is not to do a filmed version of the comic book so that they’ll have things in common, definitely the main character and his kind of rule set, but that we can take it to other places as well.”
He also went on to give an update regarding the progress of the comic book’s anime spin-off, revealing that they’re searching for the right animation company to handle its production.
Reeves continued, “We’re talking to a couple of different animation companies and trying to figure that out. And, again, for me I’m hoping to be inspired and influenced…there are some rules to the story, but I also want other creators to do their version of it. So I’m hoping to do a different version of a metaverse where in the sense having different storytellers with one set of rules but go other places with it. We’re working on trying to set up a company with the animation and we’ve hired a writer for the film Mattson Tomlin. He’s been cool and just starting to put things together. That’s where we’re at.
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Created by Keanu Reeves, BRZRKR is a brutally epic saga about an immortal warrior’s 80,000-year fight through the ages. The man known only as “B” is half-mortal and half-god, cursed and compelled to violence, even at the sacrifice of his sanity. But after wandering the earth for centuries, B may have finally found a refuge — working for the U.S. government to fight the battles too violent and too dangerous for anyone else. In exchange, B will be granted the one thing he desires — the truth about his endless blood-soaked existence, and how to end it.
Pick up a copy of the first issue here!
The live-action film adaptation of BRZRKR is expected to be led by Reeves as he portrays the leading role of B, who actually bears a resemblance to him. As for the anime adaptation, Netflix is planning to release it after the film’s debut, with Reeves also attached to voice the lead.
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The BRZRKR adaptations will be produced by Reeves and Company Films’ Stephen Hamel. The projects will be part of BOOM! Studios first-look deal with the streamer. BOOM! Studios’ Ross Richie and Stephen Christie are producing with Adam Yoelin set as an executive producer.
The 12-issue limited series was based on Reeves’ original idea which he has been developing with Boom! Studios for a long time. It is co-written by Reeves and Matt Kindt with illustrations by Marvel artist Ron Garney and colors by Bill Crabtree, letters by Clem Robins, and character designs and covers by Rafael Grampá. It finally launched on March 3 where the first issue has already sold over 615,000 copies, making it the highest-selling debut in almost 30 years.
