‘Improve’ Producer Dishes On the TV Sequel That Nearly Was

Followers of Leigh Whannell’s sci-fi flick Upgrade could recall there was some extent the place it appeared prefer it’d get a sequel. It acquired introduced, then reworked right into a TV collection, after which…nothing, not a peep till final yr when Whannell mentioned the movie would keep a one-and-done. What’s the deal there?

Properly in accordance with Tim Walsh, the movie’s producer who was tapped to jot down and showrun the collection, the present confronted a number of obstacles earlier than getting canned. As he not too long ago informed BloodyDisgusting, he and Whannell offered the undertaking to Peacock again in 2019. Then there was a “tumultuous time” on the earth, corresponding to beginning his writers room “on the day the world shut down” because of the covid-19 pandemic.

One other roadblock was the Improve present’s plot: it will’ve been about 4 criminals not too long ago implanted with the STEM chip within the hopes of reforming them, much like A Clockwork Orange. Walsh thinks it’d have been dangerous to air at a time when exhibits concerning the police and criminals have been “not common,” possible referencing protests towards police brutality in recent times and discussions of tv’s function in sanitizing them. However the greatest killer to the undertaking was above his pay grade—as he tells it, the writers have been prepared and scripts assembled when a Peacock higher-up was fired. Their eventual substitute then “got here in, thought they knew all the pieces, and dropped the undertaking.”

That’s the place Walsh’s involvement with the present ended, and he was candid in saying it “nonetheless hurts” it didn’t get made, although he’s positive there have been makes an attempt to revive it with out him. Regardless of how issues shook out, he nonetheless needs to crew with Whannell once more, so possibly sometime he’ll get an opportunity to revive the Improve present or craft parts from it onto one thing else.

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