The recently-released video game Little Nightmares is being adapted for television. Behind the scenes, the Russo brothers (Community) are executive producers, and Henry Selick (The Nightmare Before Christmas) is directing the pilot and possibly more.
Little Nightmares is a 2D horror puzzle platformer about a little girl named Six getting through a terrifying underwater vessel. The player must avoid being caught by any of the frights aboard the ship. The game was released in April for PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. Little Nightmares was developed by Tarsier Studios, the developers behind LittleBigPlanet 3 and LittleBigPlanet PS Vita.
Production company DJ2 Entertainment discovered the game while it was still in production, and partnered with publisher Bandai-Namco to develop it. The Russo brothers then acquired the TV rights competitively, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
DJ2 Entertainment is also working on films based on video games Sleeping Dogs, We Happy Few, Blacklight: Retribution, Hawken and the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise as well as a series based on Life is Strange. They’ve already adapted the game Skulls of the Shogun as a series for Nerdist. There’s no word on where Little Nightmares will debut.
Selick hasn’t been in the director’s chair since 2009’s Coraline. He also directed The Nightmare Before Christmas and James and the Giant Peach. The Russo brothers are best known for directing Captain America: Winter Soldier and Civil War, and are working hard on Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers 4. As producers, they worked on the first three seasons of Community.
There’s no release date information for Little Nightmares. The DJ2 Entertainment website carries a listing called “Unannounced Series” for 2018 next to their other video game projects, which could be the Little Nightmares adaption. If it comes out in 2018, it would be nine years since Selick last directed.
