Wesley Chu’s upcoming martial arts fantasy series War Arts Saga isn’t set to come out for another year, but already, it’s drumming up interest from Hollywood.
Deadline reports that Original Film (the outfit behind The Boys), and Sony Pictures Television have optioned the novels for television, with Altered Carbon/Jessica Jones/Westworld/Stranger Things/Wheel of Time director Uta Briesewitz set to direct.
Chu announced the series back in 2019: Del Rey is the publisher, and it will be “set in a world where martial arts are magic, and a grandmaster must train a spoiled would-be hero to battle an immortal god-king.” According to Deadline, the books are slated for an annual release starting in 2022.
Hey everyone, I have some exciting news.
I'm completely stoked to announce that my next series, the War Arts Saga, will be published by @DelReyBooks. pic.twitter.com/CKTBxBcPjs
— Wesley Chu (@wes_chu) October 24, 2019
At the time, Chu noted that the trilogy “is a story from my heart and something I’ve been dying to write and share with the world ever since I began publishing.”
Deadline notes that Expanse and Lucifer writer Jason Ning will serve as screenwriter, executive producer, and showrunner. Neal H. Moritz and Pavun Shetty (both from Original Film) and Chu will also serve as executive producers.
Chu got his start at Angry Robot with his novel The Lives of Tao and its sequels, The Deaths of Tao and The Rebirths of Tao, about a man who finds himself host to an alien who crash-landed on Earth and is being pursued by a relentless enemy, the Genjix. Back in 2016, ABC Studios and the team behind Agent Carter optioned the books for a series, although it’s unclear if that’s still in the works.
Chu also released Time Salvager back in 2015, about a chronman who travels back in time to snag resources in a bleak future where the remains of humanity are just holding on to life in outer-planet colonies. That book was also optioned for a film adaptation by Michael Bay, who was slated to direct.
Chu’s other recent work includes a Walking Dead tie-in, The Walking Dead: Typhoon (2019), as well as a Shadowhunter novel co-authored with Cassandra Clare, The Lost Book of the White (2020).
We don’t have any other details about the new series, hopefully we’ll find out who’s in it, and when and where we can watch it before too long.