Yesterday, we reported on Sony and Amazon pressing reset on the Amazon God of War show, following the exit of production leads Rafe Judkins, Mark Fergus and Hawk Ostby. Today, we know that the reset is going full steam ahead.
As reported by Deadline, Ronald D. Moore has stepped up as writer, executive producer, and showrunner for the God of War show. Ronald D. Moore had previously worked with Sony for a decade, producing the shows Helix for SyFy, Outlander for Starz, and For All Mankind for Apple, under Sony Pictures TV.
However, genre fans will remember what made Ronald D. Moore an industry player in the first place; the 2000s Battlestar Galactica show. This reimagining of the cult 1978 space opera show evolved the franchise’s premise, to an allegorical tale of war, humanity, and bigotry.
Moore’s career rose in the course of the show. He developed the premise of the new series and wrote the first two episodes. By the end, he had also directed some episodes and become executive producer.
Other people tied to the God of War show remain on the project. Cory Barlog and Jeff Ketcham from Santa Monica Studio are still executive producers. Subsequently, PlayStation Productions’ Asad Qizilbash and Carter Swan, and Sony Interactive Entertainment’s Hermen Hulst and Vertigo’s Roy Lee are also credited as producers.
A producer like Moore would not flinch in depicting sex and violence. However, his Battlestar Galactica is recognized alongside The Sopranos as ushering in the fabled golden age of television. His hand can raise the pedigree of this show, and it may even expand the show’s potential appeal.
With how we’ve seen the Fallout and The Last of Us shows been taken by non-gaming audiences, this God of War show has huge potential to go beyond the older teen to adult male audience that the video games originally catered to.
In an odd coincidence, the brutal antiheroic early God of War games released in the PlayStation 2 in the 2000s, the same decade that Battlestar Galactica came out. Two decades later, Moore may see new opportunities to tell new stories in the world of mythology and legend, after his peerless commercial and critical success in the realm of science fiction.
So this show may emerge to be something that streaming audiences talk about in the same way they do about Game of Thrones or The Walking Dead. It all definitely looks rosy for this project once again.