Back in 2017 someone sat down at their computer and started working on a live-action Assassin’s Creed TV show—but apparently that computer was an Animus and they got sucked into the memories of their ancestors for about eight years.
Looks like they finally came up for air: the live-action Assassin’s Creed series is officially a go at Netflix, steered by producers Roberto Patino (Westworld) and David Wiener (Halo). Making TV out of games is a hot ticket these days, what with prestige shows like The Last of Us and popcorny fare like Fallout, so why not Assassin’s Creed?
Well, I’ll give you two damn words why not: Assassin’s Creed (wait, I need three more words) live-action movie. The 2016 film wasn’t as bad as some videogame adaptations, but it wasn’t good, either, despite some surprisingly high production values and talent like Michael Fassbender, Marion Cotillard, and Jeremy Irons.
I watched it for the first time not long ago, and it sure was a bunch of stuff that happened on a screen. I took away no enjoyment, but I do now have some advice up my sleeve, springloaded and ready to share. Before Netflix begins production on the live-action TV show, here’s a few things it should do that the movie didn’t.
Include some, y’know… stealth
Assassin’s Creed isn’t just about neck-stabbing goons and diving into haypiles. It’s about infiltration. Reconnaissance. Surveillance. Taking in the details of a secure location and using it to sneak over walls and through hallways and past guards and into the perfect position to eliminate a target.
Stealth, in other words. The Assassin’s Creed movie had a ton of fighting and no sneaking. On a couple occasions the assassins appeared amidst a crowd and surprised everybody—but the movie didn’t show how they got into position. It just happened offscreen like magic.
With a TV series, Netflix and Ubisoft have the time and space to create some long, drawn-out stealth sequences. My secret wish: an entire episode with no dialogue, just 50 solid minutes showing someone sneaking into a stronghold, observing and avoiding guards, taking out a target, and then sneaking back out again. That’d be dope. Failing that, just a bit of stealth sometimes, please? In between all the promised sex and violence, perhaps?
Spend less time in the modern day
Once upon a time I announced to the internet that I hated the Animus and Desmond stuff in the Assassin’s Creed games. Every time I got yoinked from the past and had to muck around in the present, I was miserable. The worst part of the Assassin’s Creed games is all the modern day garbage.
While I was 100% correct about this, it turns out a lot of players like that stuff, actually, and I should shut my damn mouth about it. But I gotta believe even Animus and Desmond fans, woefully misguided as they are, would prefer the TV series to take place mostly in the past.
Part of the problem with the movie was that it spent so much more time in the present than in the 1400s, and watching a guy mope around in prison (and mope around as a kid before he went to prison) wasn’t as much fun as watching him run around in a hood killing people in the past. The show should have more old stuff than new stuff. I love old stuff.
Don’t take it too seriously
Michael Fassbender doesn’t do things halfway, whether he’s pretending to use magnetism to move a satellite dish in whatever X-Men movie that was, or dangling shirtless from a giant robotic arm while pretending to stab ghosts in the Assassin’s Creed movie. He commits!
But that intensity, great as it is, tends to come with a lot of self-seriousness, and part of the reason the Assassin’s Creed movie is no fun is that it takes itself dreadfully seriously. It’s a silly story about faking the death of a guy who murdered a pimp so you can attach a computer to his spine and have him replay the memories of his ancestor so he can find a missing apple from the 1400s. Even Jeremy Irons, usually great at turning crap into camp, was a bore.
I’m not saying it needs to be a quip-fest—we’ve got plenty of those already—but I hope the show takes a lighter tone instead of going as dark and moody as an adaptation like The Last of Us.
Don’t reinvent the wheel
There’s something to be said for creating new characters and telling a new story in a familiar setting: the Fallout series is proof of this. The danger is that your new characters and story may pale in comparison with the source material. The Assassin’s Creed movie is proof of this.
So, hey, Netflix? Just go with Ezio! Just retell Ezio’s story. It’s a good story, there’s a ton of material to draw on, and I bet it’ll work out better than trying to come up with an entirely new main character who, let’s face it, is probably just gonna be another white guy anyway. Plus, Ezio went all over the place: Italy, Spain, Syria, Istanbul… That’s four seasons right there. You’re welcome.
Cram it so full of easter eggs it explodes
The Assassin’s Creed movie underperformed at the box office, but you know what didn’t? A Minecraft Movie. It made nearly a billion dollars because Jack Black spent two hours holding up Minecraft items to camera and yelling their names. Don’t do that on the TV show, but on the other hand, do that. Do that kind of thing.
It sort of sucks that we’re like this, but deep down I think we all just want to see things we recognize as often as possible. At least 10 times per hour while watching a show based on a game, we all want to do this:
So that means someone is gonna have to dive into a pile of hay and someone is gonna have to perch on the spire of a roof while the camera swings around them and someone in the present day is going to have to eat at a British bar called “Frye’s Pub” or get on a boat called “The Kenway.” The Assassin’s Creed movie had a few references and easter eggs, but not nearly enough for my liking.
So, Netflix, just stuff as many references as you can into the show, until you reach the point where you say “Is this too many references?” And then keep stuffing them in. You gotta do it. You gotta do it so we can all point at the TV like Leo.
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