Television production is difficult and time-consuming. Many that is, Warhammer Games Workshop and Amazon announced a deal late last year to develop a new TV series set in the US. Warhammer 40,000 With the help of the Universe Warhammer We haven’t heard anything about the show since super-nerd and sometime actor Henry Cavill’s Star Wars 2.0 series, but that could change in the coming months if the show does come to fruition, since there is an actual time limit on the deal.
Today, Games Workshop released its 2024 annual report (via IGN), providing a brief update on its ongoing partnership with Amazon. In the end, a lack of news is both a good thing and a bad thing. Potentially Bad news. The good news is that this process is still ongoing and Amazon is actually Warhammer 40,000The current deal also means the streamer could potentially acquire licensing rights to Games Workshop fantasy properties. Age of Sigmar Or its predecessor, Warhammer Fantasy BattlesThe potential bad news is that there isn’t much time left for Amazon and Games Workshop to actually agree on what shows they want to make before their contract expires.
“Games Workshop and Amazon are working together to agree creative guidelines for any film and television series developed by Amazon for the 12 months ending December 2024,” reads part of an annual report on the licensing deal. “The deal will only proceed if creative guidelines are agreed between Games Workshop and Amazon. We will provide updates as the situation progresses.”
Essentially, things are still happening, but not enough to say that a specific new show is actually in the works, and there’s still five more months for that to happen before the contract is released and Games Workshop can move its grimdark world elsewhere.
This is relatively common in TV production, and Games Workshop is already familiar with it, given that it went through a similar process with Spotnitz Productions back in 2019. At the time, the company announced that it was developing a TV series starring Gregor Eisenhorn, an Inquisitor for the Human Empire tasked with hunting down alien forces that are negatively affecting human society. However, nothing ever came to fruition after the deal was first announced, and presumably that deal expired before Games Workshop entered into talks with Amazon in late 2022.
The same thing could happen here, and we haven’t heard anything about Amazon’s plans. WarhammerWe’ll probably wait a few years until Games Workshop announces that they’ve sold the license to someone else, or until we hear the news that the show is on the way by the end of 2024, find out what type of power-suited giant Henry Cavill will be playing, and go into production. 40KThe future of television will be clear by the end of 2024. What lies beyond that? Well, a dystopian future filled with wars and licensing deals.
Want more news from io9? Check out everything you need to know about when the latest Marvel, Star Wars, and Star Trek releases are due, what’s next for the DC Universe in movies and TV, and the future of Doctor Who.
