Snowcrash Set to Become HBO Max Streaming Series, Will Ironically Compete With Actual Metaverses for Viewers

After nearly three (!) decades of false starts  -- I'm old enough to remember when the director of Demolition Man was once attached to make it --  it looks like a filmed adaption of Snow Crash is finally taking shape:

Neal Stephenson's influential Snow Crash is finally poised to reach screens, although you'll have to be picky about where you watch it. HBO Max has ordered work on a TV series adaptation of the sci-fi novel that will be written and co-run by the Scott Pilgrim movie's Michael Bacall, and directed by Attack the Block's Joe Cornish. The L Word's Angela Robinson will run the show alongside Bacall.

So "filmed", but not as a movie, and rather for a series to be streamed on the Internet. But given that cash-flush HBO is involved, this is the version most likely to finally make it to the screen. Which is ironic timing for several reasons, including:

• As an Internet-streamed series, Snowcrash will compete for viewers with countless online games directly influenced by Snowcrash. (As a Netflix report recently put it, "“We compete with (and lose to) Fortnite more than HBO.")
• Stephenson himself is still "Chief Futurist" with Magic Leap, an AR company coming up with its own version of the Metaverse. (Though small sales suggests Magic Leap's vision hasn't caught on.)
• Stephenson, who once said about the Metaverse, "this is actually just about my least favorite interview topic of all time" is now not just talking about it at Magic Leap, but will soon get asked about it even more after the HBO show comes out.

Less ironic and more poignant: As a novel which takes place in a fallen America whose institutions have been hollowed out and largely replaced by giant corporations, Snowcrash remains totally relevant for the times, totally apart from the Metaverse.

Update, 3:25PM: Welcome, Hacker News readers! Here's some other, related Stephenson/Metaverse posts:

• Did Neal Stephenson Say Second Life Is "Pretty Much What I Imagined"? Not Exactly, Says Neal Stephenson
• Neal Stephenson On Second Life And The Metaverse: I'm A Storyteller, Not A Future Predictor
• Why Fortnite's Most Unexpected Predecessor Is... Second Life

Comments

[Chris Childs]

If memory serves didn't Phillip on several occasions directly credit Snowcrash as being the main influence when he created Second Life?

[Wagner James Au]

Yep his now-wife Yvette gave him a copy when they were in college in the 90s.