Sony has announced that the 2019 action-adventure video game Days Gone will be adapted into a feature film by Sony Playstation Productions, after the success of Sony’s Uncharted adaption starring Tom Holland and Mark Wahlberg. As reported by Deadline, the film’s principal actor is Sam Heughan, who plays Jamie Fraser on the critically acclaimed Outlander series on Starz. Sheldon Turner, who wrote for Up in the Air and X-Men: First Class and was nominated for an Oscar, is adapting the video game. The original PlayStation 4 video game, which was published in April 2019, sold 9 million copies throughout the course of its lifetime.
In the third-person video game, the player took control of Deacon St. John, a former criminal turned bounty hunter trying to make it through the post-apocalyptic wasteland. An epidemic in the game’s universe transformed regular people into “Freakers,” rapidly mutating zombies. Deacon, unlike the other survivors, does not make camp but rather continues to go on his motorcycle. As soon as Deacon hears that his presumed-dead wife could still be alive, he sets off on a quest to track her down. Players have the option of walking or riding around on Deacon’s motorcycle to explore the game area.
If Heughan commits to the film adaptation, he will play Deacon. Turner and Jennifer Klein of Vendetta Productions are attached to produce the movie. It has been announced that Asad Qizilbash and Carter Swan would be co-producing the film adaptation of Days Gone. Since last year’s Uncharted adaption made over $401 million globally, the announcement of another video game adaptation for Sony is no surprise.
Sony is also working on television adaptations of The Last of Us and Twisted Metal for HBO and Peacock, respectively, and has a film version of Gran Turismo in the works with District 9 director Neill Blomkamp scheduled to helm. Heughan’s cinematic roles include The Spy Who Dumped Me and Bloodshot, and he has starred in all six seasons of Outlander. Besides his upcoming roles in It’s All Coming Back to Me and Everest, Heughan can now be seen in the British mystery series Suspect. Actually, Turner is the screenwriter for Everest, as well as the upcoming feature Love, is a Gun and the series Wyrd starring Matthew Rhys.
As of this writing, we know little to nothing about the film’s plot.