John Carpenter Still Wants To Direct a Dead Space Movie

Chances are if you’re reading this, you likely know who John Carpenter is. For the uninitiated, Carpenter is one of the most well-recognized names in pop culture. With references to his works that broadly span across various different mediums from other movies to games to even books. 

Major Takeaways:

• John Carpenter expresses interest in directing a Dead Space movie as he did almost 9 years ago.
• Also wants to compose the score for video games. 

In a recent interview with AVClub, John Carpenter talks about his interest in video games and what games he enjoys playing. Carpenter cites Fallout 76 and Horizon Forbidden West as some of his favorite recent titles and why he loves open-world exploration games. 

Well, it’s fun. Your freedom to roam around and do it your way. And that’s what I love about Fallout. There is a template to follow, there are missions, but you can do it differently. And they keep coming up with new missions every once in a while, and new ideas. It’s good. It’s really interesting.”

Carpenter further expresses his interest in playing Elden Ring and mentions that he also loved 2021’s Ratchet and Clank Rift Apart. 

One of the most interesting details from that interview however was when Carpenter was told there was a The Last of Us TV show by HBO. Carpenter expresses surprise at hearing this and when asked if there was a game he’d like to adapt into a movie, he says that he could do a movie of Dead Space. 

The only one I can think of, and I’ve mentioned it before, is Dead Space. That would make a real great movie. I could do that.”

Dead Space itself owes a lot of its DNA to horror movie directors such as John Carpenter and Ridley Scott, so having one of them direct a Dead Space movie would be a dream come true for Dead Space fans like me. 

He was also asked if he had a favorite game in the series to which he replied,

Well, any of them were really good. I even like the last one, the action one that nobody else liked.”

Keeping the current situation of Dead Space in mind, there is hardly a better time for a Dead Space movie than now, especially with the remake of the first game coming out in January next year. 

John Carpenter also expresses a lot of interest in composing for video games, saying that if somebody asked him, he sure would. But no one does. Which is honestly a shame, a horror game with James Carpenter himself as the composer would be incredible. 

Also notably, only one of Carpenter’s movies has ever been adapted into an official videogame. The Thing which came out in 2002 and was an adaptation of the 1982 movie of the same name. The game continues the story of the seminal horror classic and was developed by Computer Artworks under Konami and Vivendi as the publishers.

Honestly? Dead Space is a fantastic horror franchise and there are very few people who can do it justice in a movie adaptation, and one of them is John Carpenter. Get to it, Hollywood!