In 2018, filmmaker Leigh Whannell drew notice with his low-budget sci-fi action film Upgrade. Produced by Blumhouse for $3 million, the film earned $17 million in cinemas and received generally favorable reviews. Now, both Whannell and Blumhouse want to turn it into a TV series.
Set twenty minutes into the future, Upgrade tells a story of Grey Trace (Logan Marshall-Green), a mechanic left paralyzed after a car crash/mugging. He agrees to receive an experimental chip that would allow him to once again control his body. But the AI inside the chip starts advising violent revenge towards criminals who maimed Grey and turns him into a killing machine during combat.
Set several years after the events of the film, Upgrade the TV series would expand upon its world, introducing unsettling ways this new technology gets abused by corporations and government alike as it gets used to curtail criminal activity. Blumhouse already assembled the writer’s room and Whannell (whose remake of The Invisible Man came out in February) is ready to direct again.
