HBO Max is developing a TV series based on Neil Stephenson’s cyberpunk novel Snow Crash. According to Deadline, British filmmaker Joe Cornish (The Kid Who Would Be King, Attack the Block) will direct. Michael Bacall, who wrote scripts for 21 Jump Street and Scott Pilgrim vs the World, will pen the adaptation and serve as showrunner alongside Angela Robinson (The L Word).
First published in 1992, Stephenson’s seminal novel both celebrates and lampoons the cyberpunk genre. Its story follows Hiro Protagonist, a hacker and pizza delivery driver. After a mysterious computer virus starts killing hackers, Hiro begins a search for its creator before he unleashes the infocalypse. Snow Crash was nominated for the British Science Fiction Award and the Arthur C. Clarke Award. In the mid-1990s, Hollywood studios bought the adaptation rights but the project subsequently spent over two decades in development hell. Joe Cornish first signed on to direct the film version of Snow Crash in 2012, with Stephenson himself praising his script. Presently, the adaptation is finally being made – but as a TV series instead. This would allow more time to unpack Stephenson’s prose dense with references to history, linguistics, cryptography, and computer science.
