Hunger Games director Francis Lawrence has Red Rising movie in the works

Paramount Pictures has finally decided to give the Red Rising series a proper crack at the big screen, and they’ve picked up Francis Lawrence to direct. If the name rings a bell, you’re probably thinking of all those Hunger Games sequels he helmed—the bloke’s basically synonymous with stylish, big-budget dystopia at this point.

Now, if you’re not familiar, Red Rising is Pierce Brown’s wildly successful saga mashing up sci-fi spectacle and a hefty dose of Roman mythology, all set against blood-red Martian dust. The books are set in a future where people are sorted into a strict colour-coded caste system. The Golds, naturally, lord it over everyone else, while our protagonist Darrow starts out on the absolute bottom rung as a Red—digging tunnels and working himself to the bone for people who’d step on him as soon as speak to him. His life gets even grimmer when his beloved is killed. That’s the point Darrow discovers the society’s rotten core, at which point he decides to go deep undercover and take the Golds down from the inside.

There are six published books so far, with a seventh, 'Red God,' on the way.

False Starts and Franchise Ambitions

This isn’t the first time Red Rising has looked set for an adaptation. About ten years ago, Universal had a feature film in development that fell to pieces before it could get off the ground. Since then, someone else had a bash at a TV series, but, again, no dice.

But Paramount’s not mucking about this time. They’ve put Justin Rhodes (he wrote for Terminator: Dark Fate) on script duties. Early days, but at the very least a cinematic universe wouldn’t be out of the question—given the sheer number of books and the very devoted fandom Pierce Brown has managed to build since 2014.

Francis Lawrence Returns to the Arena

In case you’re keeping track of where Lawrence has his hands, the man’s basically built his career directing every Hunger Games movie apart from the original. That’s relevant, because he’s currently knee-deep on another: The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping, which is a prequel-of-a-prequel set decades before Katniss was even a glimmer in Suzanne Collins’ plotting eye.

This one follows a young Haymitch Abernathy—played by Joseph Zada—at the time of the Fiftieth Hunger Games, i.e. the notorious Second Quarter Quell. The supporting cast comes stacked: Whitney Peak plays Lenore Dove Baird, Mckenna Grace is Maysilee Donner, and Ben Wang turns up as Wyatt Callow. You’ve also got Elle Fanning making her debut as Effie Trinket (back when she had a different vibe), Kieran Culkin as Caesar Flickerman, and several others, in a line-up that feels almost unnecessarily loaded, even for a big studio tentpole.

Ralph Fiennes puts in an appearance as a younger President Snow, taking the baton from Tom Blyth from The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes.

The new Hunger Games film, Sunrise on the Reaping, is locked for theatrical release on 20 November 2027.