For the God of War TV Show To Work, It Needs a New Approach to Violence – IGN

At a glance, there are many reasons to be at least a little bit hopeful about Prime Video’s plans to adapt the Norse duology of God of War. Ronald D. Moore is a tried and tested showrunner, having helmed both Battlestar Galactica and Outlander, among others. And Ryan Hurst, who played Thor in God of War: Ragnarok, is a promising if surprising lead. The celebrated Frederick E.O. Toye of Shōgun is set to direct the first two episodes, while Cory Barlog – the franchise’s creative shepherd – will serve as an executive producer, not unlike Bethesda’s Todd Howard on Prime’s Fallout or Naughty Dog’s Neil Druckmann on HBO’s The Last of Us, two of the finest game adaptations of all time.

And yet, like Kratos, I have a hard time letting my guard down. Yes, Moore has a pretty nice track record, but he’s also told IGN that he is “not a gamer” – something that could prevent him from grasping the God of War experience in its entirety. Hurst clearly knows how to play big, angry guys, but can he live up to the legacy of Christopher Judge? As for Barlog: George R.R. Martin serves as an EP on House of the Dragon, but that has not prevented showrunner Ryan Condal from straying further and further away from the source material, the way Benioff and Weiss did with Game of Thrones.

Above all, I’m reminded of that cringeworthy live-action Super Bowl commercial for God of War: Ascension from 2013 – the one where Calliope turns to ash in Kratos’ arms to the sound of Ellie Goulding’s “Hanging On.” Even as an obsessive teenager amassing piles of Collector’s Editions and bombarding the inbox of Santa Monica Studio’s HR department with ideas for sequels involving Ra, Buddha, and Jesus, I couldn’t help but feel that there was something off about seeing Kratos as an actual human being as opposed to an in-game model.

So when it comes to this Prime series, there are a couple of challenges. First, a relatively minor issue: what about Greece? More than a few fans were frustrated to learn that the show will only cover God of War 2018 and God of War: Ragnarok, rather than work their way up from the original trilogy. They’re right to be upset, as the Norse games need the Greek ones to make sense, and the same can be said about any adaptation, should they want to make the same impact. Start with 2018 and you won’t fully understand why Kratos is so afraid and ashamed of his past, why he’s hesitant to open up to Atreus. Likewise, you’ll miss out on the meaning and pathos of one of the best moments in the entire series: the return of the Blades of Chaos.

Several solutions present themselves. The adaptation could sum up the entire Greek saga in an immersive, stage-setting episode à la the preamble of One Battle After Another, or it could deliver the story piecemeal through flashbacks. Or it could just do what the 2018 game does: have Kratos drip-feed his past, his confessions drawn out by the twists and turns encountered on the journey with his son. If anything, Moore and his writing team shouldn’t feel like they owe new audiences exposition: the mystery of Kratos’ relationship with Atreus, why he keeps a distance from this otherwise nice boy, should be enough to keep them engaged.

The other, bigger issue requires some explanation. In hindsight, it isn’t surprising that Fallout and The Last of Us were the ones to definitively break the game adaptation curse. Both franchises are, first and foremost, vehicles for storytelling. In Bethesda’s case, players create their own stories through sandbox gameplay and dialogue options; in Naughty Dog’s games, stories are told directly by the developers, their cinematic style blurring the line between games and movies. The transition from one medium to another is fluid, almost logical.

Narrative plays an important part in God of War too, of course, but it’s neither the only nor the most important one. Regardless of mythology, the franchise has always concerned itself above all else with spectacle, delivering action set pieces on a scale never seen before – in any medium. To this day, the opening sequence of God of War 3, in which Kratos and the Titans face off against Zeus’ pantheon as they climb up Mt. Olympus, remains the single most epic thing I have seen in my entire life. Nothing – not the Battle of Minas Tirith in The Return of the King, nor the fight against Thanos at the conclusion of Avengers: Endgame – comes close.

Fanboying aside, I think any director would have a tough time capturing this epicness on camera. Not only because of financial restrictions – Moore is unlikely to receive a budget similar to James Cameron’s latest Avatar movie, let alone the $1 billion pumped into Prime’s own Rings of Power – but also because of limitations baked into the filmmaking medium itself. Though great at representing wars and battles with many moving pieces, live-action has long struggled to depict the kind of extended, stylized, one vs. one confrontations between superpowered individuals that animation (think Legend of Aang, Legend of Korra, One Piece, One-Punch Man) and video games (God of War, Devil May Cry, Black Myth: Wukong) excel at. Not even the recent Superman films, developed during an age when CGI can theoretically help directors achieve anything, have captured the kind of supernatural brawls demanded of Kratos’ story.

Put differently: I think it’s impossible to film the fight between Kratos and Baldur (or Thor or Zeus or any other god) using live actors that goes as hard as it does in-game, which puts Moore and his team in a bit of a conundrum. They could scale the fight back, reducing the literally earth-shattering conflict into your run-of-the-mill Hollywood fistfight, though this would anger and alienate fans of the games who expect something just as – or almost as – impressive as what they experienced with a controller in their hands.

Another, more efficient and effective but also ballsier option would be to treat Kratos’ unfathomable strength like the shark from Jaws: alluded to and talked about, but kept hidden from view except for a couple of brief moments. Instead of having the Kratos-Baldur fight play out like two cosplayers pretending to do what their characters do in the game, imagine following the events from Atreus’ perspective: hidden under the floorboards and feeling the ground shake once talking leads to punching. We wouldn’t see the fight itself, just its aftermath: the trees felled, the boulders shattered, that gigantic ravine that appeared from nowhere. This way, we’re left to imagine what transpired – and chances are, your imagination is better than anything the filmmakers could show us.

Ironically, then, it just may be that the best possible adaptation of God of War would be one that keeps the visible action to a minimum.

Tim Brinkhof is a freelance writer specializing in art and history. After studying journalism at NYU, he has gone on to write for Vox, Vulture, Slate, Polygon, GQ, Esquire and more.