Luc Besson is revisiting Taken with NBC.
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The Taken prequel comes as IP – including features and TV series – have been hot commodities across broadcast and cable networks amid an increasingly cluttered original programming landscape.
Finally, we get to learn how Liam Neeson got his “very particular set of skills”!
The successful “Taken” movie franchise is expanding to television “with a prequel drama about a young Bryan Mills (the character in the movies played by Liam Neeson)”, writes our friend Nellie Andreeva in an exclusive story for Deadline. But in a further twist, Taken: The Series won’t be set in the past even though Bryan Mills would have been in his twenties during the “70s”. For its part, NBC is also prepping a gay-focused remake of TV series Hart to Hart.
NBC seeks a particular set of skills in its newest straight-to-series order.
Network TV schedules for 2015-16 are dotted with film-inspired series, including ABC’s Uncle Buck, Fox’s Minority Report and CBS’ Limitless and Rush Hour.
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The “Taken” prequel hails from Universal TV and Besson’s EuropaCorp. One of the only reasons why the “Taken” movies have become such a big success is because you have someone in Neeson who is such a strong, magnetic performer. That’d mean the Taken films take place a few years into the future. It joins La Femme Nikita and Transporter.
