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The long-awaited card game series Magic: The Gathering produced by Netflix gains another chapter in its troubled history: during the streaming platform's Geekend Week, it confirmed on its official website that the series is in production.
Check out the ad below:
Magic: The Gathering is expanding from your tabletop to Netflix (for real), and you won’t even need to break out your Pyromancer’s Goggles to watch.
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The hugely popular card game Magic: The Gathering, which has enthralled millions of tabletop gamers for more than 30 years, is set to become an event animated series streaming on Netflix — and it’s currently in production with new creative direction from showrunner and executive producer Terry Matalas (Star Trek: Picard, 12 Monkeys). Announced at Geeked Week 2024, the series was created in partnership with Hasbro Entertainment and Wizards of the Coast, with Oscar winner Patrick Osborne (Feast) as supervising director and executive producer.
“It has been an absolute dream collaboration with Netflix, Hasbro Entertainment, Wizards of the Coast, and the brilliant Patrick Osborne to bring the many worlds of Magic: The Gathering to streaming,” Matalas tells Tudum. “Those new to this sprawling saga will learn what millions of fans who play every day already know. Magic is the ultimate storytelling sandbox, brimming with iconic, complex characters, extraordinary mind-bending powers, and portals to every genre imaginable. It is also a powerful reminder that no matter what culture, country, or plane of existence you come from, we can all unite and become heroes together.”
The Long Controversy of Netflix's MTG Series
Netflix announced its partnership with Magic: The Gathering in 2019, produced by the Russo brothers, known for Marvel's Avengers films. Promotional art was used with Exquisite Firecraft to confirm the announcement
Two years later, Wizards of the Coast invited actor Brandon Routh to participate in its livestream about future Magic releases. In it, Brandon was confirmed to lend his voice to the planeswalker Gideon Jura, who would be a core character in the plot - it was confirmed in this same broadcast that the Netflix animation would be released in 2022, with a change of direction to Jeff Kline (Transformers: Prime) after creative disagreements with the Russo brothers.
In 2023, during a Hasbro shareholder meeting, Chris Cocs, the company's CEO, stated that the series was still in production, but did not present any material or details about the delay in its release.
On September 11, 2024, Brandon Routh stated in an interview for Collider that the series would not happen.
“I'm not sure. I did do a voice for it. As far as I understand, nobody's put out a press release about it, but apparently it's not happening. That's kind of old news. I'm not sure why it's surfacing again.”
- Brandon Routh
What happened, after all?
There is no official statement regarding the disagreement between Brandon Routh and Netflix.
It is likely that Netflix's MTG series went through its third production process from scratch and, consequently, all material made and recorded prior to Terry Matalas' direction was discarded - which has already happened with other audiovisual works and digital games before.
The biggest indication of this possibility is the promotional image presented in the new ad, which includes the characters Ajani Goldmane and Chandra Nalaar - while there are no confirmations that Gideon will not be present and that he will not be voiced by Brandon Routh, it is possible that the actor is no longer part of this new phase of MTG's Netflix series.
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Source: Netflix, Collider
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