Snake? Snake!? Snaaake! Stop me if you heard this one, folks. The long-gestating Metal Gear Solid movie may have hit another snag. According to industry insider Daniel Richtman, Oscar Isaac will no longer play Solid Snake in the Jordan Vogt-Roberts-directed adaptation of Hideo Kojima’s beloved video game fever dream.
It’s been a dog’s age since we heard any updates about Vogt-Roberts’ Metal Gear film project, with the last word coming from the director in 2021. Speaking with Entertainment Weekly, Roberts said the road to bringing Metal Gear Solid to theaters is long and winding.
“Metal Gear is something I’ve been trying to Sisyphus push up the hill for seven-plus years,” Jordan Vogt-Roberts told Entertainment Weekly. “That game and Kojima-san’s world mean the world to me, and that’s something that I’m very proud of what we’re doing. I think it’s very Kojima, punk rock, twisty. And then Gundam, likewise, is the godfather of otaku culture in a lot of ways without exaggeration. It is the grandfather to modern anime and thus most Japanese things that we love. It really is wild what Gundam was doing on television in an animated format in the ’70s and the complexity and the weight of the stories they were telling.”
On a more recent note, Twisted Metal and Captain America: Brave New World star Anthony Mackie said he’d like to tackle Kojima’s Metal Gear Solid when asked if he’s star in another video game adaptation.
“There’s so many video games that I would love to see turned into movies just so you can go on a journey with those characters,” Mackie told TheWrap. “They already did ‘Max Payne,’ they did so many of them already. It’s just another wave of it now. But I would love to do ‘Metal Gear Solid.’ I feel like there’s so many characters that we learned of and we fell in love with through video games that would make cool IP to turn into television shows and movies. “
Considering Oscar Isaac’s star power, it’s easy to understand why he would exit Vogt-Roberts’ Metal Gear Solid. It’s not a slight to the project. It’s a matter of Isaac’s Hollywood dance card filling up fast with high-profile projects like Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein and Ben Stiller’s London, a crime thriller based on the short story by Jo Nesbø. Why remain attached to a project that appears to be in development hell? I sincerely hope Vogt-Roberts figures something out soon, especially since Metal Gear Solid creator Hideo Kojima is getting into the film business with one of his forthcoming projects. Maybe the two of them can combine their talents? We shall see.