Halo TV series is coming to Showtime

It took a few years, but a TV show based on the Halo game series finally has a slot at Showtime.

Production on a 10-episode series based on the hit Xbox game will begin in early 2019, Entertainment Weekly reports. Showtime has tapped Kyle Killen of Awake as executive producer, writer, and showrunner, and Rupert Wyatt of Rise of the Planet of the Apes as executive producer.

The show is, unsurprisingly, being called Halo for now, and Showtime's president and CEO David Nevins called it "our most ambitious series ever." It'll be based on the game series' 26th-century human-alien conflict, per Variety.

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A Halo show was first announced in 2013 with Steven Spielberg at the helm, but it fell dormant soon after, TV Guide says, though Spielberg's Amblin Television company is still set as one of the show's producers. Nevins said he expects "audiences who have been anticipating [the show] for years to be thoroughly rewarded."

The first Halo game attracted a massive fan base when it launched in 2001, and it's been close to getting a TV or film adaptation several times over the years. More than a dozen Xbox titles later, the series has sold over 77 million copies and brought in $5 billion in worldwide sales.