Kate Beckinsale May Return To Underworld Series

Producer-director Len Wiseman has dropped some hints for the future of the sci-fi horror series ‘Underworld,’ saying two further films and a TV series may be in the pipeline.

Wiseman’s highly stylised saga of an eon-spanning war between the vampires and the lycans (werewolves to the rest of us) has spawned four films to date, kicking off with the 2003 original which introduced Kate Beckinsale – who later became the director’s wife – as Selene, the vampire warrior with a penchant for black PVC.

Whilst a further ‘Underworld’ film had been reported for some time, the rumour was that Beckinsale would not be returning this time around – but Wiseman stresses that this may not be the case, and Selene may yet return.

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Speaking to IGN at New York Comic Con, Wiseman says the ‘Underworld’ series has “a few things being developed right now.”

“There are some characters that we really like (for) more of a spin-off, kind of like we did on (2009 prequel) ‘Rise of the Lycans.’ And then another film is also being developed, in the works with Kate possibly as well.

“And then there’s a television series as well. So it’s all expanding that universe, in many ways.”

Sure, ‘Universe’ seems to be the buzz word that everyone’s trying to invoke now in imitation of Marvel Studios – but to give Wiseman his due, ‘Underworld’ has built up a fairly vast, comic book-like mythology of its own which could certainly warrant further exploration, on either the big or small screen.

Asked which will emerge first, Wiseman smiles, “You tell me. I don’t know, they’re all in development. There’s a lot of releases out there that aren’t actually true, but it takes too long to wrap all that up.”

Fans of the series will no doubt be pleased to hear that Beckinsale may not be out of the picture after all. Not unlike Milla Jovovich in the ‘Resident Evil’ series, there can be little doubt that the continuing popularity of the ‘Underworld’ franchise owes much to the charisma and sex appeal of its leading lady.

It would seem likely there would be greater demand for this than the spin-off film Wiseman mentions. While I for one found ‘Underworld: Rise of the Lycans’ entertaining enough, it would seem to have suffered from the absence of Beckinsale, winding up the least profitable film of the series.

On the other hand, if a TV series should successfully introduce new characters within the vampires-versus-lycans world, perhaps there’s scope for the films to do likewise.

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Picture Credit: Screen Gems, WENN