50 years after its CBS debut, a reboot of Irwin Allen’s 1965 cult classic sci-fi series Lost in Space has been announced by Netflix. The original iteration, starring June Lockhart and the late Guy Williams, followed the Robinson family exploring and — surprise, surprise — getting lost in space. Deadline reports that Netflix’s upcoming take on the straight-to-series order is part of the streamer’s new initiative to appeal to families. It may be on the darker side of things, though, as The Last Witch Hunter and Dracula Untold writers Matt Sazama and Burk Sharpless will write the script.
In the original series, set in 1997 (three decades into the future at the time), the Robinsons’ spaceship, Jupiter 2, was driven off course by an enemy, Dr. Zachary Smith (played by Jonathan Harris). Joining the Robinson family in their ship was a robot (voiced by Dick Tufeld), which Dr. Smith planned on using to try to destroy the ship and its crew. Although he was unsuccessful, Jupiter 2 ended up crashing on an alien world the family called Priplanus, which set the scene for most of the show’s first season. Seasons 2 and 3 depicted the family further exploring Priplanus and other alien planets.
Neil Marshall (Doomsday, The Descent) will direct the reboot, which will be executive produced by Sazama, Sharpless and Synthesis Entertainment’s Kevin Burns. Burns and others had unsuccessfully tried to revive the classic story in the past, most recently in 2003, when WB Television commissioned a John Woo-directed pilot. Despite production by Synthesis Entertainment with Irwin Allen Productions, 20th Century Fox TV, and Regency TV, WB decided not to order a series.
New Line Cinema did produce a Stephen Hopkins-directed film adaptation in 1998 starring William Hurt, Matt LeBlanc, and Gary Oldman, but it received mostly negative reviews.
This upcoming version doesn’t yet have a release date or cast announced. Notably, Kevin Burns had been closely working with Irwin’s widow, Sheila Matthews Allen, on the reboot before her death in 2013.
In related news, all 83 original episodes of the series were released in a Blu-ray box set entitled Lost In Space: The Complete Adventures in honor of its 50th anniversary in September.
