Halo Movie: Guillermo del Toro Apparently Wanted Master Chief to Have an Evil Twin – IGN

In one of its many possible live-action incarnations, Halo was at one point set to become a movie directed by Guillermo del Toro. According to one of the original game’s developers, the director was at one point pitching for an adaptation in which Master Chief had an evil twin that sided with enemy faction, The Flood.Speaking on the latest episode of IGN’s Devs React to Speedruns series, centred on Halo: Combat Evolved, environment artist (and creator of Halo’s title) Paul Russel brought up a mooted del Toro script for a Halo movie, and brought up a surprising plot detail:

“Master Chief had a twin brother, and the twin brother sided with The Flood, and then the end of the movie was going to be brother against brother.” You can hear the discussion, starting at around 58:54 in the video below:

The rest of the Devs React panel – made up of other Combat Evolved developers – expressed disbelief at the plot point, but Russel insists that it was at least an idea pitched to the team by the director.

“That’s what Joey [presumably Joseph Staten, Halo 1’s writer and cinematic director] was saying. Del Toro was pitching this to Joe at his house. He was punching Joe on the arm and going, ‘And they’re brothers! And they’re going to fight at the end!'” Sadly, we don’t learn any more about del Toro’s ideas before the panel turnms to other topics, although Russel does say he’s sure he could get that story corroborated.

Del Toro has previously told IGN that he adapted the game into a script with writer D.B. Weiss (Game of Thrones) in 2006, but eventually opted to make Hellboy 2: The Golden Army instead.

Halo’s attached a number of major writers and directors across the years. Aside form del Toro and Weiss, the project has also crossed the desks of Peter Jackson, Neill Blomkamp, Alex Garland.

In its latest form, live-action Halo is a Showtime TV series executive produced by Steven Spielberg, and starring Pablo Schreiber (Orange Is the New Black, First Man) as Master Chief. Last we heard, the series is moving forward at Showtime, but has no release date.

Joe Skrebels is IGN’s Executive Editor of News. Follow him on Twitter. Have a tip for us? Want to discuss a possible story? Please send an email to newstips@ign.com.