Assassin's Creed Assassinated?

Netflix IS Abstergo

I love the Assassins Creed Franchise.

Well, I loved it anyway.

Imagine if you will, a flashback melody accompanied by a wavy visual effect as we go back in time to 2007. Yes this was the year the spiritual successor to the ‘Prince of Persia’ series was released. In this first title of the series you played Desmond, someone in the present day, who has DNA linking him to the ‘Assassin Brotherhood’ of the past. Through the “Animus”, a clever machine created by an ominous Corporation called Abstergo Industries, the world's largest pharmaceutical conglomerate (…yeah) it was possible to go and “re-live” events of the past with the goal of retracing the steps of a particular Assassin by the name of Altaïr, to find a magical artifact (or ‘Piece of Eden’) and keep it out of the hands of sworn enemies of said brotherhood ‘The Templar Order’, also known as the ‘Order of the Knights Templar’ (they don’t say “ni”).

Yes in this game the The Knights Templar are basically evil…yeah, this game series was somewhat ahead of its time there with that kind of thing and often there were questionable people throughout history portrayed as heroic and lovely here (though who’s to say some of them weren’t, I suppose). Oh and :spoilers: Abstergo ARE The Templar Order - still up to their old tricks and wanting to bring about a New World Order; them ruling the masses via the mind-control properties of said artifact to achieve their idea of peace. I know. It all sounds absolutely bananas. Great eh? Well, in a fictional sense. A group of elitists who want to enslave and control the masses using mind-control happening in real-life is not as much fun, but I digress..

As soon as I played this game, I was hooked. Doing parkour around the cities, uncovering secrets, using a hidden blade to do stealth assassinations…the game was awesome. As were the majority of its sequels, which eventually introduced more open combat, exploration and RPG type elements, as well as having a bit of a weird goal of appeasing offended people with the more recent games, natch:

Anyway, I remember spending (wasting) many hours on the games to accomplish everything, gaining all the trophies required to get a Platinum Trophy (I played them on PlayStations) for nearly all of them - most recently Assassin’s Creed Odyssey (I couldn’t get hold of the PS5 at launch and wanted to continue on PlayStation as with all the other titles, so I haven’t actually played the latest offering yet; Assassin’s Creed Valhalla). So, you could say, I’m a bit of a “fan”.

Cue the inevitable; live-action depictions of a beloved video-game series.

*sigh*

Yes it’s just a well known fact with plenty of evidence, none of which I will cite here, that in general any live-action take on a video-game series is usually utterly dreadful; a complete let down to the fans and met with indifference from non-fans. You see they try and do too many things; base it on the broad strokes of what the game series is about (with maybe an Easter Egg here and there to pay fan-service) but also keep things loose enough for the casual viewer. This is just a recipe for disaster, leaving both sets of viewers unsatisfied. The difference with live-action depictions of popular books is that they usually trust in the source material and try to stick to it, the characters, the stories, the imagery - well, for the most part anyway…I suspect they’re about to completely destroy ‘Lord of the Rings’ with its Amazon series (of course the movies took some liberties themselves, but they mostly tried to keep to the lore). Also video-games don’t necessarily always really have much of a story anyway of course, because they’re often about the interactive experience first and foremost. Oh by the way take a look at what’s on the agenda for the upcoming Tolkien Society Seminar:

…wow seems really fun!

But getting back to the point; video-games rarely translate well to the small or silver screen. The first attempt at trying to depict Assassin’s Creed with real-life fleshy meat-sacks was a movie, of the same name, back in 2016 with Michael Fassbender starring. Exactly as you’d expect, it was utterly forgettable. In fact, cards on the table, I put it on at home and didn’t even bother finishing it…I was fairly bored from the get-go and I imagine fans and non-fans alike pretty much felt the same (no particular fault of Michael) and judging by the predictable middle-of-the-road ratings, I think that’s a safe bet:

…but they can’t help themselves. Despite these reviews and the difficulty faced with having the live-action version of a video-game ever be popular, they’ve decided to sully the franchise even more…with a Netflix series.

“Requiescat in Pace”

Are we about to see the utter clowning of the Assassin’s and this fictional world?

For example just how far will they decide to push modern-day political discourse given the framework for this already being set-up within the franchise as it is? I mean for me this never detracted from it or crossed any lines; it was only ever interesting even when unbelievable. Also to be honest, despite Abstergo clearly being the villains (something I’m sure any reasonable person would agree on) they would even try to sometimes paint their cause as having merit, at least in the eyes of the elitists who think they know best. They’re never just all always pure evil, if that makes sense - though usually their most senior leaders and the thugs as hired hands are shown to be utter pieces of shit, of course…after all they have to have you feeling okay with quietly plunging your hidden blade into people’s jugular veins or spinal chords.

But with this will Netflix just abandon all impartiality and shoehorn in the latest ridiculous trends rather than just focusing on a good story, captivating conspiracies, espionage, stealth action as well as occasional brawls, battles and all-out wars? What about the characters? Will the main Assassin we follow be someone who bangs on about their “identities” (secret organisation membership status or otherwise) or be a ridiculous casting if it’s a well known character such as Altaïr, or Ezio who was in 3 of the games? You only have to look at the casting for the upcoming Resident Evil live-action series on Netflix for infamous Albert Wesker, who has a very distinct look in the games to see what I mean:

…despite liking Lance Reddick’s acting and presence on screen in anything I’ve ever seen him in, come on really? He will be playing Wesker? He hasn’t even got any hair!

Hey look, I for the most part genuinely couldn’t care less who plays what, certainly in fictional things or where how they look isn’t of particular note etc. In fact usually when there’s a fuss about this stuff it’s nearly always mostly because of the fascinating nature of a double standard on display, rather than anyone actually annoyed at the casting itself (or worse reasons). But like I say Wesker is a very popular character and has a VERY unique and purposely crafted look. The shades. The thick head of slicked back blonde hair. The long black trench-coat. He’s surely the designers at Capcom’s depiction of a modern-day SS General?! Like the way he looks serves a purpose; it’s an essential part of the character’s design because it matches his personality, actions, his involvement in eugenics and plans of wiping out humanity and ruling the world, you know, stuff like that. So given the fact he clearly looks like a classic 90’s movie style of Nazi (and basically is one!) and I’d say surely by design, you have to wonder whether they’re literally just trolling with some of this stuff now. I suppose you could also argue that it’s moving away from such a cheesy and cliché looking character too though, to be fair.

”Nothing is true, Everything is permitted.”

Hmm, quite.

Anyway, to be fair to Netflix, ‘The Witcher’ series does have mostly positive reviews:

…I can’t say whether I agree with the ratings since I haven’t watched it myself (yet, anyway…I haven’t played the games (or read the books) and have always meant to get around to them so thought if I hold-off on the show until then it would be a good motivator to set aside time for them - hasn’t worked yet, whoops!) but they’re certainly more promising.

In addition to ‘The Witcher’ I would say the anime of ‘Castlevania’ on there is also pretty decent; but that’s not live-action so doesn’t count, sorry suckers!

So let’s hope they give this Assassin’s Creed series the kind of treatment they gave to ‘The Witcher’ and steer clear of the (not-so-)casual social conditioning they sometimes use their platform for; yes although Netflix would essentially be the streaming services arm of Abstergo if it were real, I will hold out hope that they will just make an entertaining romp through the world of the Assassin Brotherhood and The Templars and not use it as an opportunity to sew division…though I 100% foresee some present day scenes of a prominent member of The Templars, endorsed by Abstergo, being a Republican (perhaps already in a powerful office or gunning for one). You just know they’d love to do that!

Anyway whether I like it or not the franchise will be flung from the top of the highest viewpoint around…fingers crossed there’s a pile of hay at the bottom to land on - something that certainly requires a leap of faith.