Producers of Syfy’s ’12 Monkeys’ Promise the Show Will Not Just Be a Remake of the Original 1995 Film

When I first heard that the Syfy network was making a TV adaptation of the Terry Gilliam classic 12 Monlkeys, I was skeptical to say the least.

Today I'm still skeptical, but at least I know more about it.

I know, for example, that it stars Aaron Stanford (a.k.a. Pyro from the X-Men movies) and Amanda Schull (Suits). And, more importantly, I know the shows producers are dead-set on making sure the series is not just an extended remake of the movie.

"It's a complete reimagining," co-executive producer Terry Matalas said at the Television Critics Association summer press tour on Monday. "We were all big fans of the original film and had a deep love and respect for the material. We didn't want to just redo what the movie does."

Of course, the show will still be about a time traveler named Cole (i.e., Bruce Willis in the movie version) sent from a post-apocalyptic future to stop the plague that annihilated the human race. The difference, it seems, will be that the TV show is really going to focus on the time travel.

The producers said they really wanted to do "a gritty time-traveling show," so they're going to put this element of the story front and center, add some special effects (think Looper), and get rid of the film's ambiguity (e.g., is he from the future, or crazy?) about the subject.

What does that mean? It means Cole won't just make one trip back in time. He'll be bouncing around from one time period to the next, including visits to World War I and the 1980s.

No word yet on whether Scott Bakula will be making any cameos.

[Via]