A brand new Robocop TV series is in the work at Amazon MGM Studios … but the Stargate franchise is still missing in action, two and a half years after the mega-corp closed its $8.45 billion acquisition of the historic Hollywood studio.

Variety reports today that the new Robocop series has hired its showrunner, Peter Ocko. He previously created the short-lived AMC sci-fi drama Moonhaven, and worked as an executive producer on Lodge 49.

James Wan has also been tapped to executive produce the series under his Atomic Monster banner. Wan produced and directed former Stargate Atlantis co-star Jason Momoa in the Aquaman movies for DC and Warner Bros., and has produced TV series such as 2016’s MacGyver reboot.

Robocop appears to be rebooting the franchise by adapting the original premise. According to the logline:

A giant tech conglomerate collaborates with the local police department to introduce a technologically advanced enforcer to combat rising crime — a police officer who’s part man, part machine.

Peter Weller starred in the original film trilogy, the first of which opened in theaters in 1987. A reboot in 2014 starred Joel Kinnaman, and earned $242 million worldwide (against a reported budget of $100 million). The property has also been adapted for television more than once, including the 1994 series that toned down the violence in order to appeal to a younger audience.

FRANCHISE BUILDING

Amazon Studios executives made it clear during its purchase of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer that it was interested not just in bolstering its streaming library with MGM’s deep catalog of film and television shows. Amazon’s stated intentions were also to tell new stories in the studio’s most popular franchises.

That includes IP with films and shows already in the works when the deal closed in March of 2022, including Rocky, Vikings, Wednesday, and The Handmaid’s Tale. But while Stargate fans have anticipated the announcement of a new show, movie, or miniseries any day now, on that front the newly christened “Amazon MGM Studios” has remained silent.

Other legacy franchises have been put into active development, though — not only Robocop but also a new Poltergeist TV series, which this summer hired Kalinda Vazquez (Star Trek: Discovery) and Robbie Thompson (The Winchesters) as showrunners. Based on the 1982 fantasy horror film, MGM’s Poltergeist: The Legacy was produced alongside Stargate and aired on Showtime, SCI FI Channel, and syndication stations in the U.S. from 1996 to 1999.

And finally, Prime Video has ordered a Legally Blonde prequel series titled Elle. Reese Witherspoon is on board as a producer, announcing just today that the casting call has gone out for a high school version of her character. Elle is created by Laura Kittrell (Insecure), who will serve as executive producer and showrunner.

WHERE IS STARGATE?

In the midst of this development flurry and today’s new announcements, however, the Stargate franchise remains conspicuously absent. This comes after years of speculation that, once Amazon completed its purchase of the studio, Stargate would be near the top of the priority list. So has Stargate lost its cachet inside the reorganized studio … or are there other factors that have stymied its development behind closed doors?

After picking up the rights ahead of the release of the 1994 feature film, MGM found a global smash hit when it launched the spin-off series Stargate SG-1 in 1997. SG-1 starred Richard Dean Anderson (MacGyver) and ran for ten seasons, moving from Showtime to SCI FI halfway through its run. Two direct-to-DVD movies, The Ark of Truth and Stargate: Continuum, followed in 2008.

The TV universe expanded the original premise with a sprawling mythology, adding to this with the 2004 spin-off Stargate Atlantis and 2009’s Stargate Universe. These shows ran for five seasons and two seasons, respectively, bring the franchise’s total to more than 350 hours. At its height in the first decade of this century Stargate was said to be a $1 billion franchise, second in importance only to James Bond inside the halls of MGM.

But the last Stargate series broadcast its final episodes in 2011 — now more than 13 years ago.

Following the studio’s bankruptcy in 2010 it came under new management, which kept Stargate lodged firmly on the shelf. A low-budget experiment in 2017 and 2018 produced Stargate Origins, a 10-part Web series that never got a sequel before the studio shuttered its streaming platform and went up for sale. By 2020 Brad Wright — who co-created all three Stargate TV series — was actively working on a pilot script for a fourth show, but the pandemic and the sale to Amazon appears to have buried that project.

After the 2022 sale, GateWorld reported that Amazon and MGM were soliciting pitches from creatives for where to take Stargate next. Among those rumored to be in contention were The Expanse creators Mark Fergus and Hawk Ostby, J.J. Abrams’ Bad Robot, and the producers of Amazon’s dark superhero hit The Boys. But no announcement came, and in 2023 the industry suffered another shut-down due to the labor strikes of the writers and actors guilds.

Today Stargate remains one of the studio’s most valuable properties … at least on paper. Its global reach, untapped licensing possibilities, and a still-active fan base suggest that Stargate is bursting with market potential in 2024. And so it seems all but certain that there is a desire to revive it in some form. Getting it right, however — in a way that long-time fans will welcome with open arms — may be posing unique challenges not faced by the likes of Robocop or Poltergeist. Amazon MGM executives don’t want to get this wrong.

Where Stargate will end up, and who will be placed in charge of shepherding the franchise for a new generation, remain to be seen. Hopefully the wait won’t be much longer, and Stargate will join MGM’s other famous franchises in finding a new lease on life.