There are plenty of successful game franchises out there that have engaging storylines, deep characterizations and meaningful subtext that would make for perfect movie translations.  God of War, Metroid Prime and Syphon Filter come to mind.  You know what doesn’t come to mind?  Tekken.  But that’s never stopped Hollywood before.  A Tekken movie is coming in 2009, like it or not, and now it has a director.  Dwight Little has been tapped to helm the Crystal Sky production.  A veteran TV director, Little has also overseen films like Anaconda: The Hunt for the Blood Orchid, Free Willy 2 and Murder at 1600, as well as the full motion video game Ground Zero Texas for the Sega CD.  

Tekken’s development story so far has been one of delays, false leaks and serious doubts about the release of the film.  The signing of Little and announcement of a shooting date (Feb. 4, 2008) shows that it just might be moving forward in a real way, but seriously, is there enough story here to support a movie?  I doubt that Crystal Sky wants another Dead or Alive straight to DVD situation, but it’s hard to believe that this will amount to  anything more than that.

The director and his meal ticket, Nina Williams.