Gore Verbinski's BioShock Movie Would Have Somehow Included Both of the Game's Endings

Pirates of the Caribbean manager Gore Verbinski has said that his scrapped BioShock movie adaptation would person someway included some of the archetypal game's endings to messiness with the audience's heads.

Verbinski was attached to marque a movie mentation of the beloved crippled backmost successful 2008 alongside Universal Studios, with a publication successful spot from Gladiator and Skyfall scribe John Logan.

Alas, the task ne'er materialized owed to lengthy wrangling implicit its planned $200 cardinal fund — deemed risky owed to it besides aiming for an adults-only R rating. Verbinski has antecedently said the movie came wrong 8 weeks of shooting, earlier plans faltered. Work continued to effort and get the movie financed for respective much years, though BioShock creator Ken Levine confirmed the task had been afloat cancelled by 2013.

"I loved this task erstwhile we were getting adjacent to making it astatine Universal," Verbinski has said now, discussing the task successful a reddit Q&A. "I was going to dive profoundly into the Oedipal facet and decidedly support it hard R with the Little Sisters, and the 'choices' the protagonist makes... and the consequences.

"I had worked retired a mode with writer John Logan to person some endings and I was looking guardant to bringing that to the large surface and truly f***ing with people's heads," helium continued. "[We] had immoderate large designs for the Big Daddies and the full underwater demented art-deco aesthetic. Every twelvemonth I perceive thing astir the project, but I'm not definite immoderate workplace is rather consenting to spell wherever I was headed."

The archetypal BioShock has 2 endings, based connected the player's choices to either rescue oregon sacrifice the game's Little Sisters — and the 2 precise antithetic outcomes you get based connected your level of mercy. The game's 'happy' ending — seen if you rescue each Little Sister — rewards the leader with a agelong beingness and the surviving sisters contiguous connected his eventual deathbed. However, if you harvest immoderate Little Sister, your quality is shown alternatively having influenced Rapture's citizens to judge that powerfulness is each that matters. An ominous last cutscene past shows what looks to beryllium a atomic submarine being taken implicit successful an attack.

The 2 endings are beauteous different, past — a agelong and blessed beingness oregon imaginable atomic apocalypse — and it's unclear precisely however Verbinski's movie would person shown both. Could 1 person been a imagination sequence, showing what mightiness person been the alternate outcome? Or would the movie person presented audiences with 2 imaginable futures, and near viewers unclear arsenic to which really played out?

The aboriginal BioShock Infinite played connected the multiverse mentation ("there's ever a lighthouse"!) but it's worthy pointing retired that this was inactive years distant astatine the constituent of Verbinski being involved. Still, it's amusive to ponder however an adaptation mightiness dainty the game's 2 endings now. Especially arsenic plans to accommodate BioShock person since resumed — with Netflix present progressive successful a imaginable adaptation.

Netflix announced plans for a caller adaptation backmost successful 2022, though caller years person seen the task stall again, arsenic cuts changed the scope of the movie, necessitating changes to its script. In September 2025, shaper Roy Lee confirmed the task is inactive successful progressive development, with manager Francis Lawrence connected committee to nonstop aft finishing his enactment connected the forthcoming The Hunger Games: Sunrise connected the Reaping.

"It's a tricky adaptation, truthful there's tons of things to fig retired and to get right," Lawrence told IGN previously. "There's authorities changes astatine Netflix, and truthful things stall retired and get re-energized and stall retired and get re-energized, and I deliberation we're successful a beauteous bully place, honestly."

Back successful the satellite of video games, 2K confirmed past summertime that it had overhauled the likewise long-awaited BioShock 4, which has been successful improvement for the past decade. Amid layoffs and a further hold to the project's release, erstwhile Gears of War caput and Diablo franchise pb Rod Fergusson volition present oversee the project. Fergusson volition besides caput up the game's improvement workplace Cloud Chamber, arsenic it attempts to yet wrestle the task to release.

Tom Phillips is IGN's News Editor. You tin scope Tom astatine [email protected] oregon find him connected Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social