Lifelong Tomb Raider fan Phoebe Waller-Bridge has opened up about adapting Lara Croft for her upcoming Prime Video sequence.

Again in April — earlier than the continuing Writers Guild of America (WGA) strike — Waller-Bridge sat down with Pleasure Press of Vainness Truthful. In the course of the newly-published interview, Waller-Bridge mentioned creating the upcoming Tomb Raider sequence, in addition to her teenage habit to the unique video video games. “My dad and mom had been very good as a result of they didn’t truly restrict me. They may sense that I used to be going to only recreation myself into the bottom, and I did,” Waller-Bridge mentioned. “I packed the PlayStation away, and I used to be like, ‘I’ve received to not try this as a result of I’ve received to put in writing and skim and do different stuff.’”

Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s love for Lara Croft

Regardless of hanging up her PlayStation controller, Waller-Bridge maintained a love for the character of Lara Croft. “She had an perspective. She was very deliberate in what she needed to do,” the Solo: A Star Wars Story alum mentioned. “That every one modified after they realized that they may market her to be a intercourse image.” Nonetheless, Waller-Bridge dove again into Tomb Raider throughout the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. So, it appeared like destiny when Amazon requested her to pen a small-screen adaptation.

“God, it actually felt like that teenager in me saying: Do proper by her, do proper by Lara!” Waller-Bridge recalled. “The chance to have, as we had been speaking earlier, a feminine motion character … Having labored on [James] Bond and having labored as an actor on [Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny], I really feel like I’ve been constructing as much as this. What if I may take the reins on an motion franchise, with every part I’ve discovered, with a personality I like, and likewise simply carry again a few of that ’90s vibe?”

Phoebe Waller Bridge’s ideas on rebooting Tomb Raider

Press requested Waller-Bridge if she was hesitant to contribute to the present pattern of remakes and reboots in Hollywood. “I really feel like if you’re working within the business, you’ve received to trip the waves and lean in,” Waller-Bridge replied. “There’s room to do one thing actually fairly harmful. And if I can do one thing harmful and thrilling with Tomb Raider, I have already got an viewers of people that love Lara and hopefully will proceed to. And that may be a very uncommon place to be in. It’s the outdated Malicious program.”

Notably, as a author, Waller-Bridge is not any stranger to referencing breasts in her works. Nevertheless, there was apparently a heated debate within the Tomb Raider writers’ room relating to whether or not Lara ought to have her basic busty determine, or an athletic construct in keeping with the extra trendy video games. Waller-Bridge’s stance on the matter is obvious. “She’s a tomb raider, so she’s extremely match,” she mentioned. “She has to squeeze by way of tiny rock crevices on a regular basis. It’s a completely different expertise squeezing by way of a small rock crevice when you’ve bigger boobs than in case you have smaller boobs.”

Tomb Raider returns to live-action

The Tomb Raider online game franchise consists of 12 main-series video games and numerous spin-offs. The unique recreation launched in 1996 and spawned eight follow-ups by way of 2008. The franchise was rebooted with a brand new main-series recreation in 2013, which might show to be the primary installment in a trilogy that concluded in 2018.

The franchise was first tailored into live-action through the 2001 Paramount movie Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, which was based mostly on the early video games and starred Angelina Jolie as Lara Croft. Jolie reprised her position for the 2003 sequel, Lara Croft: Tomb Raider – The Cradle of Life. MGM and Warner Bros. rebooted the live-action sequence with the 2018 movie Tomb Raider. Starring Alicia Vikander as Lara Croft, the 2018 movie was based totally on the 2013 reboot recreation.

In January 2023, information broke that Amazon — the brand new writer of the Tomb Raider video video games — had tapped Waller-Bridge to pen a live-action sequence adaptation for Prime Video. Amazon can also be reportedly creating a brand new Tomb Raider movie, which can tie into each the Prime Video sequence and the subsequent Tomb Raider recreation as a part of a shared universe.