Sega Genesis video game mascots ToeJam & Earl will be getting their own feature film courtesy of Amazon Studios, basketball player Stephen Curry’s Unanimous Media and Story Kitchen (Sonic the Hedgehog), according to a report from The Hollywood Reporter on Monday. Hotel Transylvania 4 writers Amos Vernon and Nunzio Randazzo are writing the movie.
The original ToeJam & Earl first made their appearance in 1991. Made by Mark Voorsanger and Greg Johnson, it features the two titular aliens who crash land on Earth and must find the pieces of their spaceship to return home. Both ToeJam and Earl borrow heavily from ’90s hip-hop culture.
The movie will follow a similar plot with ToeJam and Earl traveling to Earth to visit the origin of the music that so heavily inspires their own culture. Upon landing on Earth, they find it’s not a musical paradise, but it definitely does have some chart-topping beats. They hope that finding music will save their planet.
Amazon Studios and Unanimous Media didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
Video games continue to be popular inspiration for movie studios. Moviegoers have already gotten live-action titles like ‘Uncharted,’ Sonic the Hedgehog and Detective Pikachu, all films that broke $400 million at the box office. Fully animated 3D movies are also gaining traction, with The Super Mario Bros. Movie, being made by Illumination (Despicable Me, The Secret Life of Pets), currently in development at Universal Pictures. The video game industry itself is massive, bringing in revenues that usurp both movies and North American sports combined. Studios are banking on that popularity, which explains why two Angry Birds movies have already been made. Upcoming video game movies include Borderlands, Pac-Man, Ghosts of Tsushima and Metal Gear.
ToeJam & Earl went on to become a cult classic in the early ’90s and spawned three sequels, ToeJam & Earl in Panic on Funkotron, ToeJam & Earl III: Mission to Earth and 2019’s Kickstarter-backed ToeJam & Earl: Back in the Groove.
