‘Rabbids’ Movie in Development at Sony and Ubisoft, ‘Robot Chicken’ Writers Attached

Not simply content with giving some angry birds a new life on the silver screen, Sony is turning its focus toward another video game property (and a unique one at that).

As announced in an exclusive report by Variety, Sony Pictures and Ubisoft Motion Pictures (the film/TV arm of Ubisoft) are developing a live-action/stop-motion hybrid adaptation of the once popular Rabbids video game series.

Matthew Senreich, Tom Sheppard, and Zeb Wells will pen the screenplay for the film. All three men are writers on Adult Swim’s Robot Chicken (a series co-created by Senreich). Their work on the show has earned them multiple Emmys and an Annie Award throughout its seven seasons (and counting).

Stoopid Buddy Stoodios, a company co-founded by Senreich and the current production company behind Robot Chicken, will produce the film alongside Sony and Ubisoft. This will be the second collaboration between Sony and Stoopid Buddy Stoodios, as they are also developing an original live-action/stop-motion project titled Superbago, which will be directed by SBS co-founders John Harvatine IV and Eric Towner and produced by Jared Hess (of Napoleon Dynamite fame).

The titular Rabbids (sometimes referred to as the ‘raving rabbids’) originated from the Rayman series of video games. But, as they began to grow in popularity, they were eventually spun off into their own franchise, beginning with Rayman: Raving Rabbids in 2006. This was four years before the first Despicable Me would introduce the Minions, who also began to catch fire in subsequent years.

Sony and Ubisoft have quite the challenge with this type of film. Not only do they have the charge of making a video game adaptation (which is actually good), this is also a ‘hybrid’ film that utilizes a blend of live-action and stop-motion and so far there are no successful examples of films or TV shows of this type. Add to this the challenge of trying to revitalize these characters in a post-Minions world where we have seen other studios try to do the same thing (and mostly fail) and you have a project that might prove trickier than adapting the Angry Birds property.

At the same time, Sony and Ubisoft have already found writers who are well-suited for the particular brand of manic comedy the Rabbids provide, so perhaps having the strong Robot Chicken connection will help imbue the film with a stronger layer of meta and adult satire than what is normally seen in hybrid films.

What do you think? Are you familiar with these games? Can the Rabbids compete with the Minions on any level?

Edited by: Hannah Wilkes