Geekery: Neal Stephenson’s ‘Snow Crash’ is Being Adapted for HBO Max
The influential cyberpunk novel is getting a turn on the small screen.
The book brings Stephenson’s fascination with linguistics, philosophy, history, and politics into one story set in not too distant LA, after a massive worldwide economic collapse. Society has fallen into a form of anarcho-capitalism that’s run by the mafia and other sullied organizations. There’s a virtual world on top of all of this, the Metaverse, that offers a secondary existence. Hiro Protagonist is a pizza delivery driver for the mob and hacker offline, and a warrior prince in the Metaverse, dives headlong into the mystery and aims to take down the virtual villain bent on bringing on the infopocalypse.
It was a ground breaking book in 1992, influencing multiple books (Ready Player One likely wouldn’t exist without it), movies, games, and tech that followed. Its story remains very relevant. If you’ve got a plane trip coming up this holiday season, Snow Crash is a great choice to read while you’re traveling.
Deadline is reporting writer Michael Bacall (21 Jump Street, Scott Pilgrim vs. The World) and director Joe Cornish (Attack the Block, The Kid Who Would Be King) are on the project. Cornish initially shopped the project to Amazon, but it looks like HBO will give it a home. No casting or dates yet, but I’ll be keeping an eye out for developments. Hopefully Stephenson will be involved in some way.
