Could a Metal Gear Movie Work?

Okay, let me explain why this article exists. Because, you know, there is no Metal Gear movie and there likely won’t ever be one.

A friend of mine at work has recently gotten into the Metal Gear series through MGS5. His excitement for the series was infectious, so I pulled the Legacy Collection off of my shelf and dusted off the ol’ PS3 to replay Snake Eater. It was a lot of fun; that game holds up so well you would think it came out yesterday.

While I was playing, however, I noticed something. Something I had noticed many times before but had never really thought about. Something I had always just accepted was a part of this series.

Those cutscenes are really long. Like, everyone knows Metal Gear Solid 4 is basically a movie, but you could say the same for Snake Eater at many points.

Which got me thinking: could a Metal Gear movie actually work?

I mean, think about it. They’re basically movies already! Really long, badass spy thriller movies with quirky moments! That you get to play! And that’s no mistake; Hideo Kojima is a very outspoken movie fan. Cinema is literally baked into the DNA of the series!

If put into the right hands, the idea could work pretty well. With a solid director, a good script, and a good cast, you could make it work. At least, it would have a better chance at success than many other video game movies.

Not to say it’s a guaranteed success. No film can capture the unique attributes that make games great. And Metal Gear has more of those unique attributes than most.

Let’s face it: Metal Gear is weird. Psycho Mantis reads your memory card, you have a button to stare at EVE’s cleavage during cutscenes in Snake Eater, Quiet exists, the Colonel tells Raiden to turn the game console off, Ocelot has his gun tricks, the list goes on and on and on. It’s those quirks that make Metal Gear Metal Gear. And not all of them can translate into a film setting. Not unless they’re willing to get weird with it.

Then again, that could work. Imagine sitting in the theater, then suddenly the Colonel tells you, the audience, to get up and leave. Confusing as hell to a newcomer? Yes. But can you name anything more Metal Gear Solid than that?

Of course, there’s another problem: exposition. See, Metal Gear loves to just dump information onto its player. It creates this sense of falling down an endless rabbit hole. Perfect for an espionage thriller where nothing is as it seems. And it gives a nice little break to the player.

But for a movie? That can get pretty boring pretty quickly.

Then there’s the obvious problem: the lack of the game. Because at the end of the day, we all love Metal Gear because it’s fun. It’s fun to fight the bosses, to sneak around in a cardboard box, to smoke a cigar to pass the time. You can’t get any of that in a movie. Sure, you can get some badass action scenes. But it just wouldn’t be the same.

Does any of this matter? No, not really. This is just me throwing a random conversation I had with myself onto an article.

These are the thoughts I have when I’m hung over as hell…