‘Mad Max’ Is Shifting Gears From Film to TV Show

Tom Hardy once told fans back in 2015 that he was signed on for three more Mad Max movies after Fury Road. Around that time, director George Miller also revealed that he wanted to make another film called Mad Max: The Wasteland.

Later, while promoting his other projects Three Thousand Years of Longing and Furiosa, Miller shared more details. He explained that he and co-writer Nico Lathouris had written what was basically a novella about Max’s life in the year before Fury Road.

The story followed Max’s time in the wasteland before he was captured by Immortan Joe. Miller said they wanted to turn that novella into a script. He described the project as character-driven, similar to Furiosa, but promised there would still be “a lot of action.” He also admitted he was “waiting to see the reception on Furiosa” before moving forward.

When Furiosa came out, Hardy gave fans bad news. While promoting The Bikeriders, he said, “I don’t think it’s happening.” It wasn’t clear if he was talking about the film itself or just his role in it.

Miller, however, didn’t completely shut the door. In a February 2025 interview with Vulture, he said he was still interested in making The Wasteland. But he also explained, “If for whatever reason the planets align, you can never tell. Too often, you’re lining up to do a movie and then something happens. Some things fall into place and some don’t, so all I can say is we’ll see.”

The problem is that Furiosa did poorly at the box office. According to Deadline, even with good reviews, Warner Bros. lost around $120 million on the film, making it one of the studio’s biggest financial flops in 2024.

With Miller now 80 years old, many thought the chances of him directing The Wasteland were slim. He even said himself that his next film would not be a Mad Max movie, admitting the project was on pause.

But now there’s a new twist. The podcast Mad Max Bible, a leading source for news about the franchise, reports that The Wasteland is no longer planned as a film but is instead being turned into a series. Screenwriter Shaun Grant, known for Nitram, has been brought in to work on the script.

This move makes sense for Warner Bros., which is trying to stay competitive in the streaming wars. HBO Max has been aggressively greenlighting shows, even expensive ones, and The Wasteland could fit right into that push.

The story of The Wasteland has already gone through many forms. Miller first imagined it as a TV series in the 1980s. When that didn’t happen, it was developed as a video game, then as a book, then as a movie script. Now, after decades of changes, the project may finally return to its original shape, as a television series.

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