Former softcore wonderland Cinemax has undergone a few different image tweaks in its time as a premium cable outpost. Most recently, the HBO-owned pay TV entity has elected to make “high-octane action dramas” their paramount priority and let programs like the alternately-octaned The Knick wander off into the cancellation wilderness. The upside of this switch? We’re getting a proper full-on series from underrated blockbuster craftsman Justin Lin.
Lin, who has directed the franchise revitalizing 3-6 stretch of the Fast and the Furious series and Star Trek Beyond, will be at the helm for a 10-episode crime drama titled Warrior. Based on an idea by Bruce Lee, the program will take place during the Tong Wars and contain a grimmer edge than say Lin’s work on Fast Five. Here’s the official description of the upcoming series.
WARRIOR is a gritty, action-packed crime drama set during the brutal Tong Wars of San Francisco’s Chinatown in the second half of the 19th century. The series follows Ah Sahm, a martial arts prodigy who immigrates from China to San Francisco under mysterious circumstances, and becomes a hatchet man for one of Chinatown’s most powerful tongs (Chinese organized crime family).
Joining Lin in bringing the project to life is a Cinemax veteran. Banshee co-creator Jonathan Tropper has aligned forces with the Better Luck Tomorrow filmmaker for Warrior and he says that the crime drama will eschew a strictly superficial take on the 19th century setting.
“As a show that proudly bears the imprimatur of Bruce Lee, it’s our intention to deliver not only explosive martial arts action – which we will – but also a powerful and complex immigration drama that is as relevant today as it was in the 1870s,” said Tropper.
Deadline reports that production on Warrior is slated to begin this fall in South Africa.
