Metropolis canceled amid writers' strike and pre-production cost adjustment

The series filming of Metropolis for Apple TV + is no longer going ahead. Production of the science fiction series has been permanently halted. Sam Esmail's yearlong adaptation of Fritz Lang's classic 1927 sci-fi film Metropolis (pictured) has become one of the most glaring casualties of Hollywood's growing insecurity brought about by labor unrest against the backdrop of economic headwinds.



The massive UCP series for Apple TV+, which was in preparation in Australia, has been permanently discontinued. The crew has just been notified that the ambitious project will not proceed with production, which was aimed at a summer start.

UCP has confirmed to Deadline that Metropolis has been scrapped. “Printing costs and uncertainty associated with the ongoing strike led to this difficult decision,” said a studio representative.

Metropolis has been in limbo for the past seven weeks. Because drafts of the scripts for the large-scale, special-effects-heavy series were not completed before the start of the writers' strike on May 2, budgeting and other key elements of pre-production were delayed.

The series was already partially cast, with Briana Middleton starring and Lindy Booth (The Librarians (2014)) playing a major role.

Due to the timing, UCP faced escalating costs of delaying the start of production, building and holding large stages, labor and VFX work - while not knowing when filming could begin due to the writers' strike (and the prospect of a possible SAG-AFTRA strike). After evaluating the money spent to date and the risk of continuing, UCP has decided not to continue with the series and have notified their partners at Apple TV+.

Filming would take place in the state of Victoria, where the April 2022 announcement said nearly 4,000 jobs would be created, using one of the largest "virtual manufacturing" infrastructures in the world.

Australia's VicScreen took the series to the state through its Victorian Screen Incentive grant. This was expected to be the first of several NBCU projects in the region, injecting A$416M ($310M) into the local economy.

Metropolis has been a passion project for Mr. Robot creator Esmail. He was the writer, director and executive producer of the eight-episode series that he had been working on for over seven years. The long-awaited project landed on Apple TV+ last year with a series order. Esmail produced through his deal with UCP, a division of Universal Studio Group, and Chad Hamilton, through Anonymous Content.

The original film, directed by Lang and written by Thea Von Harbou based on the latter's 1925 novel, is set in a futuristic urban dystopia and follows the attempts of Freder, the wealthy son of the city boss, and Maria, a sacred figure to the workers, to bridge the huge class divide in their city and bring the workers together with Joh Fredersen, the city boss.