12 Years a Slave writer John Ridley is adapting Isaac Asimov’s Caves of Steel novel for 20th Century Studios

John Ridley, the screenwriter behind features like 12 Years a Slave, Needle in a Timestack, and Ben-Hur, and comics like GCPD: The Blue Wall, The Other History of the DC Universe, and Black Panther, wants to break into the Isaac Asimov business. Deadline announced today that Ridley will adapt Asimov’s 1954 sci-fi novel Caves of Steel, otherwise known as the first installment of the prolific author’s Robots series. Joining Ridley to help create a draft of the script is Marvel’s Luke Cage alum Cheo Hadari Coker.

Here’s a synopsis for Isaac Asimov’s Caves of Steel courtesy of Amazon:

A millennium into the future two advancements have altered the course of human history: the colonization of the galaxy and the creation of the positronic brain. Isaac Asimov’s Robot novels chronicle the unlikely partnership between a New York City detective and a humanoid robot who must learn to work together.  

Like most people left behind on an over-populated Earth, New York City police detective Elijah Baley had little love for either the arrogant Spacers or their robotic companions. But when a prominent Spacer is murdered under mysterious circumstances, Baley is ordered to the Outer Worlds to help track down the killer.  

The relationship between Life and his Spacer superiors, who distrusted all Earthmen, was strained from the start. Then he learned that they had assigned him a partner: R. Daneel Olivaw. Worst of all was that the “R” stood for robot—and his positronic partner was made in the image and likeness of the murder victim!

John Ridley’s version isn’t the first time Asimov’s novel has been adapted for screens. The BBC brought the story to television screens, while radio and video game versions also exist. In an attempt to tell a complete story, Ridley’s version could pinch elements from other books in the series, including The Naked Sun and The Robots of Dawn.

Isaac Asimov is one of literary history’s most influential writers, inspiring stories across the science-fiction spectrum. Other features inspired by Asimov’s work include the 1999 artificial intelligence drama Bicentennial Man, starring Robin Williams in a story about a household appliance programmed to perform menial tasks that begins to experience emotions and creative thought. Other film projects based on Asimov’s work include I, Robot, Nightfall, Robots, and The End of Eternity.

Are you familiar with Issac Asimov’s Robots series? Are you excited about John Ridley taking a stab at adapting Caves of Steel? At a time when artificial intelligence is growing at an alarming rate, it will be interesting to see what issues and ideas John Ridley and Cheo Hadari Coker tackle with Caves of Steel.

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