Five years have passed since audiences have seen the beloved Tomb Raider on screen. Amazon announced that a new series about Lara Croft will be released along with a movie, with the series being written by Killing Eve and Fleabag's Phoebe Waller-Bridge. While not much is known about either of the projects that Amazon Studios will be producing under the Tomb Raider name, the somewhat lackluster taste that the last film left in the mouths of fans has many hoping that this new project will bring life back to Lara's story, and give fans the important fixture of the series they had been promised.
Waller-Bridge, while not having any video game-related credentials, is no stranger to action and adventure in her work. She wrote the first season of the acclaimed spy thriller series Killing Eve and more recently has been a writer on the James Bond film No Time to Die. The talented creator, writer, and actor will also soon be appearing alongside Harrison Ford in Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny. With such an impressive body of work, fans have little to worry about regarding the writing for the upcoming series.
Lara Croft's Missing Dual Pistols
Tomb Raider had big shoes to fill at the time of its release. The Angelina Jolie portrayal of the character was considered the best video game movie at the time, and part of its success was how it matched the tone of the games it was adapting. However, the 2018 film had a much more gritty take on Lara, one that didn't fight robots or bungee jump before bed. Lara Croft: Tomb Raider was able to charm audiences with its campiness that didn't require it to take itself too seriously, but the 2018 film was brutal on its main character. The tense stakes left audiences feeling exhausted as they watched the character they had grown to love take hit after hit for two hours, without the use of any firearms to defend herself, not even her famous dual pistols.
Throughout the "Survivor Trilogy" of the Tomb Raider games, Lara is seen wielding climbing axes, a shotgun, bows and arrows, handguns, explosives, and all other manner of weaponry. But her Dual pistols, which have become a staple for the character, never make an appearance. Tomb Raider (2018) Sees Lara get her pistols eventually, but only at the end for a final action shot that mimics the still frame that Jolie's 2001 film ends on. While it may seem like a minor detail, the pistols are not only prominent in the iconic forms of the character, but they also showcase a key component of Lara herself.
In the 2013 Tomb Raider game, Roth initially uses the dual pistols, defending himself from wolves before giving them both to Lara. Roth tells her that she is a Croft, only for her to then give one of them to Sam as they continue through the island. With how this weaponry is tied to her, the implication of this is that Lara has not yet grown into her role as a successor to her father's legacy, and by extension the title of Tomb Raider. Much is still not known about the Tomb Raider universe that Amazon has planned, but given how upset some fans were by not seeing Lara in proper form, this version of Lara will need to come into her own so that fans can enjoy watching the fully formed adventurer they've been missing.
Phoebe Waller-Bridge's background of having worked on the dark comedy Fleabag could also mean a return to a more comedic Lara. While this would be a relief after the bleak nature of the last movie, fans of Tomb Raider are looking for a version of Lara that shows why so many fell in love with her to begin with, along with all the features that helped to shape her. While the curse of video game adaptations has seemingly been broken with shows like Arcane and The Last of Us, fans still haven't gotten a proper Tomb Raider adaptation that gets Lara and all her complexities quite right.