‘Hunger Games’ Team Developing Franchise Based on Homer’s ‘The Odyssey’

Director Francis Lawrence and producer Nina Jacobson have proven themselves to as an excellent team — Lawrence directed The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, along with both parts of Mockingjay, with Jacobson producing for Lionsgate. And now the pair are teaming up again for another possible hit franchise, this time based on a classic piece of literature: The Odyssey.

Not to be confused with Arrow producer Greg Berlanti’s own Odyssey-themed project (based on graphic novel The Infinite Horizon), Lawrence and Jacobson’s new film takes its inspiration directly from the source material: Homer’s epic poem The Odyssey, believed to have been originally published sometime around the end of the eighth century, B.C.

According to Variety, Lawrence and Jacobson are planning “at least” two films based on the text, which centers on the epic journey of Odysseus, who embarks on a quest to return home following the end of the Trojan War and the fall of Troy. Back home, his wife Penelope has assumed her husband dead, and struggles to fight off myriad suitors competing for her hand in marriage. Along the way, Odysseus encounters cyclopean men, a witch goddess, cannibals and the Sirens, among other threats.

The new Odyssey franchise will be scripted by Peter Craig, who previously co-wrote both Hunger Games: Mockingjay installments. In addition to re-teaming with Jacobson on The Odyssey project, Lawrence is also set to reunite with Hunger Games star Jennifer Lawrence on The Dive, with James Cameron producing.