Further frustrating future scholars, the Universal Soldier franchise will now be expanded into a weekly TV series, surely adding another convolution to a canon that already encompasses six films, at least half of which completely ignore the existence of all the others. Roland Emmerich’s 1992 original seed from which so many undead-army-guy flowers bloomed starred Dolph Lundgren and Jean-Claude Van Damme as two reanimated Vietnam casualties outfitted with cyborg parts, then installed as part of an elite counterterrorism squad. Most recently, both Lundgren and Van Damme were due to return for 2012’s Universal Soldier: A New Dimension, its title both a nod to the film being in 3-D, as well as the more nuanced shade of existential ennui the actors would no doubt bring to their characterizations. And even though original Universal Soldier producers Allen Shapiro and Craig Baumgarten are attached to the series—which will be scripted by Stargate SG-1 and Stargate: Atlantis writer Damian Kindler—it’s not clear whether the show will bear any relationship to the film series beyond its basic premise, but it’s also pretty safe to say that it doesn’t really matter.
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