In March 2020, “Halo,” the long-awaited live-action adaptation of the popular video game, once a movie, now a series, was about to start shooting. Then COVID hit. “We were just gonna stop for two weeks and come back immediately,” Pablo Schrieber who plays Master Chief told Entertainment Weekly about dealing with COVID-19. The virus hit so swiftly, he was forced to leave his dog in Hungary where the film was shooting. “Luckily she had an amazing dog-sitter, but she was there for seven months. She [got] about 10 pounds heavier.”
Cut to nearly two years later and “Halo,” which almost became a movie that Peter Jackson produced and Neill Blomkamp directed, is ready to hit Paramount+.
Schreiber called the making of the show “a herculean task,” and not just because he was working out non-stop. “It’s a huge job, from setting the tone on set down to the grueling task of waking up at the crack of dawn to work out, then go to shoot and go home to work out some more. Nothing about it is easy, and I wouldn’t want it to be.”
If you don’t know the original video game the premise is pretty straightforward. In the 26th century, an alien threat called the Covenant threatens humanity. Master Chief, one of the few remaining Spartan super soldiers in the United Nations Space Command ranks, battles the invasion with the help of an AI construct, Cortana.
The show stars Pablo Schrieber as Master Chief, with Natascha McElhone as Dr. Catherine Halsey, a UNSC scientist. Voice actress Jen Taylor reprises her role from the game series as Cortana. “Halo” also stars Yerin Ha, Charlotte Murphy, Shabana Azmi, Bokeem Woodbine, Olive Gray, Danny Sapani, and Kate Kennedy.
The new original series premieres March 24, 2022, streaming exclusively on Paramount+.