If you weren’t aware, the Escape from series has always been so good in a very special way. Not in a strict “so bad it’s good” kind of way, but more in the “so bad it’s good, but also actually good and is a full, complete piece of fiction when you think about it. Weird,” kind of way. It turns out that the Escape from universe could’ve been thrice extended beyond Escape from New York and Escape from L.A.. The series was slated to have another sequel, Escape from Earth, a video game, and a television series. How does it feel knowing the world in which you live isn’t as good as it could’ve been?
First off, it’s vitally important we discuss Escape from Earth. Both John Carpenter and Kurt Russell name-dropped this proposed sequel before the release of Escape from L.A., and as we saw at the end of L.A., (sthpoilersttthhh) Snake ended technology. Yes, he literally ended technology, because he didn’t like that some agency that got him to do their dirty work tricked him into thinking he had a deadly disease when, in fact, it was just the flu. So, going by the title Escape from Earth and how L.A. ended, one could only assume that he’d be trying to escape Earth because, man, technology was really useful and now it’s gone. Also, at the risk of mentioning L.A. too much and not New York, Snake not only played basketball by himself to save the world, but he surfed on a tidal wave that was flooding the whole city.
The television series was proposed in the early 2000s, but was turned down by every major network because it was seen as too dark and bleak, which is funny, because that means they completely missed the point of the Escape from series. Calling Escape from too dark and bleak is no different from calling The Addams Family “too depressing” or “not an obvious comedy.” This Ain’t It Cool News post from way back back in 2000 said that John Carpenter and Kurt Russell were involved as executive producers of the series, though unfortunately, Russell was not slated to reprise the role of Snake. Debra Hill, another producer of the series, said it would’ve been “exciting to try to figure out a way to keep that story line going for 100 episodes,” so maybe it’s better that the series never got going, on second thought. However, it would’ve been really fun to count how many things Snake smoked over the course of 100 episodes.
Finally, we have an Escape from video game, produced by Namco. The best part of any Escape from video game, is that the immortal Solid Snake is both named, modeled, and voiced after Snake Plissken. In Metal Gear Solid 2, when Solid Snake was in disguise and we were left to deal with Raiden as our main character, Solid Snake’s cover name was even “Pliskin.” They both share the eyepatch, the gravelly voice, and they both like to smoke whenever they possibly can. After the prevalence of Solid Snake, it would’ve been pretty amusing to play the video game version of the movie character that an extremely popular video game character was modeled after. Also, I mean, there’d be surfing and basketball and plastic surgery gangs. (Yes, I really do like L.A..)
There was also an anime version of Escape from Earth being tossed around the idea factory, and Kurt Russell would’ve provided the voice of Snake, but this pales in comparison to a 100 episode television series, a live-action movie where Snake Plissken has to get out of Earth because it’s going poorly, and a video game where we get to control one of the wackiest antiheroes in one of the wackiest fictional worlds. Roving plastic surgery gangs!
It’s almost a shame to have discovered these things could’ve existed, because now I know I’m living in a world that isn’t as good as it could’ve been.
(h/t mindspread)
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