If you're a fan of The Sopranos, get ready for some great news: there could be a return to New Jersey on the cards for a prequel film, Deadline reports.
Although it will be tough to bring back James Gandolfini for his role as head mobster Tony Soprano (he died a few years back and to be frank, the last time they tried to revive the dead we ended up with the awful CGI version of Livia Soprano), rumours are that we will still see some of the same characters from the original show, just a few years earlier.
David Chase, the creator of the show, has long said that he has no interest in continuing the show but he would be interested in a prequel.
It also looks like the prequel will be a full length feature film rather than a series. New Line has purchased the screenplay to The Many Saints of Newark, which is the working title for the project.
It will tell the story of the Newark riots during the 1960s that saw huge amounts of violence between African-American and Italian-American gangsters.
Amongst those gangsters, you'd imagine, will be Tony's dear old dad, Giovanni 'Johnny Boy' Soprano and his mum, the aforementioned Livia. Tony's uncle Junior is also likely to feature, although nothing is yet known about the plot. We can speculate though, can't we?
One thing we do know is that Chase is on board. He will produce, as well as co-writing the film alongside Lawrence Conner. It is believed that he will also help in the search to find the right person to direct the film.
New Line Cinema is owned by Warner Brothers Picture Group, whose chairman Toby Emmerich said: "David is a masterful storyteller and we, along with our colleagues at HBO, are thrilled that he has decided to revisit, and enlarge, the Soprano universe in a feature film."
The original series won 21 Emmy awards, five Golden Globes and much more during its initial run between 1999 and 2007. It is widely considered to be one of the best TV series of all time.
It created controversy when producers closed the final episode by cutting to black abruptly and ending the series forever. Some viewers were annoyed by this, whilst others have grown to love it.
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Let's hope they manage to come up with an ending we can all agree on for the film.
Featured Image Credit: HBOTopics: TV and Film