PlayStation Productions head, Asad Qizilbash, must have studied the psychology of audience engagement in marketing school.
In a not-so-subtle tweet, Qizilbash posted a short clip from the Sony headquarters showing an elevator with the Gran Turismo logo opening up to a wall-to-wall artwork from The Last of Us, with the caption:
PlayStation Productions this year in one elevator ride. You can’t see me, but my head is on fire too 🤡🔥
Reading between the lines, gamers will understand that the last sentence is a reference to the popular vehicular combat franchise, Twisted Metal. The smiling clown face is a nod to Sweet Tooth, a character from the video game series who has appeared in all 10 titles of the Sony franchise. If we piece that information together, we can come to the simple conclusion that the upcoming Twisted Metal TV series will be released this year.
In March 2019, Tony Vinciquerra, the CEO of Sony Pictures Entertainment, announced that a Twisted Metal TV show was in the works. In February last year, Peacock officially announced that the series would air on the platform, and by August, production had been wrapped up.
Regarding the show's release date, one Twitter user prodded Qizilbash for an answer, to which he responded:
Glad you’re excited. No release time has been locked yet but the team will be hard at work on it this year, that I can promise you 💪🏽🤡🔥
Anthony Mackie is set to star as John Doe, a "smart-ass milkman who talks as fast as he drives." Doe wakes up with no memory of his past and enters into the Twisted Metal competition to deliver a package across a desert wasteland filled with bandits and marauders. WWE's Samoa Joe will play Sweet Tooth, a "deranged clown who drives an all-too familiar ice cream truck."
The rest of the cast includes:
- Stephanie Beatriz as Quiet
- Thomas Haden Church as Agent Stone
- Will Arnett as the voice of Sweet Tooth
- Richard Cabral as Loud
- Neve Campbell as Raven
- Mike Mitchell as Stu
- Chloe Fineman as Bloody Mary
On the gaming front, Sony's Firesprite Studio is currently working on a Twisted Metal reboot. The British game developer took over the project from the original developer, Lucid Games, shortly after becoming a Sony subsidiary in 2021.
