



We already knew that Syfy picked up George R.R. Martin’s sci-fi horror story Nightflyers a while back, with the channel being impressed with how things were turning out. Martin previously took to his LiveJournal page and revealed that Nightflyers will have a 10-episode first season. Now it has been announced that Syfy has given a straight-to-series order for the series. Universal Cable Productions will produce, with Netflix co-producing and having first-run rights outside of the U.S.



Originally published as a science fiction short in 1980 by Analog Science Fiction and Fact, the story was turned into a 1987 film that didn't do very well at the box office. It starred '80s female lead Catherine Mary Stewart. The story sees nine academics head into space on the ship Nightflyer, prisoners to a madman intent on killing them. Martin spoke about the series script, saying that:



“Honestly, at first I was baffled as to how they hoped to get a series out of my story, since at the end of the novella…pretty much everyone is dead (it was a horror story, after all). But in May, UCP got me a copy of Jeff Buhler's script, and I saw how he'd dealt with that. It was a good read, and yes, I came away with a better idea of where they'd find a few seasons.”



Nightflyers will also be shot in the Republic of Ireland. Mike Cahill (I Origin) will direct the pilot, and Andrew McCarthy (Orange is the New Black) will serve as a producer-director . The show stars Gretchen Mol (Boardwalk Empire) as Dr. Agatha Matheson, Eoin Macken (The Night Shift) as Karl D’Branin, David Ajala (Fast & Furious 6) as Roy Eris, Sam Strike (EastEnders) as Thale, Maya Eshet (Teen Wolf) as Lommie, Angus Sampson (Fargo) as Rowan, Jodie Turner-Smith (The Last Ship) as Melantha Jhirl and Brían F. O’Byrne (Million Dollar Baby) as Auggie.



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