Matthew Goode in Watchmen. He’s starring in the TV pilot of Roadside Picnic. Image: Warner Bros.

The TV version of Roadside Picnic is moving ahead. An adaptation of the famous Soviet scifi novel was first announced in 2015, then picked up by WGN America a few months later. Now the pilot has its star: Matthew Goode, known to genre fans for roles in Watchmen and Stoker.


Deadline reports Goode is playing Red, a “stalker” who lives his life illegally entering and scavenging from an area where aliens once lived on Earth. In Roadside Picnic, originally written by Arkady and Boris Strugatsky, aliens landed on Earth years ago and then left. The story explores how the world continues with the knowledge we’re not alone in the universe.

Goode joins an already solid sounding creative team for the pilot. It’s being directed by Alan Taylor (Game of Thrones, Terminator Genisys) and written by Jack Paglen, who wrote Transcendence.


[Deadline]