In Stephen King's The Running Man, everyone, from the sprawling slums to the security-obsessed enclaves of the rich, tunes in every night to the nation's favourite prime-time TV game show.
They all watch the ultimate live death game as the contestants try to beat not the clock, but annihilation at the hands of the Hunters. Survive thirty days and win the billion-dollar jackpot - that's the promise. But the odds are brutal, and the game is rigged. The best score so far is eight days.
However, a new contestant, the latest Running Man, stakes his life while a nation watches. That's Ben Richards, the character who will be played by Twisters and Hit Man star Glen Powell in Edgar Wright's upcoming reboot of the novel (which was previously adapted in 1987 with Arnold Schwarzenegger in the title role).
Paramount Pictures has just released a new trailer for The Running Man, and while it's light on plot, there's plenty of action. However, with Wright at the helm, these action scenes feel wholly unique and have a certain style and flair that's missing from many modern blockbusters.
Powell looks like he was born to play this role, and with the world rallying behind Ben making it out of this 30-day hunt alive, the stakes are going to be incredibly high.
After all, the titular Running Man also needs to save his daughter, with the prize for surviving crucial to buying the medicine she needs. Combine that with some edge-of-your-seat action scenes, and this is shaping up to be the movie of the winter.
"One of the things about the book that I loved was the fact that Ben Richards is out in the world on his own, so it’s like the deadliest game of hide and seek," Wright previously said of his approach to adapting the novel. "It does feel like making a road movie in a lot of ways: a very intense, dangerous road movie."
"Ben is moving through different environments and meeting different people as he tries to survive 30 days out in the wild," the filmmaker added.
Explaining why he cast Powell, Wright said, "I felt it was important to see somebody who hadn’t really done something like this before. It’s similar to Bruce Willis, when he was still the guy from Moonlighting, before he did Die Hard, where that adds to the suspense. Can they make it?"
The Running Man arrives in theaters on November 14. You can watch the new trailer in the players below.