October Start Date for Apple TV Series ‘Dark Matter’ in Chicago; ‘Obi-Wan’ Star Joel Edgerton Leads Cast

The highly anticipated new series from Apple TV+ and Sony Pictures Television appears to have zeroed in on its start date, its city, and its series lead. Sources tell SCREEN the TV adaptation of Blake Crouch’s novel Dark Matter will begin filming in Chicago on October 17th and will continue through March of 2023. The epic sci-fi series will consist of nine episodes, and production offices at Cinespace Film Studios are now open.

Dark Matter is a massive coup for the booming Chicago and Illinois television production industry, and there are many more details to come in the months ahead. Back in January, SCREEN had reported the series was potentially heading to Chicago, so it’s tremendous news to see this production come through. Here is what we know so far…

Joel Edgerton to Lead the Cast

The cast of Dark Matter will be led by Australian actor Joel Edgerton, who also serves as executive producer. He is best known for his appearance in the Star Wars films Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith as a young Owen Lars, a role he reprised in the Disney+ series Obi-Wan Kenobi.

If you’re new to Edgerton, here is a quick rundown of his big screen highlights…

On the lighter side, here is a hilarious interview of Joel with James Corden that you’ll have to see to believe…

Spider-Man Producer Leads the Way

Apple will look to Matt Tolmach to executive produce the series. Tolmach has produced blockbuster hits Jumanji and Venom, as well as the recent Marvel Studios thriller Morbius.

Most notably, Tolmach served as executive producer on the latest webslinging excursion from Marvel Studios, Spider-Man: No Way Home, starring Tom Holland, as well as its predecessors Spider-Man: Far from Home and Spider-Man: Homecoming. Tolmach was also a producer on the Andrew Garfield iterations of the superhero franchise, The Amazing Spider-Man in 2012 and The Amazing Spider-Man 2 in 2014.

Sony and Tolmach have had their sights on bringing Dark Matter to life since 2014, when it made a $1.25 million deal for the book based on Blake Crouch’s 150-page partial manuscript, according to Deadline.

Story and Synopsis of Dark Matter

Dark Matter is a science fiction thriller centering on Jason Dessen, a quantum physicist, once had a brilliant research career ahead of him. But after a girlfriend’s unexpected pregnancy and the birth of a son, this future was derailed. Now a professor at a small Chicago college with a warm and loving family life, the physicist is abducted into a world in which his quantum many-worlds theory has become a fully realized technology for inter-dimensional transfer. In the parallel world, he did not marry his girlfriend and they never had a son. He is determined to get back to his other life, but nefarious powers in the alternate reality conspire to stop him from revealing the criminal lengths they have gone to create the world-hopping technology.

Dark Matter was originally published in July 2016 and was selected as one of Amazon and NPR’s Best Books of the Year.

The novel has been described as a high-concept thriller in the vein of Memento and Looper but let’s hear from author Blake Crouch himself, discussing Dark Matter…

Who Will Write, Who Will Direct?

Dark Matter Creator Blake Crouch will write the pilot script and serve as showrunner and executive producer on the series, and Louis Leterrier – best known for Now You See Me, Lupin, The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance, and the 2008 Edward Norton iteration of The Incredible Hulk – is set to direct the first four episodes.

That being said, Leterrier is currently directing the megabudget Fast X, the 10th installment in the Fast and Furious movie franchise, after replacing Justin Lin, who departed the production unexpectedly. As of today, Leterrier is directing the first four episodes of Dark Matter this fall, and SCREEN will post updates should that status change in the months ahead.

Be sure to check back here at SCREEN Magazine as this thrilling new series forges ahead into production. You can also click right here to subscribe to our weekly email newsletter.