Netflix just bought the rights to the biggest box office hit of 2019, The Wandering Earth. If you haven’t heard of this movie before now, there’s a reason for that. It’s a Chinese sci-fi blockbuster that found massive success in China, but had a much smaller release in English-language markets.
Hollywood movies regularly become hits in China, but Chinese movies rarely reach mainstream American audiences. There was already speculation that The Wandering Earth could break this trend, because it’s a big, crowd-pleasing blockbuster with a lot of audience momentum behind it. It’s made over $600 million so far, and is still playing in theaters worldwide.
Variety announced Netflix’s deal on Wednesday, with Netflix describing The Wandering Earth as ” a majestic feast for the eyes with massive production scale rarely seen in Mandarin films.”
Based on a popular novella, the movie is a near-future sci-fi story about humans cooperating to save Earth from our dying sun… by literally moving the planet out of the solar system. A wild concept, but is it really any wilder than Interstellar or Snowpiercer? Nope. And apparently, a ton of people enjoyed the hell out of it.
Netflix hasn’t announced its release date for The Wandering Earth.
READ MORE: