Trans horror enthusiasts, rejoice: Lilly Wachowski is working on a TV adaptation of Manhunt, Gretchen Felker-Martin’s hit 2022 horror novel about a post-apocalyptic world where testosterone literally turns people into feral, zombie-like creatures.
Felker-Martin posted about the news to X on Friday, including a link to an Autostraddle interview with Wachowski, and writing, “The cat's out of the bag, baby.” She added that she “couldn't be prouder or more excited to be writing it.”
“We're going to do our damnedest to bring this thing kicking, screaming, and queer as hell onto the screen,” she concluded.
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“Kicking, screaming, and queer as hell” is absolutely the best way to describe Manhunt. Though cis creators have played with the concept of post-apocalyptic worlds in which groups of people are mysteriously eliminated based on biological characteristics, Manhunt avoids essentialism by centering its narrative around two trans women, Beth and Fran. The two women spend their days on the run from both feral men and murderous TERFs, all while finding ways to continue their transitions against all odds. After all, in this instance, doing so is quite literally a matter of life and death. If it wasn’t obvious from the summary, Manhunt is certainly not for the faint of heart — just reading the descriptions in the book sends visceral shudders down the spine. We can’t wait to see what horrors a TV adaptation will bring.
The adaptation is one of several projects that the legendary Matrix co-director is currently involved in, according to a Friday interview with Autostraddle. “Some of the projects are big, some of the projects are small, but they’re all queer and trans,” she told the publication. In addition to adapting Felker-Martin’s novel, Wachowski is also adapting Jordy Rosenberg’s historical gender/genre-bending novel, Confessions of the Fox. She also just finished a script with her partner which is “a response to all of the horrible anti-trans stuff that’s going on in the world.”
“What if trans people could form this almost weather underground level of resistance?” she said. “It becomes a murder mystery that goes up the ladder into the furthest reaches of government.” I, for one, would like to see it.
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