I’ve been dreading this upcoming remake of The Running Man Paramount Pictures is pushing through. I love how 80s-gritty and incredibly campy the 1987 original starring Arnold Schwarzenegger is, and there’s absolutely no chance a newer version can capture any of that again. For similar reasons I groan whenever I flip through the YouTube TV schedule and see Total Recall showing — but it’s the remake. Arnold or nothing!
Today Paramount announced a definitive date for the release of the new Running Man: November 21, 2025. THR broke the news. Glen Powell, who just starred in Twisters, will play its central character, with Katy O’Brien (Love Lies Bleeding, The Mandalorian) co-starring. Edgar Wright is directing the film.
The thing about the 1987 Running Man is that it’s based on a Stephen King novel (that he originally published under the pseudonym “Richard Bachman”) but it took a LOT of liberties with the story. In the movie, Arnold plays a guy who seeks to expose the corruption surrounding the game, but is caught and thrown into the game himself. The novel’s protagonist enters the game willingly, in hopes to pay his sick daughter’s hospital bills. The new version will be much closer to King’s original…more dystopian, but probably less fun.
One reason Paramount may be really pushing to get this picture out the door next year is because King’s novel was set in 2025. The Arnold version set things a few years “earlier” in 2019. Though it’s too early to say for everyone, my personal odds of this movie replacing the original are “plain zero.”
