Prime Video has announced that Michelle Yeoh will star in the upcoming Blade Runner 2099 limited sequel series.
Prime Video officially announced the project in 2022 after Blade Runner director Ridley Scott announced in 2021 that he was developing the live-action sequel series. When first talking about the project to the BBC in 2021, Ridley Scott said, “We [have already] written the pilot for ‘Blade Runner’ and the bible. So, we’re already presenting ‘Blade Runner’ as a TV show, the first 10 hours.” Scott is set to executive producer under Scott Free Productions banner and with Silka Luisa as showrunner and executive producer. Luisa was most recently showrunner and executive producer on Shining Girls, starring Elisabeth Moss.
Yeoh’s character details are still under wraps, as are the plot details, but according to Variety, she is playing a character named Olwen, who is “a replicant near the end of her life.” Regardless, this is an exciting development from the streamer. Based on the title, the series will be a sequel to both the original Blade Runner and the Ryan Gosling-led Blade Runner 2049, directed by Denis Villeneuve. All are based on Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Phillip K. Dick, originally published in 1968.
Blade Runner as a cinematic universe has had other entries. Prior to Blade Runner 2049, three short films were released on Crunchyroll as a bridge between the original and the sequel: Blade Runner Black Out 2022, 2036: Nexus Dawn, and 2048: Nowhere to Run. There was also an animated series Blade Runner: Black Lotus that aired on Adult Swim, and took place in 2032, prior to the events of Blade Runner 2049 but it’s uncertain if any characters from those projects will appear in Blade Runner 2099.
Michelle Yeoh has recently appeared in many live-action series, such as The Brothers Sun, American Born Chinese, and Star Trek: Discovery. Her character from Discovery, Philippa Georgiou will have a spin-off film titled Star Trek: Station 31. Yeoh also became the first Asian woman to win an Oscar for Best Actress in 2023 for her role as Evelyn Wang in Everything Everywhere All At Once.
Prime Video is on a streak of working on big-budget series like Fallout, The Rings of Power, and The Wheel of Time, as well as other popular series like The Boys, Gen V, and Reacher, so Blade Runner 2099 is in good hands.
