Tasha Huo, the showrunner for Netflix’s upcoming animated series Tomb Raider: The Legend of Lara Croft admitted she wrote the show “for little girls as much as I’m writing it for big girls.”
A screenshot from Tomb Raider: The Legend of Lara Croft (2024), Netflix
In an interview about the show with IGN’s Katie Reul, Huo was asked if making the series animated allows for it to be seen by younger audiences.
Huo answered, “Yeah, the hope was always that everyone could watch it. If you played this game and you have young kids, you could sit and watch it and enjoy this world with them. It’s sort of a gateway drug to playing the video games if you’re younger, but also I definitely wrote it for us, for adults, for people who played the games their whole lives and really enjoyed it. And so the themes are very adult.”
“There’s still a lot of violence, but the animation, you’re right, does allow for it to not feel as graphic, and so it does create a bigger space for more people to enjoy, which hopefully they do,” she added.
Huo then concluded, “I’m writing it for little girls as much as I’m writing it for big girls.”
A screenshot from Tomb Raider: The Legend of Lara Croft (2024), Netflix
READ: ‘Tomb Raider’ Fans Torch Netflix’s Latest Teaser Trailer For ‘Tomb Raider The Legend Of Lara Croft’
Huo was also asked if she took any creative liberties in terms of reimagining the character for a 2024 audience.
She answered, “I really wanted to capture the Lara that, as a little girl, I really fell in love with, which was someone who takes no s**t, who really stands up for herself in every scenario against any villain — man, woman, doesn’t matter.”
“She’s going to do what she wants regardless of who’s standing in front of her … As we were writing, as were animating, it felt so important to show Lara as empowered at every step of the way. Even when she is at her low point, she is going to find that strength inside of her, and that always inspires me with her and inspired me in the show,” she explained.
Lara Croft jumps into a pit in Tomb Raider: The Legend of Lara Croft (2024), Netflix
Huo continued, “And then in terms of bringing it into now and away from the games, I also wanted to know more about her relationships. She’s so alone in the games. You get a sense that she has people here and there, but she must care about people.”
“And that was also, I think, part of bringing it into the now is how does this woman, who is this incredible badass and who can accomplish so much alone, how does she relate to people? How does she form friendships? And that doesn’t have to make her vulnerable because she loves other people,” she elaborated. “So exploring that sort of dichotomy of being vulnerable with friends, but still being an incredible badass.”
A scene from Tomb Raider: The Legend of Lara Croft (2024), Netflix
It was previously revealed by Huo that the series would attempt to unify the various Tomb Raider timelines. She said back in October 2021, “The team at Crystal Dynamics is hard at work unifying the timelines of Tomb Raider and we are so excited to be a part of that effort.”
She later added, “I always wondered how Lara Croft became such an epic and brilliant hero. She’s so cool, so calm under pressure, also pretty witty. So to that end, the Tomb Raider anime series from Legendary Television and Netflix will provide fans like you and me around the world with some of the first steps towards unifying the Tomb Raider timelines as we transition beyond the Survivor trilogy and start to follow Lara’s journey leading up to the first steps of that first Tomb Raider game.”
Huo added, “Now, part of that awesome task is about bringing together pieces from the different Tomb Raider eras including some of Lara’s friends and allies. That is why I am so thrilled to introduce you to two additional actors who will be joining us on this wild ride: Earl Baylon, who will be reprising his role as Jonah Maiava from the Survivor trilogy, and Allen Maldonado, who will be voicing the character of Zip from Tomb Raider Chronicles, Legend, and Underworld.”
She concluded, “Trust me when I say this is an exciting road ahead of us and I cannot wait for you to join us!”
A scene from Tomb Raider: The Legend of Lara Croft (2024), Netflix
Huo shared more details on this in her interview with IGN and how she crafted the show to unify the timelines, “ I had the whole canon in my head, because we were coming from the Survivor series, so you had to honor who [Lara Croft] was — that person that she was in those games — but move her into the person she was in the games where we all started playing — those early 90s games where she’s just a very different person. And so it was really exciting to write to Lara becoming that person.”
“‘How does someone who is like Lara from the Survivor series transform into that person? What goes on to drive her to become that person?’ [Those were] was just the best questions to have to deal with, and it was really exciting to work in more humor, which is what I really loved about her early days,” Huo said. “Getting to kind of combine those two canons has been really fun.”
A scene from Tomb Raider: The Legend of Lara Croft (2024), Netflix
Huo went on to note that she will attempt to provide warmth to Lara given she previously viewed her as cold given she was written men.
She said, “I think it was fun to be able to have one scene where she does an incredible feat of strength or agility or what have you — the Lara thing — and then another scene where she’s hugging a friend and is emotional with them. I think that’s something we definitely wanted to explore in terms of Lara’s womanhood.”
“Because historically she’s been written by men, so she has been kind of this cold figure, and I know she’s not like that. So that was the exciting part to see sort of behind the veil of how she is in her everyday life,” she shared.
A screenshot from Tomb Raider: The Legend of Lara Croft (2024), Netflix
The official synopsis for the show states, “The animated series TOMB RAIDER: THE LEGEND OF LARA CROFT picks up after the events of the highly successful Tomb Raider video game Survivor trilogy (Tomb Raider; Rise of the Tomb Raider; Shadow of the Tomb Raider), and will chart the globetrotting heroine’s next chapter as the iconic adventurer. More than 25 years after her first appearance, Lara Croft (voiced by Hayley Atwell) continues to explore ancient mysteries and uncover lost truths across breathtaking and dangerous destinations.”
“Following the events of the Survivor series, Lara Croft has abandoned her friends to embark on increasingly more perilous solo adventures. But she must return home when a dangerous and powerful Chinese artifact is stolen from Croft Manor by a thief with an uncanny personal connection. Her daring pursuit will take her on an adventure around the world and to the depths of forgotten tombs, where she will be forced to confront her true self, and decide just what kind of hero she wants to become,” it concludes.
A screenshot from Tomb Raider: The Legend of Lara Croft (2024), Netflix
What do you make of Huo’s comments about Tomb Raider: The Legend of Lara Croft?
