{"id":312226,"date":"2026-02-23T01:20:11","date_gmt":"2026-02-23T01:20:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/312226\/"},"modified":"2026-02-23T01:20:11","modified_gmt":"2026-02-23T01:20:11","slug":"13-years-on-fox-cancels-incendiary-sci-fi-series-from-x-men-writer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/312226\/","title":{"rendered":"13 Years On, Fox Cancels “Incendiary” Sci-Fi Series From X-Men Writer"},"content":{"rendered":"

Thanks to what might be considered too many terrifying real-life possibilities, this dystopian sci-fi series that\u2019s been in the works for nearly 15 years has been officially shelved by FX<\/a>, the network it was slated to appear on. The show was originally developed by David Hayter from projects like X-Men and Metal Gear Solid, alongside Hatfields & McCoys\u2018 producer Leslie Greif, and now Greif is speaking out about the reasons behind the show being put away for good.<\/p>\n

Sitting down with ScreenRant<\/a> to talk about his new show, The Gray House, Grief also dove into the politics behind why World War 3 was permanently shelved so long after it originally began development. The main reason? It \u201cwas too frightening\u201d to develop now as the unfolding story \u201cbecame too close to reality.\u201d He also went on to say that FX, the network behind the production, said that \u201cthey felt it was too incendiary,\u201d and that the ideas behind the script were \u201ctoo frighteningly possible and plausible\u201d for audiences to be able to enjoy.<\/p>\n

World War 3 Would Have Been Timely\u2014and wildly Successful<\/p>\n

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When asked what was at the heart of World War 3, Grief said that its main takeaway was \u201chope,\u201d and that he and Hayter wanted to promote a message for the US \u201cto come together as a country.\u201d He went on to elaborate, saying, \u201cAt the end of our story, Ben\u2019s character says, \u2018We\u2019re counting on you, Mr. Lincoln. We have got a lot of hope, and we can\u2019t lose the hope.\u2019 At the end of this miniseries, Willie Nelson sings a song called The Heart of America, which I hope becomes an anthem for this century and for this country, because we need to come together as one and have hope. It was too close, and all the subplots were almost too close. So let\u2019s calm down. Let\u2019s calm the waters and hug each other.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s interesting that FX chose World War 3 as the project to shy away from, especially considering that they\u2019ve tackled shows with blatant real-world subject matter before. Director Alex Garland\u2019s show Devs was a deep dive into the problematic gray areas within Silicon Valley\u2019s ever-expanding tech and AI sectors, while Y: The Last Man was absolutely riddled with parallels to the COVID-19 pandemic. Even the series The Beauty, an adaptation of the graphic novel by the same name, is Ryan Murphy\u2019s middling, self-proclaimed take on Ozempic culture\u2014a very timely and relevant subject.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s unfortunate that World War 3 is likely never to come to fruition, especially for the reasons given by the network and all of the wasted potential the series surely would have had. What are your thoughts on the cancellation of the show? Let us know your thoughts in the comments, and don\u2019t forget to head over to the ComicBook forum<\/a> to see what other fans are saying.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Thanks to what might be considered too many terrifying real-life possibilities, this dystopian sci-fi series that\u2019s been in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":312227,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[93,30081,25285,61,60,57251,282,35261],"class_list":{"0":"post-312226","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tv","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-fox","10":"tag-fx","11":"tag-ie","12":"tag-ireland","13":"tag-regular-news","14":"tag-tv","15":"tag-world-war-3"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/312226","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=312226"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/312226\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/312227"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=312226"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=312226"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=312226"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}