By Patrick Frater – The Three Body Universe, the rights and production company behind the Three Body Problem film and TV franchise, has boarded upcoming blockbuster sci-fi film "Supernova Era". The film’s producer, Conqueror Entertainment, has also appointed Li Yang to direct from late 2026.

Like Three Body Problem, the Supernova Era film is developed from a work by bestselling and Hugo Award-winning Chinese novelist Liu Cixin, whose credits also include "The Wandering Earth".

Written in 2003 (and published in English in 2019), "Supernova Era" takes as its starting point the explosion of a supernova which showers the Earth with lethal radiation. As only children under the age of 13 are able to recover, the soon-to-die adults must teach their offspring how to take over responsibly. The result is fractured between those new societies that degrade into savagery and others which try to ensure human survival.

Li enjoyed his solo feature directing debut last year with "Escape From the 21st Century," a well-regarded sci-fi comedy that earned US$15 million worldwide. With Frant Gwo, the solo director of "The Wandering Earth" movies, Li also co-directed "The Adventures of Li Xianji" (2011).

"Supernova Era" is being produced by Vasco Xu, who was an associate producer on "Dune: Part One" and who founded Conqueror in 2022 with venture capitalist Sun Ge and Brian Cheng, director of Hong Kong property and infrastructure behemoth NWS Group.

Xu and Conqueror are represented by Laura Reddy at Range Media Partners.

Mainland China-based The Three Body Universe is committed as Supernova Era’s developer and financier. It expects to bring in additional financial partners as the film nears production.

Xu expects soft pre-production to begin from the first quarter of 2026, A-list cast to be attached subsequently and for physical production to begin later in the year.

With Li now in the director’s chair, the screenplay is being written by Yang Yuhao. Earlier drafts of the screenplay saw Ann Lu and Xu credited with adapting the novel.

While Liu’s underlying book was penned in a different technological era, Xu says that the story does not need to be radically changed.

“The script is set before the iPhone came out, but it does feature a quantum computer, basically a ChatGPT. So, it’s both retro and future combined,” he told ContentAsia.

The Three Body Universe has past credits on a trio of past animated and live-action Three-Body series in China as well as the David Benioff and DB Weiss-produced "3 Body Problem" delivered to Netflix in 2024, with another two seasons in the works.

The company is also a backer of the upcoming feature film version of "Three-Body Problem" to be directed by Zhang Yimou.

For many years, China’s film industry regulators discouraged sci-fi movies with their depictions of dystopian societies and authoritarian regimes. But as China became a scientific and space superpower, attitudes towards the genre slowly softened.

A major breakthrough occurred in 2019 with Ning Hao’s sci-fi comedy "Crazy Alien" and the blockbuster Gwo-directed fantasy-adventure "The Wandering Earth", both adapted from short stories by Liu.

The following year, China’s National Film Authority issued policy measures to boost sci-fi movie production.

"The Wandering Earth" earned US$700 million at the box office. Its prequel, "The Wandering Earth 2" earned US$615 million from a release in 2023. "The Wandering Earth 3" is currently scheduled for a 6 Feb 2026 release, shortly ahead of the Lunar New Year holiday season.