Tomb Raider: The Legend of Lara Croft Showrunner Unpacks Its Canon Impact in Exclusive Interview

Tomb Raider: The Legend of Lara Croft will hit Netflix on October 10.

By Megan Peters

Lara Croft needs no introduction. For decades, the heroine has entertained fans on screens and through consoles thanks to Crystal Dynamics. By now, it seems like Lara Croft has done it all with Tomb Raider, but that isn't quite true. The franchise is about to dip its toes into Netflix with an original series, and ComicBook got the chance to chat with the showrunner behind Tomb Raider: The Legend of Lara Croft not long ago.

Speaking about the upcoming original, Tasha Huo dove deep into the work it took to develop this Tomb Raider project. From its canon impact to its casting of Hayley Atwell, Huo has plenty to share about the Netflix original ahead of its premiere this October. So if you want to check out our chat, you can find it below:

Interview with Tasha Huo, Showrunner of Tomb Raider: The Legend of Lara Croft

Tomb Raider: The Legend of Lara Croft marks the latest screen adaptation of the heroine and her rich history. So looking at this animated project, I wanted to know how did your team come together to craft its look? Did you have any kind of inspiration or notes that you were looking to?

Tasha Huo: I think the first part of that answer is that we are all fans of the game. So our biggest inspiration was the games. We really wanted to capture all that we loved so much about playing them in terms of the action. The way Lara's body moves, which is such a specific kind of action heroine way of moving, makes her so special. I think that was our biggest influence. Then it was a lot of looking at other action movies and a lot of movie references. There was anime as well as we really tried to capture the general feeling of the series. As long as we knew we were having fun, we knew we were on the right path.

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(Photo:

Tomb Raider: The Legend of Lara Croft. Cr. COURTESY OF NETFLIX © 2024

- Netflix)

Looking at The Legend of Lara Croft, it has a dedicated place in the lore for the Tomb Raider franchise. We know that the show is going to be meeting our heroine after the events of Shadow of the Tomb Raider, and then we go from there. Can you kind of walk me through what your experience and your team's experience was like lining up this show with the Tomb Raider canon and what that process was like?

We definitely talked with Crystal Dynamics early on and sort of got the blessing to do the in-between phase of Lara's life, which is the phase that really fascinated me after playing the Survivor series. It's such a different Lara than we got in the '90s and beyond.

How? How did she become that character? This question became the big one for me in writing the show. It was me trying to figure out how Lara built the huge network that she ended up having, where she could go to the middle of nowhere and somehow have a connection from some random monk in a monastery. How did she get to know that person? You know, I wanted to know that. How did she become funny? It was so cool to be able to build up the Lara that we all fell in love with to start with.

We know that Lara embodies the spirit of adventure so well. In this series, we have Hayley Atwell coming in to bring that bold voice to Lara. I just wanted to ask why you feel that Hayley was the perfect actress and voice to bring your vision of Lara to life?

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I think with Hayley, it really became very clear after Agent Carter that she had this immense talent to be very funny and extremely classy which is who Lara is while also having gravitas that we see so well in the Survivor series. She sort of encompasses all the elements that we're trying to now mash together and combine to create classic Lara. It was kind of an obvious fit for me. 

Are you excited to check out Netflix's take on Tomb Raider? Give me a shout at @meganwpeters with your take! You can also let us know what you think over on X (Twitter) and Instagram.

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