Gary Whitta
Gary Whitta once stayed on camera for 24 hours straight. In October 2011 he co-hosted a live-streamed edition of the show This is Only a Test with Tested creators Will Smith and Norman Chan. The marathon raised over $50,000 for Child's Play. Whitta is an English-American screenwriter, author, game designer and video game journalist, born on the 21st of July 1972. Few careers wander as widely as his. He has written for cinema, television, video games, comic books and novels, and he has spent years talking into microphones. How does someone who starts out writing about video games end up writing for Hollywood? What happens when a screenwriter turns up as a talk show host inside a video game? And which of his many jobs shaped the others?
ACE magazine, a British games title owned by Future Publishing, gave Whitta his start as a writer and games journalist. When ACE closed down in 1992, he moved to The One for Amiga Games as deputy editor. He also helped found the original PC Gamer magazine in the UK. Later he edited Total Football and worked for C&VG. A few years after that, he crossed the Atlantic to become editor-in-chief of the newer US edition of PC Gamer.
In early 2000, Whitta worked with Future to launch a film magazine called Total Movie. The venture was short-lived. Financial difficulties at the publisher ended it after only four issues in early 2001.
He no longer runs magazines, but he still files game reviews and opinion pieces for a number of gaming publications. His byline continues to appear in PC Gamer and on 1Up.com.
In 2009, Whitta became a US citizen. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area of California with his wife Leah and their two children. A year after the citizenship came through, The Book of Eli reached audiences in 2010 with Whitta credited as its screenwriter.
The Book of Eli is Whitta's biggest Hollywood success as a screenwriter. His next major film was After Earth in 2013, which he co-wrote with M. Night Shyamalan from a story by Will Smith. He also wrote the script for an action thriller called Undying.
Not every project reached the screen. Whitta was developing the "Monkey Project" with Chris Weston, which would have reimagined the Buddhist novel Journey to the West, and the classic television series Monkey, as an animated series. Weston pulled out of it.
On the 9th of January 2015, Whitta was announced to have amicably parted ways with Rogue One, the first stand-alone Star Wars film, which Gareth Edwards directed. He had been hired to write its script. The 2016 film still credits him, together with John Knoll, for the story alone.
Television followed. He worked on nine episodes of Nerd Court in 2015 and four episodes of Star Wars Rebels in 2016-2017.
On the 27th of October 2016, Variety reported that Warner Bros., Village Roadshow and Team Downey had assembled a writers' room for the third Guy Ritchie Sherlock Holmes film. Whitta sat alongside Nicole Perlman, Justin Malen, Geneve Dworet-Robertson and Kieran Fitzgerald. One more film, called Starlight, lists him as writer with its date still to be announced.
Duke Nukem Forever, Prey and Gears of War all benefited from Whitta's writing. In 2006 he co-wrote Prey. He has also advised on general game design for Microsoft, Electronic Arts, Activision, Midway Games and others.
Telltale Games then asked him to oversee the narrative development of its episodic adaptation of The Walking Dead. He wrote the fourth episode himself. The Walking Dead: The Game appeared in 2012, with Whitta as story consultant and co-writer alongside Sean Vanaman and Jake Rodkin. The 2013 follow-up, The Walking Dead: 400 Days, was co-written with Sean Ainsworth, Nick Breckon, Mark Darin and Sean Vanaman.
Whitta left Telltale after completing the first season. He came back to help finish The Walking Dead: The Final Season in 2018, credited with additional writing.
In 2015 he served as a story consultant on Halo 5: Guardians. He also developed Lewdle, a variant of the word game Wordle.
The latest game credit in his list is Forspoken in 2023, where he is named as the creator of its original concept and lore.
Death, Jr. is the character behind a short, popular comic series that Whitta wrote. Mike Mignola drew the covers and Ted Naifeh illustrated the pages. The series grew into a second three-part run. Reviewers called the writing "charming and cleverly subversive" and praised its "quirky characters and slick humor". In May 2005, Whitta talked about the experience with Silver Bullet Comics.
He later turned to OLIVER, co-created with Darick Robertson, the illustrator and co-creator of Transmetropolitan and The Boys. The comic was set for a 2015 release from Image Comics.
Prose and licensed work came too. Whitta is the author of the book Abomination, listed for 2015. In 2018 he wrote the comic adaptation of Star Wars: The Last Jedi.
In 2020 he co-wrote a story called "Kill the Batman" with Greg Miller for The Joker 80th Anniversary 100-Page Super Spectacular #1.
Colin Campbell was Whitta's partner on the Game Theory podcast, which has since stopped being produced. Whitta was also a frequent commentator on the PC Gamer podcast and appeared on the Next Gen podcast until it was canceled. In September 2011, he and Campbell, then News and Features Editor at IGN, launched a similar show called IGN's Game Business Show.
Whitta became a weekly co-host of This is Only a Test, from Tested. He guested on Behind the Screened Door, the Giant Bombcast and the Comic Vine Podcast. That was before Whiskey Media was sold in two deals to CBS Interactive and BermanBraun. He has returned to the Giant Bombcast as a guest in recent years.
Every October, Whitta chairs the Octoberkast charity event. In 2013 he created a game for it called Space Rocks.
In November 2017, Whitta became an official co-host of Kinda Funny Games Daily, after many guest spots on that show and one on Kinda Funny's flagship GameOverGreggy Show. He has also co-hosted the Xbox-focused Kinda Funny Xcast since its premiere in July 2020.
April 2020 brought Animal Talking, a late-night talk show he launched as a live stream set inside Animal Crossing: New Horizons. Its guests have included Elijah Wood, Brie Larson and Danny Trejo.
On the 21st of August 2020, he announced Talk Guys, a talk show set in Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout.
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Common questions
Who is Gary Whitta?
Gary Whitta is an English-American screenwriter, author, game designer and video game journalist, born on the 21st of July 1972. He wrote The Book of Eli and co-wrote After Earth.
What films did Gary Whitta write?
Gary Whitta wrote The Book of Eli (2010) and co-wrote After Earth (2013) with M. Night Shyamalan from a story by Will Smith. He also shares the story credit on Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016) with John Knoll.
What magazines did Gary Whitta work for?
Gary Whitta began at ACE magazine, then became deputy editor of The One for Amiga Games and helped found the UK edition of PC Gamer. He later edited Total Football, worked for C&VG and became editor-in-chief of the US edition of PC Gamer.
Which video games has Gary Whitta worked on?
Gary Whitta co-wrote Prey in 2006 and was story consultant and co-writer on The Walking Dead: The Game in 2012. He was also a story consultant on Halo 5: Guardians and the creator of the original concept and lore for Forspoken in 2023.
What happened between Gary Whitta and Rogue One?
Gary Whitta was hired to script Rogue One, the first stand-alone Star Wars film, directed by Gareth Edwards. On the 9th of January 2015, he was announced to have amicably parted ways with the film, and he is credited for story only, with John Knoll.
What podcasts and shows does Gary Whitta host?
Gary Whitta co-hosts Kinda Funny Games Daily, since November 2017, and the Kinda Funny Xcast, since July 2020. He also launched Animal Talking in Animal Crossing: New Horizons in April 2020 and announced Talk Guys in Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout on the 21st of August 2020.
All sources
33 references cited across the entry
- 1Gary Whitta13 February 2013
- 2Amiga history guideGareth Knight — ACE
- 61Up profile page1up.com
- 8HIGHLIGHTS: This Week's Podcast - Edge MagazineNext-gen.biz — 2007-01-19
- 10The Book of Eli15 January 2010
- 12Kurt Russell Goes Dark in 'Undying'Bloody-disgusting.com — 12 May 2010
- 13'Star Wars' Spinoff Hires 'Godzilla' Director Gareth Edwards (Exclusive)Borys Kit — 22 May 2014
- 15Warner Bros. and Team Downey Set Writers' Room for 'Sherlock Holmes 3' (EXCLUSIVE)Justin Kroll — Variety — 27 October 2016
- 20Original co-writer returns for final season of Telltale's The Walking DeadHaydn Taylor — 30 November 2017
- 28IGN's Game Business ShowTested — 2011-09-27
- 29OCTOBERKAST! 24 Hours of This is Only a Test For the Kids!Tested — 2011-10-14
- 32I became an American Citizen TodayGary Whitta — 4 March 2009
- 33BookGundog by Garry WhittaInkshares, Inc — 12 September 2023