Metro (franchise)

• 1. Introduction

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  The Metro franchise started in 2002 with a single novel, Metro 2033, by the Russian writer Dmitry Glukhovsky. It has since grown into a sprawling world of novels and video games. Much of it was written by people other than its creator.

  This documentary asks how one book about the Moscow Metro became a shared universe, and who built the rest of it. It asks how far that universe travelled from Moscow. It also asks why a franchise with this much reach has never reached the cinema.

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• 2. One Shared World

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  Dmitry Glukhovsky's own novels describe only one place: a devastated Moscow, and above all the Moscow Metro system that gives the franchise its name. His sequels, Metro 2034 and Metro 2035, stay with that single vision. Every other story in the franchise shares the same fictional universe, but the extended works roam across Russia and beyond, through a world ruined by global biological and nuclear warfare.

  The Universe of Metro 2033 is the name given to the long series of short stories, novellas and novels by many different authors. Its genres run from post-apocalyptic action all the way to romance. Glukhovsky supports these stories, and the official Metro website advertises them.

  The first book on the extended list is Road Signs by Vladimir Berezin, dated December 2009.

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• 3. Maps Beyond Moscow

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  Sergey Antonov's Dark Tunnels, from January 2010, is one of the many extended stories set in Moscow. Others leave the capital behind. Ruslan Melnikov's Muroncha takes place in Rostov on Don, and Sergey Paliy's The Nameless in Samara. Sergey Moskvin's To See the Sun is set in Novosibirsk, and Andrey Grebenschikov's Below Hell in Yekaterinburg.

  Alexandr Shakilov's War of the Moles, from December 2010, goes to Kyiv. Andrey Butorin's The North, from October 2010, is set on the Kola Peninsula and in Murmansk. Zahar Petrov's MRLs is placed in Minsk, Suren Tsormudyan's Ancestral Heritage in Kaliningrad, and Sergey Moskvin's Hunger on Novaya Zemlya. Andrey Dyakov's Over the Horizon, from January 2013, follows a path that begins in Saint Petersburg and ends in Vladivostok.

  Grant McMaster's Britannia, from September 2011, runs from Glasgow through Carlisle, York, Doncaster, Sheffield and Leicester to London. Tullio Avoledo's The Roots of Heaven, from March 2012, passes through Rome, Urbino, Rimini, Ravenna and Venice. His The Children's Crusade, from March 2014, is set in Milan. Igor Vardunas's Ice Prison, from October 2011, travels from the Baltic Sea and the Atlantic Ocean to Africa and Antarctica.

  Pierre Bordage set three novels in Paris: Left Bank, Right Bank and City. A 2017 collection by twelve Polish authors, In the Ruins, even reaches as far as Chicago.

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• 4. A Crowd of Authors

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  Pierre Bordage's City, dated April 2022, closes a list that began more than twelve years earlier. In between, many writers returned to the world more than once. Sergey Antonov wrote the Rublyovka books, including Rublyovka-2 and Rublyovka-3, along with Unburied and The Supreme Power. Andrey Butorin followed The North with Siege of Paradise, The Daughter of Heavenly Spirit and Mutant.

  Nikita Averin produced a trilogy of Crimea, Crimea-2 and Crimea-3 between October 2013 and July 2015. Shimun Vrochek wrote Piter in February 2010, then returned with Piter. War. in 2018 and Piter. Battle of the Twins in December 2019. Zakhar Petrov wrote MRLs, then Muos: Purgatory and Muos: The Fall. Robert J. Szmidt contributed The Abyss, The Tower and The Giant.

  Some works came from teams. A collective of writers published The World's End in September 2012 under the name Timofey Kalashnikov. Irina Baranova and Constantine Benev wrote The Witness together, and later Queen of the Night and City of Seven Winds. Polish writers formed their own strand, with In the Firelight by fourteen authors in January 2014, Whispers of the Fallen by eight authors in April 2015, and Echo of an Extinguished World by fourteen authors in March 2016.

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• 5. The Video Games

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  In March 2010, the publisher THQ released Metro 2033, a first-person shooter for Microsoft Windows and Xbox 360. It was developed by 4A Games in Ukraine. A sequel, Metro: Last Light, followed in May 2013 on Windows, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.

  In 2014, both games came back as Redux versions, with updated graphics and gameplay. Each bundled all the downloadable content released so far. The Metro Redux bundle arrived on the PC, Xbox One and PlayStation 4.

  Metro Exodus, the third game, was released in February 2019. A virtual reality spin-off, Metro Awakening, followed in November 2024. A fourth mainline entry, Metro 2039, is currently in development.

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• 6. Crossing Languages

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  Piter, Towards the Light and Into the Darkness are among the few Metro books to leave Russian behind. They have been translated into several European languages, including German, Polish and Swedish. Most of the series was first released in Russia and stayed there.

  Before 2014, none of the books in the series had been released in a country where English is the prominent language. For English speakers, other formats would speak first.

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• 7. Comics And Board Games

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  In 2011, the publisher Hobby World released a Metro 2033 board game based on the original novel. It was designed by Sergei Golubkin.

  A year later came Metro 2033: Britannia Comic Prologue, a graphic novel inspired by the opening of the novel Britannia. Grant McMaster, who wrote the novel, also wrote the comic, and Benedict Hollis illustrated it. Unlike the novels, it is in English rather than Russian, and it is free to download.

  Film plans proved far harder to carry through.

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• 8. Films That Stalled

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  Michael De Luca and Solipsist Films set out to turn Metro into films for MGM. Dmitry Glukhovsky cancelled the deal because he disapproved of how they planned to Americanize his work.

  In 2019, the Russian state company Gazprom Media announced its own Metro 2033 film project. That project is now considered unlikely to be made. Glukhovsky left Russia to avoid prosecution and prison for criticizing the Russian war in Ukraine, which leaves the 2019 announcement without a clear path to the screen.

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