Michael Mann is returning to television, and as fans of his work know, it’s hardly a step down. The filmmaker made his mark on the small screen far before Peak TV came rolling along with shows like “Police Story,” “Miami Vice,” and “Crime Story,” however, as he heads back to the episodic format he’s leaving procedurals behind and trying out something a little new.
“Huê 1968” is a miniseries adaptation of the book by Mark Bowden which dives into the Tet Offensive, the key event in the Vietnam War that saw a mass surprise attack on the capital of Vietnam in the title. It’s a sweeping look at the event, with characters including everyone from a young revolutionary schoolgirl to President Lyndon Johnson, so we can already see the appeal of the epic scope of the story. FX does too, as they’ve swooped in and landed the rights to the show. Here’s the book synopsis:
In the early hours of January 31, 1968, the North Vietnamese launched over one hundred attacks across South Vietnam in what would become known as the Tet Offensive. The lynchpin of Tet was the capture of Hue, Vietnam’s intellectual and cultural capital, by 10,000 National Liberation Front troops who descended from hidden camps and surged across the city of 140,000. Within hours the entire city was in their hands save for two small military outposts. American commanders refused to believe the size and scope of the Front’s presence, ordering small companies of marines against thousands of entrenched enemy troops. After several futile and deadly days, Lieutenant Colonel Ernie Cheatham would finally come up with a strategy to retake the city, block by block and building by building, in some of the most intense urban combat since World War II.
The mini-series is planned to run between eight and ten episodes, with Mann directing multiple installments, and leading the overall creative vision. Filming is aiming to get started by the end of the year, so hopefully we’ll see this before 2018 runs out the clock. [Deadline]