Conan the Barbarian live action series in the works at Netflix

Netflix is reportedly developing a new live-action Conan the Barbarian series, according to an article from entertainment website Deadline.

In the report, Netflix has entered into an agreement with Conan Properties International, owned by Malmberg’s Cabinet Entertainment. The deal gives Netflix exclusive rights to draw ideas from all existing Conan adaptations, books, films and TV, and transform them into both live-action and animated projects.

Netflix is currently searching for a writer/showrunner to pen the Conan adaptation and a director to helm the project. It will be produced by Fredrik Malmberg and Mark Wheeler’s Pathfinder Media.

Conan the Barbarian is the latest acquisition under Netflix’s strategy of securing globally recognizable IP in an effort to build a universe of films and TV series.

Pulp fiction author Robert E. Howard created the sword-and-sorcery fantasy stories of Conan the Barbarian, published at Weird Tales magazine back in 1932. Since then, Conan has also spawned hundreds of novels, thousands of comics, video games, and more.

The character was famously played by Arnold Schwarzenegger in the 1982 feature Conan the Barbarian and the 1984 sequel Conan the Destroyer. A Conan the Adventurer animated series and spin-off ran in the early '90s, as well as an action-adventure series shortly after.

In 2011, Jason Momoa portrayed the hulking protagonist but the remake was not well received at the box office. A couple of years ago, Amazon started developing a Conan drama series, but unfortunately, things fell through.

(Image from Conan the Destroyer)