The Departed is, for us anyway, one of the best crime films of the past twenty years.

Martin Scorsese's electric, vital directing, a career-best performance by Mark Wahlberg, the soundtrack - all of it. It was pretty special and Scorsese rightfully won his first and only Oscar for Best Director for it. So, we have to scratch our heads and wonder why they'd want to make a TV remake of it.

Roy Lee, who was one of the producers on The Departed and was also producing Bates Motel until 2014, mentioned in a recent interview that there's one in the offing. What's even more interesting is that there was a sequel planned for The Departed, or rather a prequel. According to a recent interview, there were plans to bring back characters who died in The Departed and, according to Lee, "an amazing idea to make it work, but it would be so expensive and Scorsese didn’t want to do a sequel."

That makes sense, in fairness. The cast of The Departed was pretty spectacular; Nicholson, Martin Sheen, Matt Damon. Getting a studio to stump up the money for those three again for a sequel would a tall ask. However, Lee is pretty hopeful that his idea for a TV series of The Departed can happen, likening it to the excellent Fargo TV series on FX.

"The Departed as a concept is amazing. That’s what attracted me to the story, the two moles working on either side of the law, and translating that idea into other settings with new characters, like how Fargo has taken the feel of the Coen Brothers film. We were having discussions about making Infernal Affairs a television series. A different city, so it’s not anything like The Departed, but essentially The Departed as a TV series.”

The film he's referring to, Infernal Affairs, is the Hong Kong crime saga that spawned two sequels and served as the basis of The Departed. In fact, some of the cast turned up in that scene where Jack Nicholson meets a bunch of Asian gangsters and Mark Wahlberg goes nuts at the technician who was supposed to bug the place.

As it stands, The Departed's TV series is a good while away yet from being a reality. Taking the story out of Boston, however, is a mistake as the city is just as much a character as Matt Damon or Martin Sheen. Granted, we would have said the same about Fargo and that blew us all away.

According to Lee, the writers of the show are currently discussing whether it's a network show or a cable show, noting that a TV series could either work as a six-part miniseries or as a huge franchise ala The Walking Dead or The Sopranos. Scorsese, as we know, has a very good working relationship with HBO and it's entirely possible he could be coaxed into getting on this train and bringing HBO on board. If Scorsese does climb aboard, that's a huge vote of confidence in the project. It needs his touch and his gravitas to make it a reality.

Here's hoping. Now let's enjoy Mark Wahlberg's best scene in the film.

 

 

Via Collider