We wondered last week what exactly Nathan Fillion was teasing with his not-so-cryptic Instagram posts and it turns out that his Uncharted project is not tied to the Sony-produced film at all. Instead, his turn as the charismatic Nathan Drake is part of an all-too-short fan film directed by Allan Ungar.
The film has an agonisingly brief fifteen-minute runtime and stars Nathan Fillion, of Firefly and Castle fame, in the role that fans have dreamed of seeing him in for a decade. And let’s cut to the chase, he was perfect as Drake. I literally couldn’t imagine anyone else pulling it off as well, Fillion and Drake go together like bacon and eggs. The short film also stars Avatar’s Stephen Lang as the gruff but lovable Sully.
The short film is a passion project for its creators, and it’s explicitly stated at the start that it is indeed unauthorised and isn’t endorsed by Sony or Uncharted’s creators, Naughty Dog.
“I’ve wanted to do this ever since Uncharted first came out in 2007,” Ungar said in an Instagram post. A Canadian writer-director, Ungar specialises in action-films and it shows here as he perfectly condenses Uncharted’s larger than life action and boils it down to a brief minute or two during the film’s runtime. There’s a moment during Drake’s escape where it clicks that’ll make fans of the franchise grin ear to ear.
“This is something I’ve wanted to do, but more importantly, something I’ve wanted to see for a long time,” Fillion said, also on his Instagram. “If you’ve ever pinned a towel around your neck for a cape, or donned a fedora and nearly put your eye out with a homemade whip, this is for you.”
So unless Sony happens to see Ungar’s Uncharted short film and decides that Fillion is the man for an official adaptation to the silver screen, this is perhaps the first and only time we’ll see him in the role that he was made for, and that’s something to be thankful for.
