Snowpiercer, a Korean film shot with English-speaking actors including Chris Evans and Tilda Swinton, was a big hit in Korea and a solid performer on US VOD (despite a delayed release following a dispute over final cut with The Weinstein Company). The ambitious film was also a favorite with critics during awards season.
Friedman, one of the writers on War of the Worlds (2005) and the upcoming Avatar 2 & 3, is no stranger to TV, having created Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles. Tomorrow Studios is responsible for TV properties such as Teen Wolf, Last Man Standing and Aquarius.
Bong's film takes place in a post-apocalyptic ice age, when the remainder of the human race lives in a class-segregated train that perpetually circumnavigates the globe. Given that Snowpiercer was based on a multi-part French graphic novel, there's plenty of room to expand the world for television. Bong and his producers Choi Doo-ha and Park Chan-wook are attached as executive producers, but it is unclear if they will have any significant creative influence.
Writing on Twitter, Friedman has insisted that the show will not land at a network, which is encouraging, but not enough to sell me on the package just yet. In any case, if a Snowpiercer TV show is to succeed, it'll have to pull together an impressive cast to rival the terrific ensemble of the film.