First Monopoly, then Catan, and now Netflix has announced a movie based on the Ticket to Ride board game

Another day, another example of Netflix continuing to expand its roster of film and TV projects by walking into the board game aisle of a Target, pointing at a random box, and going: “That one.”

Last April Netflix successfully bid for the rights to make a reality series based on board game Monopoly, and followed that up in October when it announced it was working on multiple “scripted and unscripted” projects based on the Settlers of Catan board game.

Now it’s pried open the lid of strategy train game Ticket to Ride with a similar deal, “securing global rights” to “scripted and unscripted projects across film, television series, and other formats,” according to a press release (PDF here) from publisher Days of Wonder.

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“Yes, really,” insisted Days of Wonder on instagram, probably because it knows we were all asking “Really?” when we heard the news. The press release also said the game’s designer, Alan R. Moon, will executive produce the film, which will be written by Ben Mekler and Christopher Amick (Kung Fu Panda: The Dragon Knight).

(Oh, also, if you’re wondering why Will Forte, Bowen Yang, and Kristen Wiig are in the image up top—they haven’t been announced as part of this movie. It’s from a video I’ve included down below.)

Look, I’m not saying you can’t make a good movie out of Ticket to Ride. Train movies can be good. Maybe it’ll be like Snowpiercer but with fewer axe fights and a smidge less cannibalism. It is interesting that Netflix seems so keen on gobbling up rights to board games, though. Maybe there aren’t enough movies and TV shows based on videogames left to acquire?

Personally, I’d have preferred something like, oh, I dunno, a third season of Mindhunter—but hey, I’m not in charge of Netflix. (At least not yet.) I’m not sure what kind of film Ticket to Ride will make, but I did enjoy this TV adaptation of the game from a Saturday Night Live Sketch in 2024: