Lara Croft has, over her 28 years of tomb raiding existence—and Christ, but we’re old—moved back and forth quite a bit over the line between being a more grounded character, and a completely ridiculous action game/film protagonist. Notably, the more modern Tomb Raider games that kicked off with the franchise’s reboot back in 2013 tried really, really hard to emphasize her humanity and vulnerability…before giving in to the impulse to turn her back into a dual-pistol-wielding reaper of men as that franchise continued. Similarly, the three extant Tomb Raider films have had to at least nominally acknowledge that stars Angelina Jolie and Alicia Vikander were actual human beings, with basic flesh-based limitations, while deploying their stunts.
All of which is to say that the new teaser for Netflix’s upcoming Tomb Raider: The Legend Of Lara Croft, is maybe the most “stereotypical action hero” we’ve ever seen its titular heroine, to the point that some of the animated stunts on display are practically Tom Cruise-esque. Sure, there’s some more traditional Tomb Raider-type stuff—leaping over spiked pits, contemplating glowing skulls, doing elaborate rope swing moves that would make our personal, human arms not just pop out of our sockets, but probably tear clean off, if we tried them. But it’s also pretty clear that animation studio Powerhouse—who previously oversaw Netflix’s well-received Castlevania show—is feeling fully empowered to take Lara beyond any such pathetic human limits for the show, with the teaser showing her pulling off motorcycle stunts, aerial spins, and elaborate skydiving maneuvers in very quick order.
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The trailer arrived alongside a date announcement for the series, revealing that it’ll debut on October 10, 2024. Hayley Atwell will star in the series as Lara, taking on a voice role that’s had a number of incumbents (including, at one point, Minnie Driver, for a different animated Tomb Raider series) over the years.