Shawn Ryan

In the latest quick and big sale this development season, a drama from The Shield creator Shawn Ryan and feature writer Karl Gajdusek just landed at ABC with a hefty pilot production commitment. The project, titled The Last Resort, was pitched to the networks on Friday with the deal at ABC closing in principal last night, though final points are still being ironed out. Sony Pictures TV, where Ryan is based with an overall deal, is producing. The Last Resort is described as a big swing and massive in scope. It is a thriller set in the near future when the country is very fractured and revolves around the crew of a U.S. nuclear submarine who become hunted after ignoring an order to shoot nuclear missiles. They escape to a NATO listening outpost where they publicly declare themselves to be the world’s smallest nuclear nation with 24 nuclear warheads. The show will explore the society the fugitives create, the natives they meet and how what they’ve done affects the group and its unity. “It also allows us to examine what is going on in this country in micro form,” Ryan said. The project came together when Marney Hockman, Ryan’s executive at his MiddKid Prods company, brought in Gajdusek, whom she had been pursuing for a couple of years. Ryan and Gajdusek then came up with the idea for The Last Resort and decided to write it together. This is the second project from Ryan, repped by WME and the Shuman Co, to land a major deal this development season, his first at Sony TV. His collaboration with Criminal Minds creator Simon Mirren, a crime procedural, was recently bought by CBS with a put pilot commitment. Gajdusek, repped by Verve and Management 360, is an in-demand feature writer. He recently did production work on the Liam Neeson film Unknown, wrote the upcoming Trespass, starring Nicole Kidman and Nicolas Cage as well as the adaptation of graphic novel Oblivion for Universal that Joseph Kosinski will direct and Tom Cruise will star in, and thriller Last Days Of American Crime with Sam Worthington attached to star. The scribe, who started off in television on Dead Like Me, is currently rewriting Viking at Working Title with Baltasar Kormakur attached to direct.