Things are getting ugly over at 20th Century Fox. The studio has picked up the rights to Scott Westerfield’s teen book Uglies.
A blend of angsty metaphor and Orwellian warning, the plot sees a future society where kids are known as “Uglies” until they hit 16 and are surgically made-over into “Pretties” and get to live in a swanky area of town. Our hero is a precocious type who is asked to spy on her friend, a rebel who ditched getting the operation and joined a splinter group. Unless she obeys, she’ll be denied the procedure and condemned to a life of misery.
With their eyes on a franchise, Fox hopes the film will set up a trilogy, since Westerfield has already penned two other books. There’s no director, writer or cast on board yet.