With two film adaptations and an upcoming Hulu show underneath his bald cap, it seems like directors are desperate to put Agent 47 (and his silverballers) onto the silver screen. So why do they keep going about it the wrong way? Agent 47 shouldn’t be a James Bond-esque action star, and he shouldn’t be a deep and tragic lead either - he should be a horror villain.

The big problem with trying to portray Agent 47 in a film or TV series is that he’s not the most personable character. In fact, it’d be pretty easy to argue that he has no personality at all. He quips and shows an attachment to a few key figures throughout the games, but there’s only one scene in the entire franchise that sees him smiling. The rest just have him nonchalantly glaring at things he wants to kill.

This is why making him an emotional lead with a tragic backstory like they seem to be trying to do with the upcoming Hulu series, isn’t very appealing. You can give 47 emotions and focus on his character, but that wouldn’t fit the games - it seems like another person entirely. Agent 47 is a chameleon without a name, which is why he works so well in the first place.

Another issue is the fact that the Hitman games simply aren’t an easy thing to translate to another medium. Yes, they’re technically about the world of assassination, but they’re also about patiently waiting in the shadows and observing people. The best Hitman moments are when you move in and out of a location without ever being seen, killing your targets with only a banana at your side. It’s not when you run in guns blazing trying to headshot everyone.

That’s exactly why neither of the Hitman films worked. Both tried to portray Agent 47 as some sort of super-spy with no morals, gunning down people left and right without a care in the world. It made for some cool scenes, but it misunderstands why people enjoy the games. Agent 47 is a badass, sure, but he also shouldn’t need to shoot a moving helicopter out of the air. If you played Hitman like it’s shown in the films, you’d be missing the point (and a Silent Assassin rank). Playing Hitman is all about going unseen and unheard to get the best score possible, whilst shooting whatever you see lowers your ranking and makes you look a bit of a fool.

So how exactly do you bring Hitman to the big screen? Easy - you make Agent 47 a horror villain.

I don’t mean that a Hitman show should star a bald Jason Vorhees. Instead, I think the best approach would be to make him an ever-present threat to the other characters. Have him be the antagonist of the story, and instead focus on whoever it is that he’s trying to hunt down. If done in an episodic format, each episode could take place in a different location and focus on a new set of targets. You’d find out all about each target, going into their life and slowly figuring out why they’re being hunted down. Maybe they aren’t quite as awful as the characters in the games, but they’re still flawed people that you can empathise with.

Whilst all of this is going on, we’re getting hints to where Agent 47 is and will slowly start to realise his plan. Maybe you’ll see him in the background. Maybe you’ll see him climbing around the outskirts of a scene. Maybe you’ll hear a wrench pointedly hit the ground. Every episode could be filled to the brim with red herrings before the master plan is unveiled and the target is taken down. Imagine re-watching and being able to see it all clearly, or catching glimpses the first time around and arguing with your friends about how it’s all going to turn out.

Doing it this way capitalises on a lot of what makes Hitman great. Not only does it ensure that Agent 47 is as powerful as he is in the games, but it also puts the story focus on the targets and not a character that doesn’t have much… well, character. It also translates the gameplay of Hitman to the screen pretty well, rather than relying on a bunch of incoherent action scenes.

Hitman has some interesting plot threads in it, but arguably the best stories are the ones about your targets. Almost all of them are comically evil, or unlikeable, which is exactly what makes them so fun to kill. Take that premise and make it a Black Mirror-esque assassination series with a villain that you’re always wary of and targets that can carry a plot much better than he can.

If nothing else, it’s a much more interesting way of trying to put the Hitman games into another format than anything we’ve seen so far. The upcoming series might be great, but right now it sounds like yet another attempt at something we’ve seen get blown up by a rubber duck countless times.