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Space Marines, rejoice! Henry Cavill has finally succeeded in making his wish come true, as Deadline reports that a Warhammer 40K series is officially in development at Amazon's Prime Video, one that will see the former Witcher star in and executive produce. The announcement comes two full years after Amazon acquired the rights to adapt the Games Workshop project, naturally making us all wonder just what the hell took so long. Well, gaming nerds, we'd like to suggest the theory that this announcement came about because of another Warhammer project - that is, episode 5 of the hotly-anticipated animated series Secret Level.

Then again, maybe the answer is little bit more boring. Let's get into it.

As Warhammer fans have no doubt noticed, the series news dropped on December 10, the very same day that Prime Video released its first batch of Secret Level episodes. The gaming-inspired animated series, from LOVE DEATH + ROBOTS producer Blur Studios, features a full episode dedicated to and set in the universe of Warhammer 40K, and according to early reviews, it's one of the series's standout episodes. Couple this with the fact that a whopping 2.1 million viewers have tuned in to just the first trailer for Secret Level, and you have to assume there were some high fives going on in the Amazon Prime boardrooms.

Awkward high fives, you also have to assume.

And yet, the reasoning behind the news's timing might actually have more to do with boardroom than battlefield. In the Deadline article that broke the Warhammer story, much attention is payed to the issue of Amazon's rights over the Warhammer property. "In its annual financial report filed in July," the piece reads, "Games Workshop noted that the company and Amazon had until December 2024 to mutually agree on 'creative guidelines for the films and television series to be developed by Amazon' for the streamer to retain the rights."

Maybe it's just me reading into it, but it sure feels like Deadline credits this as the reason for the Henry Cavill-centric announcement, saying that "The timing [of the news] is not a coincidence."

Sure, fine, take all the magic out of an animated show that kickstarted a potentially billion-dollar TV franchise with a single fifteen-minute episode. It's not like we could use all the cool stories we can get these days or anything. We're doing totally fine in the "success story" department.

But answer me this, corporate stooges: Why did Prime Video pick the exact date of the Warhammer Secret Level episode dropping to announce this news that fans have been praying for for two years? Even if procrastination is at the core of the decision, why didn't they pick any other date in December to do it? Can't give me a boring reason for that now, can you?

I thought not.

Episodes 1-8 of Secret Level are streaming on Prime Video now, with episodes 9-15 slated to come out December 17.

Don't stop here - Popverse's What to Watch covers every major release on every major streaming service for the upcoming month. Just follow these links and find out:

• Netflix
• Max
• Prime Video
• Disney+
• Hulu
• Apple TV+
• Peacock

Happy streaming!