Photo: Left, Netflix producer and Game of Thrones video game developer Lin Qi; Right: Game of Thrones HBO series creators, David Benioff and D.B. Weiss
A Netflix producer and owner of the firm behind the Game of Thrones video game, Lin Qi, has died after allegedly being /poisoned by a senior executive at his company 'Yoozoo'.
The 39-year-old Chinese billionaire died on Christmas Day after being poisoned on the 16th of December 2020. It is believed that the motive behind the poisoning was a business disagreement.
The senior executive accused of the poisoning, Xu Yao, is said to have fallen out with Lin Qi as a result of a disagreement over who was allowed to sell the adaptation rights to a trilogy of sci-fi books 'The Three-Body Problem' to Netflix.
Qi is believed to have been poisoned with a cup of pu-erh tea, a common Chinese drink.
The Shanghai police, who have arrested the suspect, said in a statement:
"At 5pm on Dec 17, 2020, the police received a call from a hospital regarding a patient surnamed Lin. During the patient's treatment, the hospital said it had determined that the patient had been poisoned. Following the call, the police began an investigation. According to investigations on site and further interviews, the police found that a suspect surnamed Xu, who is a co-worker of the victim Lin, was the most likely the perpetrator. The suspect Xu has been arrested and investigations continue."
Qi's company, Yoozoo, has denied that there was fighting between executives and released a statement saying:
"We hope that radical people and [such] behaviour will not change our well wishes for the world or change our destination. The company is operating normally."
The hugely popular Three-Body Problem series of books includes the titles Remembrance of Earth's Past, The Dark Forest and Death's End, and follows the story of mankind making contact with aliens. The series of books are bestsellers and have won a series of awards, including a Hugo Award for Best Novel, the first books written in Asia to do so.
David Benioff and D.B. Weiss, the Game of Thrones television series creators, who have been asked by Netflix to adapt The Three-Body problem for Netflix, said of the books:
"Liu Cixin's trilogy is the most ambitious science-fiction series we've read, taking readers on a journey from the 1960s until the end of time, from life on our pale blue dot to the distant fringes of the universe. We look forward to spending the next years of our lives bringing this to life for audiences around the world."
As an author, Liu Cixin has courted controversy primarily due to his past statements on the alleged imprisonment of Uighur Muslims in China's Western provinces. He told a reporter in 2019:
"Would you rather that they be hacking away at bodies at train stations and schools in terrorist attacks? If anything, the government is helping their economy and trying to lift them out of poverty."
It is unclear when the Shanghai police will complete their investigation and when filming of the new Netflix series will begin.
COMMENTS