Borderlands' OG characters are still "integral to the universe" and Randy Pitchford would be "thrilled" to see them in future games - but they're not in the movie because of Gearbox's Marvel problem

gamesradar.com:

Borderlands' boss has promised that fan favorite characters missing from the upcoming film adaptation are still "integral" to the series. 

Speaking to Gamesradar+, Gearbox Entertainment CEO and Borderlands lead Randy Pitchford explained that "it took a while" to find the heart of next month's blockbuster. "We took a lot of turns in the earliest development of this, but you can tell from the video games that Lilith is the centre of the universe," Pitchford says.

Opening on August 8, the Borderlands movie mainly follows Cate Blanchett's Lilith returning to her home planet to round up a ragtag group of familiar faces, including Kevin Hart's Rolan, Jack Black's Claptrap, and Tiny Tina. Despite the wide ensemble, Pitchford thinks people will agree that Lilith is at the heart of the franchise "with the work that we have in the future with the video games."

After four mainline shooters, two choose-your-own-adventure games, one fantasy spin-off, and an untraceable amount of expansions, the Borderlands roster is pretty massive at this point. But when asked about the absence of two major playable characters from the first game, Brick and Mordecai 'The Hunter', Pitchford blamed it on the challenge of "confining yourself to a movie that's not two hours long" with so much pre-existing source material.

"These video games are massive, taking tens of hours of content," Pitchford notes. "So we've created dozens and dozens and dozens of amazing characters that we love. And we want to find a place for all of them, and everyone has their favorites. And it's kind of like the same problem that Marvel has, right? How do you put everyone's favorite characters in one movie?"

Pitchford continues to say that Brick and Mordecai are "integral to the universe" and he'd "be thrilled beyond belief for them to be appearing in future Borderlands movies or video games."

Speaking of new games from the looter shooter giant, Randy Pitchford teased that Tiny Tina's Wonderland was so "wildly successful,"