As if reading about Joe Abercrombie trying his hand at a trilogy for younger readers wasn’t exciting enough, Deadline has today announced that 20th Century Fox (you know, those big movie people) have decided to press ahead with a Kingkiller Chronicles television series.
Personally, I think this is just the start of popular fantasy novels being turned into television series – and rightly so. I think, in the past, the lack of technology, the belief that a fantasy series could not attract a mass audience, and numerous flops of those that were attempted held studios back from investing big in adaptations of our favourite novels. But with Game of Thrones kicking arse all over the world, it makes sense that other popular series will get the nod as well.
So far all we know is that the show will begin with Name of the Wind and follow up with the next two books of the series. Will it be one series? Will it be three series, will it be more? We don’t know, but it’s all very exciting!
My single hesitation is that knowing how much of a perfectionist Rothfuss is (from reading interviews and such), I would expect he’d want to be very, very involved in it and, if so, that could only delay book three even further, right?
Wondering how the series will be adapted? Well, it seems brief, but in my opinion the summary of the series gives away quite a lot about Deadlines’s take on the upcoming show:
New Regency Productions and 20th Century Fox Television have optioned Patrick Rothfuss’ fantasy trilogy The Kingkiller Chronicle to develop into a drama series. Eric Heisserer (Hours, The Thing) is attached to adapt the series and will exec produce. Arnon Milchan, Andrew Plotkin, Brad Weston and Robert Lawrence (Die Hard With A Vengeance) also serve as exec producers.
Set in a compelling world where the sharpest minds can master magic, The Kingkiller Chronicles tells the story of Kvothe, a streetwise young man who hopes to one day hunt down the mysterious group that murdered his family.
To me, it sounds like they are going for dark. Seeing as how popular GoT has been, why wouldn’t they? The words ‘revenge’, ‘sharpest minds’ and ‘streetwise’ certainly back this up. In the books, the ‘mysterious group’ that killed Kvothes family actually takes a backseat. However it seems that the television show thinks this is one of the most important aspects of the show.
Notice too that there is no mention of the university, which is at first surprising. Perhaps this is a sign that the studio will be trying to keep away from the Harry Potter label that would certainly come with any mention of a school for wizards!
I honestly can’t wait to see what they do with the series. What do you guys think?
Richard Marpole
Jennie Ivins
I knew Pat said something big was coming soon, but this is awesome! I wonder if they’ll insert new story arcs. I really hope they won’t make it into a Game Of Thrones T.V. copy, because the charm of the KKC is, I think, totally different. Far more traditional in it’s style, with that air of magic and wonder suffusing it. It is a story of one boy’s wanderlust at it’s essence. And that must be preserved.
I think this sounds great. Anyone know when it’ll begin filming? And any idea when it’ll air? Not for at least a couple of years I would imagine.
Just a word of caution: books get optioned for TV and film all the time. It’s a LOOOOOOOOOOONG way from optioning to season premiere. But, I’m sure I’m not the only fan who is willing to wait for the right cast, the right crew, the right budget, etc. And if Rothfuss is involved, we may indeed have a wait on our hands, ha.
It’s only been optioned. That doesn’t mean anything as plenty of shows and movies have been optioned before yet never even entered production.
As a huge Rothfuss fan, I can only hope that this will be as awesome as his books. However, I’m not entirely sure that we’ll be seeing this in the near future. I do note that the word used is not “in development”, but “optioned”. Optioning popular books for movies or TV happens a lot, and rarely do we see them actually hit the big screen, or the airwaves.
I have my fingers crossed. But I’m not holding my breath.
A GOT copy would deviate way too much from the KKC; KKC is heaps of fun, dark in places but not oppressive like GOT is. Totally different story; it would be sacrilege to make it be anything other than Name of the Wind. But I guess it’s okay if they turn up the dark. Maybe.
Sounds more solid than most options to me though – to name so many people involved and to discuss it so openly is quite exciting. As you say though, a lot of books are options: I believe Myke Cole, Mark Lawrence, Peter V. Brett etc are all optioned currently?
Awesome. And so the “Who will play Kvothe?” games begin……. Rothfuss has not said anything about it though?
I’m going to echo what others have said here about the “optioned” part, but with the success of GoT, I do hope that means we’re more likely to see great works of fantasy adapted to the big or small screen. As for Rothfuss being involved and potentially further delaying Book 3, well, that certainly might happen but any success might stir the creative juices and push him to get the full story out before the show catches up.
Book first please Rothfuss! Else we will be waiting for 2 elements of your work to be finished!
We’re waiting for that since 2013