You aren’t adding what is clearly implied in the novels. You are simply showing it.
And yes, The Magicians is certainly going in a direction that Lev Grossman didn’t do with great success by spicing it up.
Tor was a paperback publisher in the industry ca. 1990. Its most successful series in the 80s was The Black Company, which sold well within the genre’s audience – but not all that well compared to Thomas Covenant or Edding’s Belgariad, which were #1 NY Times Hardcover bestsellers. Del Rey fantasy dominated the late 70s and 80s. Wheel of Time was Tor’s first major series and moved them from a paperback publisher to hardcovers in a major way. And Del Rey was squeaky clean to the point of being obnoxious.
I think WoT could be done in a more adult way without the audience reacting negatively in any manner. It’s not like you would be trying to sex up The Belgariad (which really wouldn’t work). There is a difference, imo.
By nerf-realm, you mean it’s just kids’ stuff to you? It starts on a more Fellowship of the Ring innocence lost tale – but it doesn’t end that way. Not even close. Did you give up on the series? (I did until this time last year when I power listened through all of the series, start to finish via audio book in 4 months. It was much better than I had hoped; braid tugging and skirt-smoothing excepted). The conclusion was satisfying. Sanderson did a very good job with it.
Jordan was a very good writer and story-teller; his chief sin was that he gave the audience more of what it wanted. And in the 90s, what they wanted was more, more, MOAR. His series marked the beginning of what GRRM calls “fat fiction”. Jordan went too far with it and ultimately there was a backlash when he was clearly milking it. But that’s the magic of editing. You can get rid of that and still have more than enough for 7-10 years of TV if that’s what the audience wants.
GoT has been a social phenomena because it’s a #1 show not only in America, but abroad. It has found an audience. While it would be very difficult to do that again, being HBO and pouring money into Sunday night drama shows at 9:00 p.m. will earn you respectability and an audience come what may. As large as GoT? Probably not, but its not a stretch.
Whatever the case, we’ll see if this announcement of an announcement leads to something. One thing is sure though: HBO’s shareholders are going to be VERY nervous in about 2 months. Because at that point, they are looking at less than two years until the end of the tentpole around which the network is currently structured. And right now? They got nothing else of much consequence. (True Detective ain’t enough) They need something else in the wings – and badly.
I agree putting in sex scenes in The Belgariad wouldn’t work, but The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant had some pretty dark patches. I remember when I re-read the first book for a course in undergrad, a few people in the class said they couldn’t make it through.
I revisited Covenant lately and have tried to get into books 7-10. It’s hard going. Have not got there yet. Poor narrator has not made the audio consumption easier.
Covenant is an unlikeable protagonist through books 1-3, though I never had a problem with him. Today’s rape culture mantra would make that difficult of course. Mind you, its not like that is glossed over in the books. Its consequence becomes a central theme of the series.
But it’s the Tolkienesque elements which make it a hard sell. The Land would be difficult to show. Those same elements make WoT difficult, too I suppose. The Father-daughter stuff? That’s… a different matter.
Ultimately, the Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, the Unbeliever have not held up well over time. Some series are huge and remain huge as the years progress. Donaldson’s series has not managed to do that. Perhaps that should tell us all we need to know.
Yeah, I was impressed when GoT included the incest scene, and those were the bad guys. Imagine a show where the protagonist was a rapist? Not a chance.
I read the first Covenant book right after reading LotR for the first time. I wanted more big, epic fantasy and there were these colorful books sitting on the shelves, so I bought all three in 1978. And I hit that rape scene and put the book down until late in my freshman year. Made it to Revelstone and the story took off and I fell in love. A few years later my mom and I were at the mall and there was book 4, which I had no idea existed. Mom woke up later that night to go to the bathroom and caught me still awake on the couch, around 2-3am, reading that book. The 6th came out just a month or so prior to my high school graduation, right around the time Return of the Jedi and Police’s Synchronicity (in fact, I bought the book and vinyl during the same mall trip).
I read book 7 back in 2004 when it was released. I hated Donaldson’s prose and barely made it to the last page. The next book came out, picked it up, and made it only a few hundred pages in before quitting. Was playing Diablo 3 a few months ago, ran into someone whose account was named Melenkurion and asked it was a Covenant reference. He/she said yes, and that I was the first person in over a decade to recognize his online/gaming handle.
I’d much rather them secure the rights to do another series in the GoT universe. Go in the future or past, whatever they think works best and tell a new story but keep the general feel. Maybe go all the way back to the when the wall was new or something. There’s a ton of stories that can be told.
They announced some time back, that they were doing Asimovs Foundation series. Now, its been rather quiet about it since then, but that could presumably be a big one as well.
Man, this thread is a real flashback to my high school and college years. I gave up on WoT somewhere around book 6 or 7, after realizing I had just read a 1000 pages and nothing at all happened. The first few books though I really liked. Amber has been a sentimental favorite of mine forever, but Covenant was by far my favorite fantasy series for a long time - I read it at least three times in HS and to this day I’m convinced reading those helped my English SAT scores - but Of Memory, Sorrow and Thorn (by Tad Williams) eclipsed it. I’ve not read much of anything since then; I never read Martin and after watching the first episode of GoT had zero interest in it. (As an aside, ‘sexing up’ any fantasy series would instantly kill my interest. I’m not in HBO’s target demo audience apparently.)
It has been stuck in development hell forever unfortunately. It is probably difficult to film due to its style. The first book is basically an anthology and would probably be told best in serial format on someplace like HBO. Once they get to book 2 they could do a series of movies to cover the parts concerning the Mule and the aftermath of his appearance. I do hope they find a way to get this made, its one of my favorites from the golden age of sci fi.
Your comment reflects the reaction – and cut off point – of a very large portion of the readers of the series. It certainly was my experience, too. Even a cursory search of the Internet sees that same frustration, reason, and cut off point mentioned time and again. I expect the sales on the novel series have a very pronounced and marked decline after Book 6, to this day.
But for all that, as I did mention, it was about this time last year that I finished an epic listen through of all of the series, one after the other, via audio book. I finally picked up the series and progressed past the end of Book 6 for the first time. It proved to be a great overall experience and I was pleased that the series does evolve, move forward, and ultimately deliver. If you are at all inclined to revisit at some stage, it is worth it. Book Ten is the nadir of the series though, not much disagreement about that, even among the series’ most ardent fans. I am very happy I pushed through it though. It was worth it.
I finally just now saw those links upthread. Um, yeah. I mean, WoT was for a long time one of my favorite pastimes. I read the first book in the late eighties when I picked up a trade paperback at the Stars and Stripes bookstore on the Army base in Berlin. Was hooked immediately. And like many, around seven or so I fell away, and have, to my shame, never finished the series–a series that up to that point I read and reread. I, um, have read the first five or six books like five or six times. I like the world and characters far more than the stuff from Martin; I got to maybe book four there and bailed, as it was simply too dark for my tastes and too convoluted. One person’s gritty realism and engrossing detail is another person’s depressing morass of complexity, etc.
But sadly, yeah, anything on TV approaching the quality of GoT is a pipe dream I’m thinking, for all the reasons discussed here.
Whoa so it may finally be happening. I can easily imagine Hulu picking this up… I mean, Amazon would make a lot of sense since they can hawk the books as well (though remember when there was a huge dispute over ebooks of WoT). I don’t think Netflix would go for it honestly, though can’t put my finger on exactly why.
Oh wow, I read the first few books in college and then just … couldn’t hang, I guess? But I’d be on board to watch the show if it turns out decent. Still though, seems like this would be a budget nightmare, like on the order of Game of Thrones. Would hate to see them go bargain basement.
On the bright side, they won’t have any problems running out of books. They can do 20 seasons easily without deviating from the books. 20 very boring seasons.
