KING'S "THE DARK TOWER" SCREEN ADAPTATION

[JOE SOAP]

The Dark Tower

I've never read it, I find King tends to lose himself in his big works and can't pull off good endings, but this has me intrigued. Ron Howard and Universal are to adapt King's magnum opus The Dark Tower as three feature films, the two sequel films will also be bridged by two TV series so they can squeeze all the story in. It could be a disaster, which is why they are granting such a huge project to a stable journeyman like Howard, but I only believe it will work if the story is strong enough.

Is the Dark Tower good enough for this treatment?


http://www.deadline.com/2010/09/universal-lands-stephen-kings-the-dark-tower-and-plans-unprecedented-featurenetwork-tv-adaptation/#more-65742

[the shutdown man]

Well it certainly needs something of that scale. There's a lot of story to get through. And sharing it between film and TV is an interesting idea. I'm not too worried about Ron howard (although he wouldn't have been my first choice), more Akiva Goldsman. He's written some good stuff, but then he also wrote Batman & Robin. Could go either way really.

[Bolt-01]

Shit- really? I kind of hope they lose this in development hell.

The Tower is my personal Favourite thing of Kings, and while it could be awesome- It won't match what is in my head.

[IAMTHESYSTEM]

I'll be looking forward to this.Yey!

[Richmond Clements]

My favourite series of books ever.
You're right, Bolt, in saying it'll never live up to what's in my head, but I'd love to see it on the screen.
My biggest worry is what they do when we get to books four and five and things start to cross over into his other books. Not to mention the fact that [spoiler]Stephen King [/spoiler] himself appears as a character in the later volumes...

[the shutdown man]

Not to mention the fact that [spoiler]Stephen King [/spoiler] himself appears as a character in the later volumes...

I'd actually be happy if they just left that out of the screen version. I like the way King cross-references his books, but that was a step too far.

[Keef Monkey]

Shit- really? I kind of hope they lose this in development hell.

The Tower is my personal Favourite thing of Kings, and while it could be awesome- It won't match what is in my head.

Kind of my feeling too. I think The Dark Tower is incredible, but I worry a lot of what seems really otherworldly and creepy/powerful/fully awesome on the page and in my head might not translate at all well to screen. Saying that, it won't hurt the books, I'll always have them so I am curious to see how it turns out.

[Richmond Clements]

Shit- really? I kind of hope they lose this in development hell.

The Tower is my personal Favourite thing of Kings, and while it could be awesome- It won't match what is in my head.

Kind of my feeling too. I think The Dark Tower is incredible, but I worry a lot of what seems really otherworldly and creepy/powerful/fully awesome on the page and in my head might not translate at all well to screen. Saying that, it won't hurt the books, I'll always have them so I am curious to see how it turns out.

I suppose it's how LotR fans felt about the movies before hand (and some may do so still).

But I'd love to see Jericho Hill, or Roland's duel with Cort, or the finale of Wolves...

[Hoagy]

Stephen King won't like it unless he is captain of production. And there's lots of emphasis on God and the Devil, that may work in books but translates in film as not being seen, as in woods for trees.

[Mardroid]

I'm really into the Dark Tower! I even get the prequel comics which, to be fair, are a mixed bunch, but not bad overall. I'd heard that a screen adaption was in the works and that J J Abrams originally going to do it... but pulled out.

I've often thought it would benefit better from a series than films due to the mass of material and the character development lends well to that, so it it's an interesting and brilliant idea that they're actually planning to combine both! And it looks like they're drawing from the comics too. The plot for those are largely written by Robin Furth (plotting) and Peter David (script) but it seems King came up with overall plot and has last say as to what goes in on an Executive Producer level.

I'm not keen on the phrase 'big star' when referring to the actor who will play Roland. I'd rather seen a talented up and comer than go that route.

I'm apprehensive how this will turn out... but rather excited too. [spoiler]I'd agree that they drop some of the metafiction stuff from the later books as that wouldn't translate well to screen, although it was interesting in the novels. (I have mixed feelings about King becoming a character. It WAS intriguing though, and I understand what he was going for. )[/spoiler]

[Goaty]

It's back on, er.. again.

http://www.empireonline.com/news/story.asp?NID=33392

[brendan1]

Hmmmm. I'm not sure about this. I suppose my main concern is the source material itself. I'm a big King fan, but I spread the reading of this series out for as long as I could, which is never a good sign.

I slogged through all six (or was it seven?) books, but "Song Of Susannah" almost finished me off; mind-bendingly dull, with all the fucking claptrap about her fucking "chap". Fuck off.

I do accept that as a series it had some fantastic set-pieces, and great ideas, and nothing King writes could ever be dull or uninteresting for very long - even the appalling "Susannah" book had its moments - but there are too many niggling irritations, which I shall list in no particular order:

1) Derivative to the extreme. To the point where King doesn't even bother to change the name of "Mordred". There's nothing here that hasn't been seen before in dozens of other stories and books. Unfortunately, here they are presented all at once, and none of it makes any fucking sense.

2) Unappealing, cut-out characters. Susannah and the other kid whose name I can't remember were boring stereotypes, to the point that a semi-intelligent raccoon creature was the most interesting member of the group. And some of the dialogue King puts into the mouth of Susannah - when she's channeling the bad-ass Southern bitch - could bring a tear to a glass eye.

3) Utterly tedious hero. Roland is entirely humourless. And when he does that shit "commala-cum-cum" risible dance thing, I was going red just reading it. The only interesting thing about him (apart from the fact that he's a cross between Clint Eastwood and, you guessed it, Stephen King) is the fact that he's got arthritis in his hands/ legfs/ sides/ back/ wherever. Which the cunt NEVER stops going on about, while rubbing ointment into various parts of his body.

4) Possibly the self-indulgent series of books ever written. And I'm including "Lunar Park" by Bret Easton Ellis in that. He writes it totally for himself. A 12 year old version of himself. And then puts himself IN the books, in some of the most toe-curlingly embarassing prose ever committed to paper. To make things worse, King's self-regard reaches such cyclopean heights, he decides to tie up his entire back catalogue of books into this rag-bag universe, and in doing so, ruins the memory of most of them for the reader.

5) The ham-fisted attempts at poetry and literary gravitas. Some of the chapter intros made me laugh out loud.

6) Shit names. Roland? Cuthbert? Fucking hell. Fuck OFF.

That said, I still enjoyed quite a bit of it.

[Mudcrab]

Interested by this. Been keen on the idea of the books, but got far too many other things I want to read to ever get round to it.

[Heath C Ackley]

I loved the Dark Tower except for Wizards and Glass which I thought was absolute dung.

During the eighties I was the Constant Reader and it was through King, who suggested that budding authors should consider working in the comics industry, that I turned to my favourite comic.

I hope the films will retain the abstract feel of the novels, especially the first two installments.

The TV series sounds a good idea. I remember the Salem's Lot TV movie with David Soul which - if memory serves me well - was quite well received at the time. Probably looks a bit dated now though.

[JOE SOAP]

I hope they use the money for something better...like another 2000AD film.