Yeah, That Might've Had Something To Do With It

[filkertom]

The Tolkien Estate has settled with New Line Cinema regarding unpaid royalties. Beyond insane is this quote from the statement of Alan Horn, Warner Bros. president and CEO:

We deeply value the contributions of the Tolkien novels to the success of our films....

Gee, good to know that you deeply value the contributions of the fucking novels you adapted, without which your movies wouldn't exist.

Which fantasy epics would you like to see properly adapted? I'm for The Chronicles of Prydain by Lloyd Alexander, The Sharing Knife by Lois McMaster Bujold, The Stepsister Scheme by jimhines, Temeraire by naominovik, and Eyes of the Dragon by Stephen King.

Comments

[ororo]

Guy Gavriel Kay's A Song for Arbonne. Or Tigana. The Lions of Al-Rassan was supposedly in production, but I haven't heard anything.

[peachtales.livejournal.com]

Oooh, definitely the Stepsistesr Scheme! Can't think of anything else right now.

[lizziecrowe.livejournal.com]

The Chronicles of Prydain, definitely!

[lapislaz.livejournal.com]

If I recall correctly, the Temeraire novels have already been optioned - by Peter Jackson.

[lariss.livejournal.com]

I, for one, would still like to see the Tolkien work correctly done. I can't ask for better cinematography than Peter did, but they effed the storyline almost completely from the 2nd book onward.

[ellyssian.livejournal.com]

Yes.

I still want to see Michael Wincott in the role of Aragorn.

I'd also like to see the Prydain stories done right, but I think anyone redoing those would either make it too sappy or too dark. They'd always try to improve the story without realizing that it worked right the first time.

[twfarlan.livejournal.com]

Well, "properly" adapted, the first two Dragonlance trilogies will always be wishful thinking on my part. I haven't heard good things about the animated adaption from a couple of years ago, so I am not heartened.

Aside from that, Robert Asprin's Myth series could make for a grand animated film or even series, while Thieves' World could make an excellent series of live-action films.

I would be greatly amiss if I neglected to mention the tales of a certain pair who found themselves in Lankhmar, or even a rogue who began as a beggar behind the walls in Greyhawk...

[filkertom.livejournal.com]

I could really get behind an animated adaptation of MythAdventures, Phil Foglio's adaptation of Another Fine Myth.

[sdelmonte]

Eyes of the Dragon, definitely.

Maybe the Mistborn books, since the writing is very much cinematic to begin with.

[jimhines.livejournal.com]

E. E. Knight's Vampire Earth series could make kick-ass movies if done right. Same thing for Tobias Buckell's series (Crystal Rain et al.)

[fair-witness.livejournal.com]

The Deed of Paksenarrion.

[oelier.livejournal.com]

hear hear!

[ravenclaw-eric.livejournal.com]

The Chronicles of Prydain, for sure. Lois Bujold's first two Chalion books. I'm looking forward to HBO's Song of Ice and Fire series, although I'll probably have to wait for it on DVD.

[mdyesowitch.livejournal.com]

I'd like to see The Three Musketeers chronicles done as a mini-series and same again for the James Bond stories. LOVE the stories.

[smoooom.livejournal.com]

I'm so tired of Book Adaptations that I could throw up.

[cathain.livejournal.com]

PROPERLY adapted? Susan Cooper's series. What they did to that was beyond butchery.

[redaxe.livejournal.com]

Amen. You took the words right out of my mouth.

[trektone.livejournal.com]

I'd settle for a properly adapted non-epic fantasy, actually. Anyway ...


Patricia McKillip's Riddle-Master sequence

John Crowley's Little, Big

Tanith Lee's Flat Earth sequence

Samuel Delany's Neveryon sequence

Clive Barker's Imajica

[ladymondegreen.livejournal.com]

Definitely agree on the first two. I haven't read the others, but I'm going to now. :)

I'd also add A Winter's Tale by Mark Helprin.

[technoshaman.livejournal.com]

it's not precisely fantasy, but I'd love to see'em start doing to Dave Weber's Honorverse what the BBC did to the whole Horatio Hornblower series. Excellent stuff. And with modern FX, doing a multi-hundred-element space battle wouldn't be all that expensive; Netter Digital already did the groundbreaking.

Oh, and if you *really* want to go first class with it? Get JMS.

The real trick will be editing them down....

Could also go with the Elizabeth Moon books on the Serranos and friends....

[allandaros.livejournal.com]

Heh, funny you should mention JMS; from what I've seen, Claudia Christian is the one person most often tapped as the ideal casting for Honor Harrington.

[wildcard9.livejournal.com]

I would love to see the first Riftwar series by Raymond E. Feist made into a series of movies. It was written as a trilogy of sequential stories, so it can be filmed and released that way as well.

[allandaros.livejournal.com]

Riftwar would make a good miniseries, I think.

[misterseth.livejournal.com]

I'd lik to see Ushurak, by the Hildebrandt bros, and Elfquest, by Wendy and Richard Pini.

[redaxe.livejournal.com]

Susan Cooper's The Dark is Rising. Yes, I know there was the abomination that claimed to be an adaptation; it was almost as much of one as I, Robot was of its original.

It's not an epic, but a series, but Glen Cook's Garrett, PI, books, would be awesome if done right.

And I'm looking forward to Rick Riordan's Percy Jackson and the Olympians being done (starting with next year's The Lightning Thief), though with great trepidation over Chris Dammit Columbus directing.

[jenrose]

OMG, "The Seeker" was SOOOOO BAD. I wanted to cry when I realized that might put the kibbosh on a "real" adaptation.

[allandaros.livejournal.com]

I would say the Malazan Book of the Fallen, but I don't think anything could do justice to that.

I will instead nominate Steven Brust's Jhereg series, Jim Butcher's Dresden Files (proper adaptation, mind you!), and Scott Lynch's Lies of Locke Lamora.

[ravenclaw-eric.livejournal.com]

I'll second Lies of Locke Lamora.

A miniseries adaptation of the Thieves' World shared universe might be a lot of fun, too.

[zellion.livejournal.com]

Properly adapted... ah, there's the rub.

I have this bee in my bonnet to see Kushiel's Dart made into a mini series. I was thinking a movie, but it couldn't be done properly as a movie. No, to correctly include sex, violence, period costumes and good acting it would need to be done as an HBO miniseries. They've proven with things like Tudors and Rome that they have an audience for the historical-ish kind of stuff, with lost of sex and pretty costumes. Yes, I think it would go over very well.

I just need to convince Ms. Carey and HBO to get together!

[filkertom.livejournal.com]

More like a Showtime miniseries, methinks, but, yeah.

[jenrose]

Sydney Van Scyoc's Darkchild trilogy, without question.

Just about anything by Tamora Pierce

Anne McCaffrey's stuff. *sobs at how many times DR has been optioned and failsauced*

I want to see Robert Jordan's unfinished series done in 30 seconds with bunnies.

Jane Yolen, both Pit Dragon and Sister Light/Sister Dark.

Heinlein's Past Through Tomorrow (which gathers all the short stories and short novels up through about 1967) series... which stops nicely before the point at which he went batshit crazy about sex. (I'm not a prude, and I don't mind polygamy, but I draw the line at incest, which he does not.)

Oh, and how could I forget...

GOOD OMENS. Omg, this would be the BEST movie, but would almost have to be directed by Terry Gilliam.

And of course, Elizabeth Moon... the one I REALLY REALLY want to see is Remnent Population. Speed of Dark would be interesting too.

I'd like to see a version of Incarnations of Immortality in which every character was not a Mary Sue.

[sarekofvulcan.livejournal.com]

dduane has posted a couple of scenes from her screenplay for "So You Want to Be a Wizard". The first one (I think) is here.

[lovefromgirl.livejournal.com]

I've always fancied adapting Tamora Pierce's Immortals series.

[edit: Or another Lloyd Alexander -- the Westmark Trilogy! Oooh, could have some fun there...]

[bayushisan.livejournal.com]

Chronicles. Of. Prydain.

With absolutely ZERO involvement from Disney please. *grumbles*

[full-metal-ox.livejournal.com]

A member of my anime club has a term for Tolkien's and J.K. Rowling's refusal to let Disney come anywhere near their work: "restraining orders against the Mouse."

[batyatoon]

As my other half said above, Mistborn could be an amazing movie series if adapted well.

And oh I would LOVE to see a good Temeraire adaptation.

In terms of children's fantasy ... Ronia the Robber's Daughter could be really nice. Also the rest of the Narnia series, including Prince Caspian done RIGHT. (Note: I haven't seen that one, largely because to my mind "done right" includes keeping your child hero a child and not aging him to frelling seventeen.)

[jenrose]

The movie was pretty good.

[secoia.livejournal.com]

I keep threatening to write Shards of Honor The Musical.
Buuut, my friends probably wouldn't help much, so it would either be a one-woman show, or done with PUPPETS! Either way, not the best adaptation.

[dan-ad-nauseam.livejournal.com]

For a while on the Bujold list, there was discussion of whether The Mountains of Mourning would work as opera.

I think it would require developing Lem as a character.