Ron Howard to direct DARK TOWER movie trilogy and produce TV series

[Werthead]

Ron Howard, director of films such as The Da Vinci Code, Apollo 13 and A Beautiful Mind, has signed on to tackle a movie trilogy based on Stephen King's seven-volume Dark Tower sequence. According to the source, there is also the possibility of a spin-off television series being developed simultaneously.

The series, which sees a gunslinger named Roland making his way to the forbidding Dark Tower, is the unifying cosmological link between much of King's other work, although its sales have not been at the same level as his other, more stand-alone books. King is currently writing a new Dark Tower novel that falls earlier in the books' timeline.

J.J. Abrams and the writing team behind Lost, Carlton Cuse and Damon Lindelof, had previously discussed adapting the series as a seven-season TV series, but had changed their minds given the desire to have a break after the conclusion of the six-year Lost project.

 

[HoopyFrood]

Hmm, I'm always dubious when I hear of anyone attempting to recreate the series as a film.

It would be pretty cool if the films and the tv series kinda weave themselves together. It would be very King-esque if they did.

I think this is the kind of project a few people would be eager to sign up for and then find themselves with something so huge and potentially rather daunting. All the stuff with 19 and what the Tower represents, that it seems like one man's undying quest to reach the Tower but there's so much more to it...things like that would be difficult to reproduce on screen.

Still, books and films are different beats and there's no doubt that the story would make an epic film(s). It's a pity the seven-season tv series didn't take off, I think that would create the most faithful reproduction.

 

[Ursa major]

I'm confused as to how this will work.

• Will the trilogy encompass the whole story, while leaving large parts of it out, leaving the TV series to fill in the gaps? (Even typing this makes it sound really wierd and audience-repelling.)
• Will the trilogy form a triple pilot for the series, or perhaps a double pilot and a film to wind the series up?

Whichever way I look at this, it seems odd and almost bound to be unsatisfactory.

 

[xLORDSNOWx]

I wonder who he could find to play Detta Walker? Or would he just find a beautiful woman and digitally remove her legs. Obviously, later on they will have to have her with legs during toedash.

I was always curious how they would do this if a movie was to be created.

Would it be easier to:

1) Have an amputee and digitally add the legs during certain parts
2) Have a person with legs and digitally remove
3) Make it all digtal like Beouwulf

 

[nixie]

not sure about this, too much would be missed out.

 

[Steffi]

not sure about this, too much would be missed out.

you're right there but would be fascinating to see what they would do with it.

 

[Orionis]

Bringing the Dark Tower series to film or tv is such a hefty task. I know as a director I sure wouldn't want the burden/challenge because no matter what you do, it's going to disappoint a lot of people. That said, I personally think the only visual medium that could do it justice would be an all digital one.

 

[Rand]

Honestly, I don't think there was that much to the Dark Tower series that would make a screen adaptation difficult. There were certainly a lot of words used in the series, but I don't think that much happened, and many of the things that did happen could be shown in a twenty second scene segment even though King might have taken two pages to describe them.