Amazon gives a "Go then, there are other shows than these" to its Dark Tower TV series
As the Stephen King TV adaptation machine gives, so, too, must it take-eth way: Hot on the heels of HBO’s The Outsider—one of the most critically well-received King TV projects in pretty much ever—Amazon has confirmed that it isn’t moving forward with a TV version of the author’s sprawling, Western-inflected omnibus The Dark Tower. Previously represented on the screen in a film version that asked the big, terrifying questions (like, “Who would win in a looking-bored contest between Idris Elba and Matthew McConaughey, two of the planet’s most charismatic men?”), the 7-book series is frequently held up as King’s magnum opus—although not for very long, because dang, these are some very heavy books.
The Dark Tower TV series was being developed under the watch of Glen Mazzara, whose credits include The Shield and a couple of the critical, post-Frank Darabont seasons of The Walking Dead. Amazon passed after viewing a pilot for the show, which would have starred Sam Strike as a young version of King’s cowboy-who-is-also-sort-of-a-time-traveling-Arthurian-knight Roland Deschain, apparently deeming it not up to snuff with all the material coming out of its other massive literary adaptations, like Wheel Of Time and especially The Lord Of The Rings.
Mazarra and his associates apparently intend to shop two scripts for the series—the ones that got them the Amazon pilot commitment in the first place—to other networks or streamers. Truly, then, ka is like a wheel, its only purpose to keep the string of meetings, deals, and other Hollywood detritus surrounding what would almost certainly be one extremely weird TV show going for as long as it possibly can.