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Robert Jordan’s "The Wheel of Time" is Coming to the Small Screen

After more than a decade of waiting, it looks the tv adaptation of Robert Jordan’s epic The Wheel of Time series is finally moving forward.

Harriet McDougal, widow of author Robert Jordan, has announced on Google+ that last year’s legal problems have been resolved:

Wanted to share with you exciting news about The Wheel of Time. Legal issues have been resolved. The Wheel of Time will become a cutting edge TV series! I couldn’t be more pleased. Look for the official announcement coming soon from a major studio —Harriet

No additional details have been released.

The Wheel of Time is a series of 14 novels. Beginning with The Eye of the World, which was published in 1990, and ending with A Memory of Light, which was finished by Brandon Sanderson following Jordan’s death in 2007, the series follows the quest of the Dragon Reborn who has to unite the forces of good to stop The Dark One.

The series has been under negotiation or contract to one party or another since 2002, but the closest it has gotten to actual production was a horrible little pilot which was released last year.

Broadcast at 2am on the FXX cable network, the pilot was produced by Red Eagle Entertainment so that it could continue to hold on to the tv rights by extending a contract which was about to expire.

After MacDougal released a statement denying that Red Eagle had the tv rights, the studio filed a defamation lawsuit against MacDougal and "John Does 1 through 20" for slander and breach of contract.

That lawsuit has apparently been resolved, although no details have been released at this time.

TheWrap

 

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Comments


DavidW April 30, 2016 um 11:06 am

It’s The Eye of the World not the Eye of the Universe.

That description is also kind of not quite right. The Dragon Reborn is revealed very early on. The story is more about him uniting the various nations together to prepare for the last battle. He also has to reseal the Dark One’s prison.

Nate Hoffelder April 30, 2016 um 11:26 am

Fixed it, thanks.


DavidW May 1, 2016 um 10:36 am

I started reading the series when I was in high school. I finished it eight years after earning my PhD. While I ultimately thought it was worth the time investment, I still wonder how they are going to treat the middle volumes. There are thousands of pages in the middle of the series with almost no significant plot or character development. Also the novels have 2200 named characters (http://encyclopaedia-wot.org/).

I usually like movies and tv shows to be faithful to the source material. But in this case, I hope they are not. I hope they streamline the story without changing the major beats.

The only other fantasy series more difficult to adapt would be the Malazan Book of the Fallen (despite starting it’s life as a tv script!).

Nate Hoffelder May 1, 2016 um 12:29 pm

That’s one of the benefits of an adaptation; it lets them cut out the tedious dross.

For example, the tv series "The Magicians" throws out most of Lev Grossman’s novel and rewrites the story from scratch. And that is great because the novel is horrible. The plot is a disjointed collection of Chekov’s rifles which are never fired.

The tv series isn’t great, but it has its moments and is much better than the novel.


Greg Strandberg May 1, 2016 um 11:57 am

Not again. Anyone remember the disastrous TV pilot they had back in ’13 or ’14 or so? I barely do, and I’m glad you mention the lawsuit. Never heard of it being resolved. Hope you can give us more, or someone can.

All in all, I’ve been a bit turned off by this. Seems like HBO is the only one that could do it right anyways.

Nate Hoffelder May 1, 2016 um 12:05 pm

I asked about the lawsuit, but they aren’t talking.

Nate Hoffelder May 2, 2016 um 4:28 pm

I know of the pilot last year; was there an earlier one?


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