J.J. Abrams Not Adapting King's 'Dark Tower' Series

Well, since Frank Darabont (The Shawshank Redemption, The Green Mile, The Mist) has the unenviable task of adapting The Long Walk, and since he has begged King to let him take a stab at it... I say let him. He's deft at being faithful (and The Long Walk will be faithfully dreary) to King's central cinematic elements.

I'm bummed by the news, though. Understandably bummed.

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I really wanted to see Damon do the writing for The Dark Tower, but I understand after 6 years on Lost, why he has declined. I think this is especially the case because the best place for the series is on TV. Each book a season, each season could be ten or so episodes, on a network like HBO or Showtime. The series has too many die hard fans to try to cut them down to 2 1/2 hour movies. Someone would have to be in it for the long haul, to do a fantasy series with the production values of a show like The Tudors.

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It does suck that Damon, Carlton, and JJ will not be doing the DT. I do agree that a television series would be best - but only on cable! Only on cable can a mythology heavy story be told. Network executives ruin shows by demanding stand alone episodes, and when it comes to myth heavy shows, that just ruins it (for me at least).

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I don't think the book series should be put on film at all. I loved the books. I'll say it again: I loved the books. but the whole story is so steeped in meta-fiction and themes that wouldnt translate that I think even if they made The gunslinger into an amazing movie, it would ultimately fail to garner the response the books have and thus leave us with one or two good dark tower movies and 5 Brett Ratner abortions.

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I'm truly saddened that they chose not to do it. I have high hopes in them after seeing Star Trek and being a Lost fan. The series is amazing, but incredibly hard to develop into a movie. Still, these two could have done it justice.

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I would love to see an adaptation, as long as it took liberties with the story. A straight copy and paste wouldn't work, for reasons already stated. I figure it's bound to happen sooner or later and hopefully who ever gets it is someone who cares about it and has the ability to nail the unique tone of the series. Like Darabont. Or maybe Abrams and Lindelof will come back to it in a few years after they get Star Trek and LOST out of their systems. Either way.

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This is kind of a bummer. Hopefully King will let Darabont take a stab at it, as far as I'm concerned he's by far the best King adapter (The Mist was epic). I think The Dark Tower would best be served on a premium cable channel. I doubt there is a studio out there willing to finance such a big undertaking to make that many movies, considering how poorly Stephen King adaptations usually turn out. It seems to me the problem with trying to make movies is just the vastness of the DT universe and how much can they cut and still make the story coherent. Also with the books being so "adult" meaning hard R, there's no way would they make movies that aren't PG-13. But a serial on HBO seems a lot more plausible, they could probably do The Gunslinger in like 2 or 3 episodes. Of course as a Tower junkie I would love to see an ultra faithful adaptation but it doesn't seem possible with movies. Maybe in 4-5 seasons of 10 eps they could cram it all in there. Of course like everything else on HBO not named The Sopranos it would probably just be canceled before it finished, which would be worse than to just not do it at all.
On a side note does anyone else think Rutina Wesley (Tara from HBO's True Blood) would make a perfect Susannah? Every time I watched her in TB I pictured her in a wheelchair screaming at Roland and Eddie.

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don't do it, i dispise most movie versions of old novel series like "Dark Tower", this will end up bein another hollywood screw up like Harry Potter/the Stand/It/Twilight/Neverending Story/Sherlock Holmes/the Godfather/and yes even all you geek's Lord of the Rings which sucked balls for all you who DID read the books..... theres no way to clear all rights and keep all elements of the books we love.. more thang likelly we'll end up gettin a tv versions wit Lost stars playing lead roles which dont convey Roland at all and there will end up being a disgusting romance between him and Susannah

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The USA Today interview you ascribe to Abrams is actually an interview with Lindelof:

http://content.usatoday.com/communities/popcandy/post/2009/10/a-lost-qa-damon-lindelof-tackles-your-questions/1

It's Lindelof who says:

"After working six years on 'Lost,' the last thing I want to do is spend the next seven years adapting one of my favorite books of all time. I'm such a massive Stephen King fan that I'm terrified of screwing it up. I'd do anything to see those movies written by someone else. My guess is they will get made because they're so incredible. But not by me."

TVSquad started the incorrect quote.

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Darabont should be the only one allowed to do King adaptations. He seems to be the only one who gets King. This series should not be adapted for the big screen. Too much material would have to be left out. This should be done as a series on HBO. Each season could cover one book of the series.

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Oh. And it should be animated. Too many elements would be too difficult in live action. (e.g. Roland's fingers, Susannah's legs, Jake's age and Eddie's appearance over the course of the series).

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A miniseries would probably be the best way to go, but I agree regarding the budget. I'd hate to see it turn into something like "The Stand," which should have been awesome but instead just felt like TV.

All in all, though, I'm not sure the "Dark Tower" should be adapted at all. I don't see how the ending, or most of the last book, would even make sense on screen.

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HBO series would be the way to go, find a way to get David Milch to produce, Frank Darabont to write and Tarsem Singh to direct and you could possibly end up with the best King story ever put on film.

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Abrams no. Cuse/Lindlof yes. Darabont yes. Very few people adapt King well in my opinion. I wonder how it would be done successfully in movie form, however? That's quite a task.

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it should be an anime series on HBO

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It should be on HBO or Showtime as a series. That'd make more sense.

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the books are amazing, everyone of them. i even read the graphic novels, which i never read on before.

if it was made at all, it should not be animated, definitely not an anime. that would be a big disappointment and i wouldn't even watch it

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