If you came for Harry Potter, it's at the bottom of the page. But feel free to skim these other news items first.
Neil Gaiman's graphic novel, The Sandman has been slated for development as a movie for quite some time. However, it has repeatedly gotten nowhere due to the lack of even halfway decent scripts. Also, the story is so expansive and inclusive, a movie probably could never do it justice. The Sandman is a story mostly about Morpheus, who is basically the god of dreaming. I still need to consult my local nerds on more info about the plot of the graphic novel, but it is considered one of the greatest ever created. More recently, HBO looked interested in creating a series with The Sandman as source material. However, the most recent development has Warner Brothers making a strong push for Eric Kripke, creator of Supernatural, to be show runner and executive producer on a series using The Sandman. While nothing has been confirmed, Kripke has expressed cautious interest in the material, but has treaded carefully due to the fact that the source material is so beloved and would be so scrutinized. As a fan of early Supernatural, and as someone incredibly curious about anything comics, magic, sci-fi, or fantasy related, this definitely gets me interested.
Marc Guggenheim, creator of Eli Stone, has a project in development at ABC. He has gotten a script commitment. The series would follow the White House Office of Crisis Management. This would be an event-type series, following one large global disaster per season.The first season would be concerned with a problem on the International Space Station.
Steven Spielberg. Joe Hill. Alex Kurtzman. Roberto Orci. They're lining up for this one, an adaptation of Joe Hill's(son of Stephen King) comic book, Locke and Key. Spielberg and Kurtzman are overseeing the development. According to Deadline.com, the project will be written and run by Josh Friedman, creator of Terminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles. Locke and Key follows the Locke children after their father is brutally murdered by a high school student. They move to an island mansion, where they discover magic keys and doorways, which are simultaneously being sought out by an evil creature from their past. Sounds like a promising project to me!
Oren Peli(of Paranormal Activity fame) and Michael Perry(of Law and Order: SVU fame) have teamed up to co-write a pilot currently entitled The River. The pilot will apparently be done in similar format to the "found footage" style of films like Paranormal Activity, The Blair Witch Project, and Cloverfield. The story is set on the Amazon River, where a famous reporter goes missing and is presumed dead. The heart of the story will pick up when a group of friends and researchers set out to look for him. Needless to say, the Amazon River isn't exactly a pleasant place, so I think it sounds pretty unnerving. Especially with Peli at the helm. Currently, ABC is leading the pack to pick up this pilot. According to Deadline.com, they are apparently pretty close to a deal.
Elizabeth Sarnoff and J.J. Abrams are pitching a pilot episode they co-penned about the famous island prison, Alcatraz. Not much is known about the pilot, other than that it's a drama. You may have seen Sarnoff's work if you liked Lost, as she rose to the position of Executive Producer for the final season. She wrote 19 episodes for the show. Abrams has recently written the pilots for shows such as Alias, Lost, Fringe, Felicity, What About Brian, Six Degrees, and the upcoming Undercovers. What's most interesting to me is the fact that Abrams isn't teaming up with one of his usual writer buddies. Perhaps he's found a new writer in Sarnoff that he's willing to work with. We could be in for something new here. I'm curious whether we'll see any of the supernatural tendencies from Fringe or Lost, or if they're attempting a straight drama. Either way, as you can tell by that list of shows, keep your eye on this one: Abrams tends to do well for himself.
Also according to Deadline.com, Anthony Zuiker, creator of all three CSI programs, is in the process of developing a spin-off of Robert Ludlum's Jason Bourne Series for CBS. The current title of the pilot is Treadstone, which in both the novels and the films is used as the program name for United States' Black Ops. What is intriguing to me is the difference between the novels and the books on the characteristics of Treadstone. In the movies, the organization is villainized and is largely seen as wrong or evil. However, in the books, they are mostly depicted as heroic. I'm curious as to which interpretation Mr. Zuiker will take. In addition to interpretation, I'm curious as to the characters we will be following, and if, in fact, Mr. Zuiker can create anything original after such a long period milking his success from CSI. As a huge fan of the Bourne franchise, I'm certainly hoping he can do it justice. John Glenn, writer of The Lazarus Project and Eagle Eye, is writing the pilot.
And finally, in a move sure to give geeks worldwide wet dreams, Battlestar Gallactica's Ronald D. Moore has signed a deal with NBC to develop a drama that Moore described as an "adult Harry Potter police procedural"... Well folks, I'm sorry if that was anti-climactic. While I probably share in the blame, I think perhaps that it is a mistake on Mr. Moore's part to announce his project by immediately comparing it with the most popular and beloved novel series ever. Also, "police procedural" doesn't sound very Potter-esque to me. In fact, the world kind of sounds like The Dresden Files, a show that you probably missed on the Sci-Fi network. On the show, a man used magic to solve cases. It was less than thrilling. In fact, it felt like cheating. Still, anything involving Mr. Moore is something worth paying attention to. While I personally am loathe to acknowledge Battlestar Gallactica as an even halfway decent show, I will give him the nod for being personally responsible for some great shows long before Gallactica came along. With Star Trek: TNG and DS9, Roswell, and the always underrated Carnivale under his belt, he is someone who clearly knows what he's doing. Something we can count on in this show is certainly an overly powerful force in control of the universe he creates, and a smaller, plucky force fighting for relevance. We can also count on quite a few religious overtones, as Ronald loves few things more than a good metaphor for religions or cults. Still, I doubt that, however interesting or compelling this project becomes, it will ever have much in common with Harry Potter. Just sayin.
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