Joy for me. I am sitting at home tonight reading the 7th and final installment of Stephen King’s Dark Tower series lamenting the fact that I will be done with it in a couple of days when I find this!
http://www.slashfilm.com/2007/02/26/stephen-king-confirms-the-dark-tower-movie/
Very cool, but I doubt that the film will be anything remotely resembling the books.
Pity. There’s no way to satisfy the readers of the Dark Tower books with anything they can put on screen, and you know they won’t do 7 movies, so they’ll have to cram it all into a couple. On the Good/Bad scale of King movies, I fear these will sit on the Bad side.
Let me know what you think of the ending, by the way. It’s a doozy.
I have my fingers crossed on the movie. It seems he has had a lot tighter control over his movies in the later half of his career. This is his ultimate baby. I cant imagine that he will let someone screw them up. Obviously the movies will not live up to the books (few movies ever do). I figure it will get a Lord of the Rings treatment. i.e. the movie will follow the books, but a lot will be cut out so that it will have mass appeal. Die hard fans will be pissed, and those that read the books will almost certainly get more out of the movie than those that havent, but the movies will make sense without having to read the books. Of course I have been known to be wrong.
If when the movie(s) are made I will try to judge them on the merit of the movie and not try to compare the movies to the books (that path will almost certainly ruin the movie for me if you kennit.)
I was hoping HBO would do a series that would encompass all of the books. I don’t see any other way to include everything that is needed. I will see the movie; if they make one.
I think this may be the way for book seried from now on, especially for ones that seem to have ongoing plots. The Harry Potter books translate fairly well into movies on a book by book basis. Even though a lot of liberties were taken, Lord of the Rings was similar.
George R.R. Martin’s Song of Fire and Ice books supposedly are in the works as an HBO series. The more I think about it, the more I like the idea. There really is no reason that you would have to compromise much of the characters or storyline this way. It should be great.
While I haven’t read all of the Dark Tower books, I can see how they would be good as a series. Movies…well let’s just say I think Dark Tower fans will be as disappointed as Tolkien fans were.
Bernie
I’m not malcoda, but I LOVED the ending. Fabulous. Perfect.
Around about, oh, book V (was that Wolves of the Calla? I forget…) I started wanting to THROTTLE SK. I was like, dude, you are seriously wearing on me. When I got the final book, and was almost afraid to read it, I had been so annoyed with V and VI.
But oh, woe to me for doubing him VII was the perfect ending for that series. Rarely am I completely satisfied with the end of a book or series or movie (a notion that I was reminded of when reading The Eyre Affair ). The ending to the TV show Angel is one of the few times when I thought the ending was perfect. Book VII of the Dark Tower series was another. Absolute perfection.
Warning spoiler alert. I will keep it semi-vague for anyone who hasnt read the book, but you might be able to peice it together from what I am going to post.
Finished “Dark Tower” Monday night. I wanted a few days to let it all sink in. Roland’s end was fitting. I still cant decide if I like it or not but I can agree with it (and was definitely surprised by it), although it reminded me a lot of Prometheus or Sisyphus. I guess the ends don’t justify the means.
The next 2 paragraphs will almost definately give something away so if you dont want to know dont read this paragraph. I felt the Susannah, Eddie, and Jake ending was put there so that the reading would have a “happy ending.” I really don’t think it fit well especially since it was an alternate world with alternate Eddie and Jake.
Definate spoiler here. I was very disappointed that Roland’s 2 main enemies (Randal Flagg and the Crimson King) though out the entire series did not have a direct confrontation. Kind of anti-climatic for me.
Over all a very well done series. One thing I always did like is how he would write other novels and give you little glimpses of the Dark Tower Series, and in a couple of cases used charaters from other books (and at least one short story) in the Dark Tower.
Now that I have finished Dark Tower I think I need to go back and read Insomnia again.
Now that I have finished Dark Tower I think I need to go back and read Insomnia again.
I don’t think there was much in Insomnia, expect one charactor, that pertained to the DT. I also thought Insomnia was pretty slow, so I definately wouldn’t suggest re-reading it just for the DT correlation. Here is a graphic depiction of all of the King books that had references to the DT and the order in which they should be read:
Eh, I remember enjoying Insomnia, but not many specifics of the book so it wouldn’t bother me to read it again. Interesting flow chart. I am not familar with the T3 reference at the bottom. Or Derry for that matter (other than it is the town in which the some of the stories takes place). Is it a short story or a recently released novel? I would argue that the little sisters could be put anywhere in direct line with the Gunslinger series as it is a short story prequel to the gunslinger. Speaking of prequels there are a series of gunslinger comic books that came out earlier this year that depict Roland’s early years. Havent had a chance to read em yet though.
T3 is apparently an unwritten book:
*This is the name King and Straub jokingly use to refer to the third book in Jack Sawyer’s story. Straub has said that they have mapped out what happens to Jack in the third (and final) story, which takes place primarily in the Territories. However, there are no concrete plans for when (if) the book will be written. *
**
The Derry reference is just any book that ties back to the fictional Maine town of Derry.
Here is the webpage that the ‘‘roadmap’’ comes from: