Has The Dark Tower series gained the dream writer?
We’ve known for a while now that Haunting of Hill House’s Mike Flanagan has been developing a Dark Tower series based on the work of the man who was at one time one of the greatest writers in the world, Stephen King and that it was planned to cover King’s entire saga and may well be released as a TV series and possibly a movie or two.
Flanagan, a self-confessed Stephen King worshipper, has wanted to make the series for years and has been developing it ever since the terrible movie adaptation came out in 2017 but now, at the Fantastic Fest preview of The Monkey which is based on one of King’s short stories, King was asked if he would be contributing to the series at all and his reply was pretty exciting: “All I can say is it’s happening. I am writing stuff now and I think that’s all I want to say because the next thing you know, I’ll stir up a bunch of stuff I don’t necessarily want to stir up yet. I’m in process right now, and to say too much feels like a jinx.”
Exciting stuff, right?
Well, maybe not because, confusingly, King shortly took to social media to shoot down any such rumours, which, em, he stated himself, saying: “Contrary to the Internet (which usually is never wrong), I am NOT writing for Mike Flanagan’s Dark Tower.”
Em… ok…
In recent months King has spoken about Flanagan’s development of the Dark Tower series and seems very, very happy indeed, saying: “I’ve seen screenplays and pitches. He starts where he should start. The beats are perfect. They’re just perfect.”
Amazon has started filming its Dark Tower series and Michael Rooker has joined the cast
So is he writing on it? Well, it’s hard to know, but if I were a betting man, I’d say yes, he is. One of the things that they attempted to do with the movie was a sequel/ending to the Dark Tower story – if you’ve read them, you understand, if not, I’m not spoiling it – and I’d not be shocked if he tried to do that here too. My only concern is that in recent years, King has lost a lot of the nuance he had as a writer and spends long periods ranting about politics and Donald Trump, so hopefully, if he can focus on the Dark Tower, it would be a great addition to Flanagan’s project. However, it wouldn’t surprise me if the Crimson King was now a bit more orange.
Thoughts? I know you have them, let me know…
Sources: Slashfilm, IGN and Bluesky
Marc
Marc is a self-confessed nerd. Ever since seeing Star Wars for the first time around 1979 he’s been an unapologetic fan of the Wars and still believes, with Clone Wars and now Underworld, we are yet to see the best Star Wars. He’s a dad of two who now doesn’t have the time (or money) to collect the amount of toys, comics, movies and books he once did, much to the relief of his long-suffering wife. In the real world he’s a graphic designer. He started Following the Nerd because he was tired of searching a million sites every day for all the best news that he loves and decided to create one place where you can go to get the whole lot. Secretly he longs to be sitting in the cockpit of his YT-1300 Corellian Transport ship with his co-pilot Chewie, roaming the universe, waiting for his next big adventure, but feels just at home watching cartoons with his kids….
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