As you've almost certainly heard by now, the news regarding Sony's The Dark Tower adaptation is not good. After over a year's worth of production woes and what's turning out to be a fairly venomous response from critics (the film's currently sitting at an oof-inducing 21% on Rotten Tomatoes), things are not looking good for Sony's would-be franchise. So much so, in fact, that it wouldn't seem crazy to think that the studio's long-in-development Dark Tower TV series is all but guaranteed to be quietly dropped and never spoken of again.
And yet...
"As the long-awaited feature film take on The Dark Tower is poised to open at the box office, the potential TV series is taking a big step forward.
Glen Mazzara (The Walking Dead) has been tapped to serve as showrunner on the TV adaptation of the ambitious Stephen King series. The TV take, envisioned as a straight-to-series project, is currently in its early stages and tapping a showrunner is the key first step."
That's The Hollywood Reporter insisting that, not only is the Dark Tower TV series not dead, but that it's also hired The Walking Dead's Glen Mazzara to be the series' showrunner. This is the same Dark Tower series which will allegedly be based on Wizard And Glass, and serve as a prequel to the film franchise. THR goes on to say that no network is yet attached to the production, but that cable networks and streaming services are being eyed for the job.
Will the Dark Tower TV show actually happen? It's honestly difficult to imagine, but I suppose it's not entirely outside the realm of possibility. Of course, this is what should've been done with the property in the first place (something I took pains to mention in my review of the film), and with that being the case one can't help but feel a faint glimmer of hope that someone might actually do it right this time. But given how poisonous the reaction to the film's been, this writer finds it difficult to imagine the studio shelling out the money for 10-13 more hours' worth of Dark Tower content at this time.
Guess we'll have to wait and see. What do you folks think? Likely to happen, or (as was suggested by our own Andrew Todd) does this entire enterprise fall apart once the opening weekend box office figures come in? Sound off below.