devilshalo

auto

Cool poster.

LorenzoL

I loved the first few books and I'm not sure what I think about this movie but that poster is awesome.

Michael Corvin

Wow, great poster.

Troy Stiffler

Neat poster.

King movies are hit and miss.

I have no idea what The Dark Tower is about (other than that it contains world-building references from various King books, MCU style ... I think).

I hope $60M was enough to do this right. That's a modest budget these days.

Looking forward to the trailer.

Rob V

I'm hoping for the best but I'm not sure how a two hour movie can do such an epic series justice. I gave 3 years to those books...

Jay G.

This movie isn't intended to cover the whole book series. There's plans for a companion TV series, and sequel films, assuming this film is successful.

Troy Stiffler

I could be wrong - but the director said this is a sequel to the books. I guess there's a "reset" or "reboot" button built into the end of the book. I assume it's something like 'history repeats itself'? And this is a new story.

james2025a

No offense, but that's not a guess. I have not read the books but even I seem to have recalled there is a certain item in the books which allows the story to loop back on itself, and I think the gunslinger in the movie might begin with it in his possession. But what I am saying is that there is no way on earth just by a poster, that quote and the very few tidbits of info that have come out about the film that you could make that assumption without already reading a more detailed synopsis on the book or other threads discussing the books/movie.

I have a feeling this will end up being a disaster. One of those stories where I think it's all in or don't bother at all. Going cheap on a large scale story does not bode well.

Jay G.

It's a bit of a shame that particular detail is getting so much press since it spoils a bit of the end of the book series, but basically there's an in-universe explanation why the movie will be "the same, but different," in regards to the plot for the books. "There are other worlds than these," and all that.

My understanding is that the TV series is supposed to deal primarily with the "Young Roland" stories that were in Books 1, 4, and 8, and have been expanded on in the comics. This movie is mostly an adaptation of Book 1, although it has elements of book 3 in it. I expect they'll make film sequels using the other books, if this one is successful.

Jay G.

What do you feel is the "going cheap" part of the adaptation? The budget for this film? Or the fact that they haven't committed to the sequel films or TV series yet?

pinata242

The book series ended 13 years ago. When is the ending of that no longer a spoiler adaptation discussion?

Geofferson

I'm glad they're not attempting to cram the story from the books into the movie - that would be a disaster. Too bad they didn't secure budget to film the sequels in parallel, LOTR style.

Jay G.

IMHO: When everyone has read the books, i.e. never.

For example, a lot of people avoided spoilers for Game of Thrones while watching the TV show, even though "The Red Wedding" had been published in a book 13 years before it showed up on TV.

Also, the last book in the series was released 5 years ago, and the comics are ongoing, although you're correct that the "ending" was published 13 years ago.

pinata242

Okay, but the "movie as sequel" has been in this very thread before.

Jay G.

LOTR is pretty unique in having all 3 films greenlit at once. Aside from it and The Hobbit, which started out as 2 films, I don't think any other film series has had more than 2 films greenlit and filmed at once. Even Harry Potter went one film at a time until near the end, although they managed a tight turnaround time on those.

It's a huge upfront investment, and if the first film bombs, the studio would be left on the hook for two more films that almost assuredly wouldn't do as well (look at the Atlas Shrugged series).

Even TV shows like Game of Thrones aren't usually committed to more than the first season initially.

Jay G.

meh. That could mean a number of things. Personally, I've tried to keep it as vague as possible while confirming what the news has been so far.

Edit: Again, "The Red Wedding," is, in itself, a bit of a spoiler, but that phrase by itself doesn't nail down specifics enough to totally remove the surprise of the event.

Troy Stiffler

Hehe. I just read the intro paragraphs on Wikipedia (the film page). I immediately thought it was some kind of variation of what happened in The Matrix (another time around, inescapable fate ... so you end up with maybe a slightly different journey, same outcomes). Seems like the perfect setup for an off-book adaptation.

Also, what ever happened to totally unfaithful adaptations? They were all the rage pre-2000 (think Starship Troopers). Staying true to the source material is kind of a new thing for movies.

Jay G.

I think the success of the LOTR and Harry Potter films caused studios to think that faithfulness was a good way to capture the fandom from the books and build on them. Also, studios became more interested in developing "franchises" than one-off adaptations, and that meant adapting a series of books, which almost by necessity requires staying relatively faithful to each book so the next adaptation make sense.

And then Harry Potter, Twilight, and Hunger Games made extending the series profitable by splitting the last book into two films, which again made staying faithful important to squeeze out all the possible plot, especially given the quick turnaround times on the books.

That said, loose adaptations still exist. The recent film T2: Trainspotting is only loosely adapted from the sequel book Porno.

Abob Teff

Delayed again ... By one week. August 4th (now).

dex14

The trailer drops tomorrow.

Dan

Are twitter embeds still broken? Let's see...

Michael Corvin

Despite this being an abbreviated something or other version I'm super excited for this one.

Troy Stiffler

Off the top of my head, this is the trailer I'm most anxious to see. We got almost nothing to go on yet.

dex14

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