I actually liked the meta nonsense. Given the way King writes (i.e. he doesn't outline plots in advance), I think the series holds together well.
Oh, well... http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/07/19/us-darktower-idUSTRE76I06Q20110719 Universal pulls plug on Stephen King's "The Dark Tower" LOS ANGELES (TheWrap) - "The Dark Tower" sleeps with fishes. Universal's ambitious adaptation of Stephen King's fantasy series has been canceled, TheWrap has confirmed. The first film was slated to begin production this summer, but shooting was delayed last spring with the studio announcing that it needed to make the project more cost-effective. That temporary delay became permanent this week, and now deprives Universal of a film series that it had hoped to make a linchpin for its film slate for years to come. The studio declined to comment. All told, the project was supposed to involve three movies and a television series. The scope of the production and King's bona fides attracted big talent. Ron Howard was expected to direct and produce the first movie; Akiva Goldsman was lined up to produce and write and Brian Grazer was also on board as a producer. Javier Bardem was supposed to star. Yet after being announced with great fanfare last fall, "The Dark Tower" ran up against a very different corporate culture after Comcast took over the studio in January. More than ex-corporate parent G.E., Comcast leans toward the frugal, and the very expensive "Dark Tower" clearly left the people who control the purse strings uncomfortable. Following Comcast's acquisition, Universal has shown a willingness to make cuts. In March, the studio scrapped plans to make Guillermo del Toro's $150 million adaptation of H.P. Lovecraft's "Mountains of Madness." Gone it seems, are the days when risky adult dramas such as "Public Enemies" could get $100 million budgets because of the caliber of the talent involved. But in cutting "The Dark Tower" from its schedule, Universal does run the risk of alienating one of its most loyal and profitable partners, Imagine Entertainment. Howard and Grazer's production company has earned millions of dollars in profits for the studio with hits such as "American Gangster" and "A Beautiful Mind." On Monday, Universal apparently decided that the risk was so great that "The Dark Tower" wouldn't join that list.
^ It'd be impossible to make. ...some books just shouldn't be adapted. McCarthy's Blood Meridian has switched directors about six times - no one can make that into a movie either.
My favorite director almost made a movie based on works from my favorite writer? We need a 'shoot myself in the head' smiley.
Disappointing. However I always felt the series would work better as a TV series.Maybe 6-10 episodes a series,and a series a book. It's too big to put straight into films. A TV series will build the on-going suspense as they get closer to the tower and more time can be given to character development. The success of Lost shows that there is a market for TV series that are mystical and a bit trippy.
I finally finished the last book in "The Dark Tower" series. Overall, I thought this was a very fitting ending. I left it in the middle section for a few months (the part where it was focused on the Breakers) and then finally returned to it. From the point when the ka-tet has their meeting before the battle to free the Breakers to the end, I thought it was pretty great. As a series, I would say it was an amazing accomplishment. There are a few sections that drag or don't work, but looking back it is quite the epic journey. SPOILER (if you haven't read the last book)....I thought the deaths of the major characters was handled really well. As much as I hated to see those characters die....it always had to be Roland going to the Tower alone. Thanks, SK.....it was a hell of a ride. "The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed."
I can track just when the series went south, and it had to do with a certain minivan. None of his writing was the same after that.
The accident certainly had a huge effect on him (and the guy at fault who has since killed himself), but I think his attentions these days are more focused on politics and causes than his writing.
Has anyone ever read anything by his son Joe Hill? He is a good writer very much in the mold (as expected) of hid dad. His short story collection 20th Century Ghosts is excellent
I've got some hope for this prequel book that's coming out, his last few releases have actually been pretty good.
11/22/63 and Full Dark, No Stars which is a collection of novellas. Under the Dome was also pretty good except for the ending. Plus the fact that it's a prequel will hopefully mean that it's a "straight" mid world story without all the nonsense of the later books.
This is my biggest problem with King. He can spin a hell of a tale and then it seems like he asks a kindergarten class to make suggestions about how to end it. I wanted to throw Needful Things out the window once I got to the end. I'll check those books out, though. Once I get through the Dunk and Egg trilogy.
Full Dark No Stars is a good one. Haven't read 11/22/63 yet but have only heard good things. Under the Dome was meh for me. People always complain about how King ends his books.....how do you want him to end, what is usually a battle with demons from another dimension?? There isn't an ending, just the end of the story.
I think the problem is the abrupt shift in tone and rapid descent into the insanity. It's like from Dusk till Dawn, the first hour of that movie is a fantastic crime story and the last half hour is exploding vampires. Also in the longer books I think the reality of the horror he's spent 1000 pages building up can't possibly live up to the readers expectations. It was probably the best example of this with the giant space spider and gangbanging the 11 year old girl to get out of the sewers.
King is a superior writer of short fiction. Why? Because they don't really require much of an ending. He shoots and misses more often than not when he's trying to tie up the end of a novel. It's befuddling.
I haven't read IT since high school (granted, I'm only 30), but the gangbang in the sewer was weird then and would probably be stranger now.
