George R. R. Martin's Wild Cards to Be Adapted to Film
By
BackFire,
Posted on: 2011-10-28 14:31 in Comic and Hero-Villain Culture
this makes me happy.... if nothing else, hopefully it will accelerate the digital copies of the books being released. the second one still isn't out in nook format!!! 
Oh yeah, that was the time that girl got her whatchamacallit stuck in that guys dooblickitz and then what his name did that thing with the lizards and it cleared right up.
screw your joke, i want "FREEM"
I was excited to see this until I saw it was a SyFy production.
Hopefully Universal can make it a good film without SyFy stepping all over it.
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Originally Posted by GibsonMcCoy
I was excited to see this until I saw it was a SyFy production.
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/this
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It's coming frmo SyFy Films, which is a distinct venture from the cable channel's original made-for-TV movie production arm (i.e. the makers of Mansquito, Sharktopus, and the upcoming Piranhaconda).|
Originally Posted by GibsonMcCoy
I was excited to see this until I saw it was a SyFy production.
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Here's the description of the co-venture from SyFy's website:
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Syfy Films extends the Syfy brand onto the silver screen through a partnership with Universal pictures. Leveraging Syfy's expertise in content development, production and marketing, Syfy Films seeks to create compelling movies for audiences hungry for fantasy, mystery, paranormal, action, sci-fi, adventure and superhero content. Co-headed by Mark Stern, executive vice president of original programming and co-head of original content for Universal Cable Productions, and Donna Langley, Universal Pictures co-chairman, Syfy Films will produce one to two genre movies per year, with budgets ranging from $5-25 million. Look for Syfy Film's first features to hit the box office in 2012. |
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That sounds much, much better, then.
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Originally Posted by TrueGentleman
Earlier this year, they hired the studio exec formerly in charge of DC's film and TV ventures ranging from Christopher Nolan's Batman movies and Watchmen to Green Lantern and Human Target.
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SyFy Films Present... Wild Cards v. Sharktopus!
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As much a fan as I am of the whole Wild Cards series/universe, I can't see this being pulled off with any sense of coherence. In comparison, Watchmen was fairly faithful to its comic roots, yet it failed to do well commercially, and it had a single story to wend its way through. The first Wild Cards book (of, what, 21, 22 now?) spanned nearly 40 years (1946 to the early '80s), hitting very selective points along the way.
The only way I can see this working at all, as far as an engaging story, is to focus entirely on the arrival of the virus, and the subsequent events immediately following. If that's done well and received well, then more stories/movies may follow. It occurs to me, too, that the "origin story" will likely be brought to near-present day, compacting the original timeline for the sake of including/introducing "main" characters in the same movie. Like I said, coherence.
That all said, I'm rooting for this to succeed. I just have my doubts this will ever emerge from Development Hell.
M. Bison: For you, the day Bison graced your village was the most important day of your life. But for me...it was Tuesday.
-- Street Fighter (1994)
McClane: Hey, thanks for saving my daughter's life.
Farrell: What was I going to do?
McClane: That's what makes you "that guy."
-- Live Free or Die Hard (2007)
I would say their best bet would be to start a web series of shorts, say 15 minutes or so. Stories that briefly told each of the short stories in the first couple books. Jetboy, Turtle, Tachyon etc... Then make the movies based on the mosaic novels with Tachyon as the thread that ties the story together.
Don't count your weasels before they pop dink!
Now my only real experience w/the Wild Cards IP was the 4-issue mini-series TPs put out by the old Marvel imprint Epic Comics 20 yrs ago. And that took place between Books 5 & 6.
While I think the prospect of seeing a Wild Cards movie and/or string of films is interesting, I think there's too much story material to do the IP any real justice.
Thank you for the time...
@Travlr (Main) / @Tymers Realm (Test) 
Obviously I'm a fan of the series, but I seriously doubt this will ever see the light of day, and if it does it'll be a mess. As was stated earlier, there's really no way to do a big screen adaptation of the scope necessary to establish the world and history the way the books did, and without that all you have is a generic superhero series.
I don't think that the main problem will be that they can't adapt the scale. I think it will be that tv shows (at least ones not overseen by Joss Whedon) don't like to kill off main characters. And the Wild Card series makes Joss look like an amateur.
Don't count your weasels before they pop dink!
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I'd watch.
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Originally Posted by Zombie Man
SyFy Films Present... Wild Cards v. Sharktopus!
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I'd have to agree. Having read the first 12-15 books, I'd have to say that a TV series would be more ideal. Just looking at the first book, we have a ton of characters that would need time to develop properly. Croyd Crenson himself is a complex and very involved character; it'd be a shame if his development were done in 5 minutes of screen time.
I find your lack of signature disturbing.
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Originally Posted by Zombie Man
SyFy Films Present... Wild Cards v. Sharktopus!
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Originally Posted by ObiWan
I'd watch.
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Jeff Goldblum as Croyd Crenson.
Obligatory in-joke: Dudley Moore and Pia Zadora, as Tisianne (etc.)/Dr. Tachyon and Blythe Van Renssaeler/Brain Trust, respectively. 
M. Bison: For you, the day Bison graced your village was the most important day of your life. But for me...it was Tuesday.
-- Street Fighter (1994)
McClane: Hey, thanks for saving my daughter's life.
Farrell: What was I going to do?
McClane: That's what makes you "that guy."
-- Live Free or Die Hard (2007)
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The great thing about Crenson is that you could get a different unknown actor to play him every episode. Even if the show or movies became a major hit that's at least one actor who couldn't demand a higher salary. At least not successfully.|
Originally Posted by Klatteja
Jeff Goldblum as Croyd Crenson.
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Val Kilmer to play the lizard king.
Don't count your weasels before they pop dink!
It's really, really hard for me to imagine Wild Cards as anything but prose for a variety of reasons.
Earlier this year, when you couldn't take a step without tripping over someone talking about the HBO production of Game of Thrones, I wondered what Wild Cards would be like were that network to present it. I decided that it would lose a lot of the characterization and contradictions that make it good. I can imagine an HBO series dealing with, say, prejudice (typified by stories about Joker movements in Wild Cards, but seen elsewhere in the series, too), or with Cap'n Trips trying to grapple with his disillusionment, but I can't imagine one where a character asks, "Why are we still obsessed with the Sixties?" or one where The Radical turns out as unabashedly evil as he is. Other production sources would have other preoccupations that would shape and limit what they'd make into a Wild Cards movie. Unless it's somehow produced by a dozen different production units, some of them led by people who won't speak to each other for hostility yet still manage to create a single, coherent narrative, I don't see anything special coming out of this. There are some things that are just much, much easier to do in certain media.
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Just out of curiosity for anyone that's read the books: Not knowing any of the background of how the books were created, there was a point where I was reading and said "Everything seems like it was based on a roleplaying game" Something about the character mechanics, their "NPC's" etc. just gave off this weird vibe that made me feel like everything was built in Champions 4E (I think it was something about Captain Trips). Later when I found out that it was based off of actual Roleplaying sessions I was pretty unsurprised, even though it was a different system.
Just curious if anyone felt the same way when reading it.
The Hollywood Reporter's Heat Vision blog reports that the Game of Thrones author's shared superhero universe series has been tapped as a potential movie series:
Syfy Films, a joint venture between Syfy Channel and Universal, has acquired screen rights to the anthology series edited, co-created and co-written by George R.R. Martin.
October 28
10:33 AM PDT 10/28/2011 by Borys Kit
With author George R.R. Martin's HBO fantasy series Game of Thrones one of the hottest things on TV right now, it's fitting that another Martin-penned project has caught Hollywood's eye.
Syfy Films, the theatrical division created in December 2010 as a joint venture between Syfy and Universal Pictures, has acquired the screen rights to Wild Cards, a superhero anthology edited, co-created and co-written by Martin.
Melinda Snodgrass, one of the co-creators and co-writers, has been tapped to pen the screenplay for the project, which marks Syfy Films' first acquisition. Martin and Snodgrass will executive produce.
Wild Cards is a series of books and stories set in a shared universe where an alien virus has been unleashed over New York City. Those who survived were turned into either a class of beings named Jokers, mostly deformed creatures, (or more rarely) Aces, who have special powers.
The first book was published in 1987, around the same time as such work as Frank Miller's The Dark Knight Returns and Alan Moore's The Watchmen were being hailed as revolutionizing the comics scene.{...}