Sci Fi Channel Plans 'Earthsea' Miniseries

Gumpy writes "The Sci-Fi Channel has started producing a TV miniseries based on the first two books of Ursula K. Le Guin's Earthsea series. The Earthsea miniseries is supposed to start on the Sci Fi Channel in December 2004."

Comments

Hate to be a Cassandra

[arivanov]

Time to put the asbestous suit.

Hate to say it. It is likely to be a flop. Compared to Earthsea the Lord of the Rings is simple. I(very biased)MO this is the second most impossible movie after the Lord of Light. The reason is that you have both an extremely complex, logical and well described world along with a complex story line and complex characters.

I love the rings, but the rings characters are like cartoons compared to the Earthsea (or nearly any Ursula Le Guin book).

Re:DragonLance

[B'Trey]

The Earthsea series is one of the defining series of fantasy. It is a classic in every sense of he word. The Dragonlance series is mildly entertaining escapist fiction with stock characters and a predictable plot. A Dragonlance movie or series might be amusing, but it wouldn't be near as significant an event.

Read the books whilst you can...

[mccalli]

For anyone planning on watching this, now would be a good time to read (or re-read) the books.

I'm not suggesting that the books are about to disappear. Nor am I implying that the TV series will be terrible. I have no idea how well the product will turn out, and the books will be as available after as they are before.

No, what I'm saying is that pretty soon this series will influence your view of things, whether you want it to or not. I'm seeing this with my nephews, who are reading Lord of the Rings directly after seeing the films. They're seeing the book as much more action-packed than I did, and I'm sure that this is due to expectation after watching the films.

So read them now, and then watch with interest. You're going to be influenced - can't help but be, but at least you'll have your own ideas in place beforehand.

Cheers,
Ian

Re:Prepare for disappointment

[Otter]

Certainly my tastes are a long way from standard sci-fi fan -- you couldn't pay me to read anything by Robert Heinlein except Starship Troopers and his older space opera-ish short stories. So take this with a large grain of salt:

I find Ursula LeGuin's books utterly painful, the most boring things this side of, well, Robert Heinlein. Even Left Hand of Darkness, pretty much a consensus all-time top ten, bored the hell out of me.

(As an aside, where's Connie Willis' rabid fan base? Her books range from excellent to mindblowing, but I've never heard people fawn over her like they do LeGuin or the other tedious female sci-fi authors. Is a general warmth towards tradition and religion too politically incorrect to be assigned in those classes that are always pushing LeGuin? It's not like she's Margaret Thatcher.)

Re:better, by far, than harry potter

[Ruds]

then came harry potter. a wizard going to wizard school, making friends and enemies while learning his special abilities and discovering his hidden power. huh. that sounds familiar. i awaited word of a lawsuit, but alas...

i have yet to trudge my way through any of the potter books, or for that matter see the movies, but i recommend to any of my adult friends who do that they read a wizard of earthsea before inflicting potter on their children.

hey, what a good idea! let's trash a book we've never read!

i heard that wizard of earthsea has a wizard in it that fights dragons! that sounds a lot like the hobbit! tolkien's estate should sue!

it's great that you recommend that parents have their children read earthsea; it's a great book that's perfect for readers from curious pre-teens to fantasy-minded adults. but rowling writes some fine fiction for children, and for you to discount it without reading it is pretty lame.

here's a tip--try not to be so pretentious.