Elba's Casting CONFIRMED?!!

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DiO'Bolic

Not completely obtuse
Nov 14, 2013
22,864
129,998
Poconos, PA
Well, can't say I'm any more excited. But I'm gonna try keepin an open mind.

Tryin to "take a sad song and make it better". Heh, get it? Oh, speakin of Hey Jude--they gonna try to get the rights to that?
Since making changes to the story line is what all the cool kids do these days, they can go after this version from the Metal-Level of the Dark Tower. And I bet it would be less expensive. :)

*** warning... colorful language ***
 

Robert Gray

Well-Known Member
My semi-optimistic thought is that if the movie is poor, that any subsequent series adapted for Netflix or other such organization will not feel beholden to treat the film as the source, and thus go back to the books. Obviously, if the film is some great success (true to the source material or not) spin offs will treat the movie as a foundation. I won't like that but I will understand it. However, if the film isn't good or particularly successful, I would hope that those with the options to do a series would simply divorce themselves from the film and start over. I still remain optimistic about that, or at least I want to be optimistic about it.
 

muskrat

Dis-Member
Nov 8, 2010
4,518
19,564
Under your bed
My semi-optimistic thought is that if the movie is poor, that any subsequent series adapted for Netflix or other such organization will not feel beholden to treat the film as the source, and thus go back to the books. Obviously, if the film is some great success (true to the source material or not) spin offs will treat the movie as a foundation. I won't like that but I will understand it. However, if the film isn't good or particularly successful, I would hope that those with the options to do a series would simply divorce themselves from the film and start over. I still remain optimistic about that, or at least I want to be optimistic about it.

Bob, I'll tell ya, I'd like nothing better'n sit down with you over a couple of beers and talk King shop. You know yer stuff.
 

GNTLGNT

The idiot is IN
Jun 15, 2007
87,651
358,754
62
Cambridge, Ohio
hZNYRdKP.jpg
 

mjs9153

Peripherally known member..
Nov 21, 2014
3,494
22,165
Leaving out the gunslinger,his initial appearance and how he saved himself by using the gun,in a manner that no one else could,fast beyond belief,and decimating the entire attacking townsfolk..how can that be left out?That is the whole hook for the gunslinger,seeing his skill and how he uses it without remorse,without pity,almost an afterthought..and they are leaving this out? :down:
 

skimom2

Just moseyin' through...
Oct 9, 2013
15,683
92,168
USA
But that's where the misgivings come from. How can Roland's race be switched without causing a different reaction to him by other characters, perhaps Eddie given that he is from this world, but especially Susannah/Odetta (especially especially Odetta, if you'll forgive the mangling)?
As I said before, it throws up some interesting possibilities as well as writing challenges, BUT since it seems like it's going to be a single movie, the most likely course of action will be to throw Odetta's white-hatred away, which would lessen both of those characters as well as the relationship with Eddie, due to running time constraints (and to avoid controversy, no doubt ;)). It'd need (at least) a trilogy to even begin to do all the themes of the books justice.
And no one get me wrong: I'll be watching this regardless.

Jordan: Yeah, I knew that. It's why I didn't mention him. ;)

Senor_Biggles: Fair do's. I hadn't heard the rumours re: Idris Elba, but then again the last I knew Ron Howard was meant to be working on it, so there you go.
That was my main concern from the beginning. I suspect that will be toned down a bit, as well; alternately, she could go very dirty by attacking Roland as an Uncle Tom (wearing 'white' garb, etc). The economic divide ploy--it becomes more a 'haves and have nots' thing rather than black white. That would play very well with today's sensibilities.
For right now, I've decided to reserve judgment until we know more. Frankly, I'm more disturbed by the skinny white girl (can't remember her name) announced as a 'major role'. What the heck is up there, I wonder? The name they gave didn't show up until the sixth book, and she's a huge ugly Low Man. Weird.
 

Ebdim9th

Dressing the Gothic interval in tritones
Jul 1, 2009
6,137
22,104
I always thought of the Dark Tower world as being like the Talisman world of the Territories, a really important individual like Roland couldn't have a twinner.... also, at least in the DT books, there is only one 'real' world and all the other less crucial worlds spin off of it. But if we're going to alter things, then maybe a new/next story could be written where Roland meets another version of himself, the Idris Elba version... tell two parallel, merging stories and then move on from there...
 

skimom2

Just moseyin' through...
Oct 9, 2013
15,683
92,168
USA
Leaving out the gunslinger,his initial appearance and how he saved himself by using the gun,in a manner that no one else could,fast beyond belief,and decimating the entire attacking townsfolk..how can that be left out?That is the whole hook for the gunslinger,seeing his skill and how he uses it without remorse,without pity,almost an afterthought..and they are leaving this out? :down:
I know! The Gunslinger is what makes his capitulation to real feeling in The Wasteland WORK. Meh. I never will understand adaptations anyway. Imma go pull out The Gunslinger again.
 

Ebdim9th

Dressing the Gothic interval in tritones
Jul 1, 2009
6,137
22,104
I don't think the Uncle Tom angle would have nearly as much impact as the clear racial dynamic between the white, high-born prince and the black woman who has suffered persecution and physical abuse so much so that she's developed a split personality to deal with it, and everything that goes into that....
 

skimom2

Just moseyin' through...
Oct 9, 2013
15,683
92,168
USA
I don't think the Uncle Tom angle would have nearly as much impact as the clear racial dynamic between the white, high-born prince and the black woman who has suffered persecution and physical abuse so much so that she's developed a split personality to deal with it, and everything that goes into that....
You never know. It could be more vicious. The economic divide is very much on people's minds right now, and with that dynamic she could toss pretty much the same epithets at him as she threw at Roland in the book, but in a sarcastic, digging way. It could work.
 

Robert Gray

Well-Known Member
Do we know who is playing Detta? Sorry, I have been half reading about this project.

Because I kinda don't want to know.

Strangely, we do not. With shooting scheduled to start in a VERY SHORT time, If it rather odd that we don't know who else is signed. I would think having Detta, Eddie, and Jake are important enough to have them lined up already.