Is A Wheel Of Time TV Series Finally Set To Roll Out?
Robert Jordan classic may finally hit our screens after a bizarre legal tangle.
Robert Jordan fans rejoice! After a lengthy legal tussle, cult fantasy novel The Wheel of Time finally looks set to get the TV adaptation it deserves.
In a press statement on Thursday, Jordan's widow and long-time editor Harriet McDougal jubilantly announced that news of a forthcoming series was imminent. "Wanted to share with you exciting news about The Wheel of Time. Legal issues have been resolved", she enthused. "The Wheel of Time will become a cutting edge TV series! I couldnt be more pleased."
The news ends a long-running and often mystifying saga that has prevented the popular series of books from reaching our screens sooner. After Jordan's death in 2007, opportunists Red Eagle Entertainment quickly snapped up the series' adaptation rights, but left them dormant for the best part of a decade. Rumours persisted that the rights had been shepherded on to Universal, but nothing concrete ever transpired.
Last year, with the license about to lapse due to disuse, the production company paid FXX for air time to broadcast a shockingly low budget 'pilot' based on Jordan's The Eye Of The World. Even the esteemed Billy Zane could not mask that the cobbled-together program was nothing short of a last-gasp attempt to retain the license by an avaricious Red Eagle.
Airing at the dead of night, the show was something of affront to Jordan's literary legacy, and after McDougal claimed to be entirely in the dark about the project, she was subjected to the wrath of Red Eagle's legal team.
Last June, the slander allegations were nobly dropped by Red Eagle, and with Thursday's announcement it seems that the novel's television future is moving into safer hands. The Wheel of Time has rotated and the influence of the Dark One is over.