The Dark Tower: Live Action at Last!

Please, entertainment powers-that-be, please don’t blow it this time! Many Stephen King fans have been waiting for this to become a reality for years, and it was heart-breaking when Warner Brothers dropped it a few years ago!

Of course, I’m talking about King’s biggest, baddest story ever, The Dark Tower, which consists of eight amazing novels, The Gunslinger, The Drawing of the Three, The Waste Lands, Wizard and Glass, The Wind Through the Keyhole, Wolves of the Calla, Song of Susannah, and The Dark Tower. This is my favorite fantasy series for its amazing characters, scope, and for being far different from any other fantasy out there.

It’s also the most genre-bending series I’ve ever read. It has the feel of a Clint Eastwood western. The main character, the Gunslinger Roland Deschain, is the last of an order of knights charged with keeping their world—and the entire multiverse—from “moving on” by protecting the good in the world and holding back the evil. In Roland’s world exists the literal linchpin of all existence, the Dark Tower, a mystical edifice at the center of all existence. Roland’s goal is to reach the Tower to keep it from toppling, sending all of existence into King’s version of Hell. (As it’s King’s version, you know it’s terrifying.)

The series also has elements of fantasy—wizards, magic, and monsters—and of science fiction—time and dimensional travel, robots, and monorails—and key characters from alternate versions of Earth. Oh, and did I mention horror? It is by King, after all. There’s lots of quality horror.

Many of the science fiction elements are also very steampunk, such as the town robot, Andy (who appears in Wolves of the Calla). You'll find it anywhere that technology appears in one of the series’ Old West style settings.

I’m more than willing to admit that while the stories are very different, The Dark Tower Cycle partly inspired my own forthcoming novel, Bodacious Creed. Though very different stories, they both feature gunslinger main characters, very western settings, and steampunk elements. I owe King a debt of gratitude for putting that in my subconscious.

The Sony series is set to consist of three movies and two miniseries on television. To my knowledge, Ron Howard is still directing and producing. It will start with the first film, based on The Gunslinger, continue with the first miniseries, seen another movie installment (I’m guessing Wizard and Glass), continue with the second miniseries, and conclude with The Dark Tower.

I highly recommend the books for fans of any speculative fiction. Here are links so you can get the books now. (One recommendation: Buy The Gunslinger and The Drawing of the Three together. Some readers find The Gunslinger difficult to get into because of its tendency to jump around through time. If you find that to be the case, King himself has recommended reading The Drawing of the Three first, which I can say from experience is impossible to put down. Then go back and read The Gunslinger, then the rest of the series.)