Legend of the Seeker and adapting novels for television

2 comments

November 6, 12:58 PM

by Guy Incognito, Writing Examiner

 

 

Bridget Regan and Craig Horner, the stars of Legend of the Seeker.

But with Disney's new show, Legend of the Seeker, we're seeing a very different approach. Legend of the Seeker is based on the best-selling Sword of Truth novel series by Terry Goodkind. The novels themselves are huge, running at just under a thousand pages each, and with 11 in the complete series, there's a wealth of information to pull from.

What makes adapting a novel for television so hard is that television is episodic. It's writting in a 5 or 7-act structure (those commercial breaks aren't in there by accident), and each episode should have its own narrative arch. Pulling that out of a novel week by week can be daunting.

And, while Seeker has only aired one two-hour episode which covers roughly the first 150 pages of the first novel, there have already been some relatively serious changes made to character relationships, plot content, etc. Not that that's surprising, given the challenges the production team undoubtedly faced when scripting the show.

So the last big question I had going into the show, and having read the books, was: Can this be successful? There is quite a large community out there who are deeply invested in these novels, and the last thing Sam Raimi (executive producer, responsible for the Spider Man movies, Xena: Warrior Princess, etc.) wants to do is make those legions of fans unhappy.

I had my doubts, but upon seeing the show and thinking it over, I realized that while this is not a format that every novel could necessarily jump to, there were key elements in Goodkind's books that made such a transition possible. For one, while the story is fascinating and well-told, it's not the end-all be-all of the series. The characters are. This bodes well for television, as you can take deviations from the central plot, and as long as your characters are well-rendered and well-cast, it's ok.

Additionally, with the author being in on the creation of each episode, it's almost like getting to relive reading the book for the first time, and yet having the story expanded upon, which is a fascinating idea for anyone who's ever completed a novel. To think that in 10 years you could go back and turn something so set in its ways into something completely new is sort of exhilirating.

Now, that's not to say that the show will be a success. But if it is, the doors might be opening for other such adaptations. If it's a hit, the novel-to-television leap could be pulled a lot closer for authors. I can see that as nothing but a good thing, but then again I suppose it depends on which novels they choose to adapt.

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