It’s been all quiet on the development of THE DARK TOWER recently; Ron Howard’s ambitious adaptation of Stephen King’s novels was at one point to span three movies and one TV series in order to tell the epic sweeping fantasy tale. Universal balked at the price tag and ambition on display and we thought that would be the end of it, but Howard and writer Akiva Goldsman refused to give in and took the project to Warner Bros.

Now it seems a new screenplay is ready and submitted and Warner’s will make a decision to green light or can the new film in the next two weeks. Ron Howard is still attached to direct the first film at least but he appears to have lost his original star Javier Bardem for the part of ‘The Gunslinger’ Roland Deschain. The producers are apparently keen on Russell Crowe to now take the lead which would make sense seeing as Howard has worked with him twice before on A BEAUTIFUL MIND and CINDERELLA MAN.

Knowing what I do of the project, I can’t see a film series ever getting the green light no matter who is committed to the project. It’s too ambitious, too expensive and too weird for the current climate of fear of new and interesting ideas in Hollywood. If anything this probably needs to be a TV series first in order to prove that it’s a valued commodity and then it should be taken to the screen. We could be on the verge of triumph here, or on the verge of a JOHN CARTER level catastrophe.

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