I would love to see Larry Niven’s Known Space stories and novels brought to the screen. Big, sweeping arcs like Ringworld Series, The Fleet of Worlds, or the epic Man-Kzin Wars; or smaller sets like the Gil Hamilton organlegger detective stories, or the individual novels that help flesh out the Known Space Universe: Becalmed in Hell, the Coldest Place, World of Ptaavs, A Gift from Earth, and especially, Protector, and the related Peace Corben novellas. These would probably be best done like The Expanse; a multi-year episodic TV drama.
The biggest problem would be preventing the studio suits from doing a Disney on the stories. I would consider that an Organ-Bank-worthy crime!
I think Ringworld has been in development a couple times, most recently with Amazon/MGM. It is Tough to get a large audience for it (especially as you move into Ringworld Engineers and later) as it wanders into hard R territory though one COULD limit that somewhat. It also would probably push limits of even current special effects for Kzin and Puppeteers. I love Protector it has the advantage that it sticks with a couple characters across its story. It probably would want to be a limited miniseries as it is a smidge too long (at 218 pg) to make a… Read more »
It’s remarkable how they’re able to waste hundreds of millions of dollars on tripe like Rings of Power but not for anything halfway interesting. I’ve got to think one day someone will step in the breach and adapt something good for the screen.
So many attempts and so little success.Looking for successes I think the latest incarnation of Dune, although flawed in some aspects, was probably the most successful of the 3 (4 if you count the aborted Jodorowsky attempt). I think the Jackson Lord of the Rings was very good even without certain sections (sorry Tom Bombadil, you just aren’t central to the plot). The Expanse did middling well, though I lost track of it mid 2nd season. The failures are more plentiful. Jacksons Hobbit was a mess with unnecessary additional characters and subplots, even though the acting (Bilbo and Thorin especially)… Read more »
It’s been decades since I read Footfall, I really would like to reread that. Niven alone
Niven and Pournelle put out so much. I still think Lucifer’s Hammer was the absolute best of the type.
Ahhh, but Ringworld made “real” and the Mote in Gods Eye—–
Nothing wrong with rereading a golden oldie.
Lucifer’s Hammer: The surfer dude riding the tidal wave would be worth the price of admission!