A while back, we heard that Showtime was making a show based on Patrick Rothfuss’ The Kingkiller Chronicle, an as-yet unfinished book series about a red-headed prodigy named Kvothe who’s orphaned at a young age and goes on to become a legendary figure capable of great feats of might and magic.
Only no, because the Showtime series was going to be set before the Kingkiller Chronicle proper, and would follow a pair of musicians — possibly Kvothe’s parents, it’s unclear — as they wander the fantasy world of Temerant, getting into all manners of misadventures. I say “was” because The Hollywood Reporter has it that Showtime actually won’t be making the series. They’ve released it back to Lionsgate TV, who are currently shopping it around.
Lionsgate is also trying to turn the actual Kingkiller books into a series of films, although we haven’t heard much about them lately, either. Basically, it wants to unleash a big new fantasy brand on the world all at once, which I always thought was a questionable strategy. I mean, why not adapt the mainline books first before seeing if there’s demand for a prequel series, y’know?
In any case, we assume the creative team behind the Kingkiller show is still in place. No one had been cast yet, but Lin-Manuel Miranda — the guy behind Hamilton — was writing the music for both the show and the movies. If you’ve read the books, you know that there are a lot of songs in them. In addition to being a magician and a martial artist and a sex god, Kvothe is also an extremely talented musician. Guy’s good at a lot of things.
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Per THR, someone at Apple TV+ may be interested in the show. Apple is going all-in on a splashy sci-fi/fantasy series called See starring Jason Momoa, so obviously they have the funds. We’ll, ahem, see what happens.
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