First image from The Winter King, from the author of The Last Kingdom

Netflix’s medieval drama The Last Kingdom wrapped up earlier this year with Seven Kings Must Die, a movie that finally brought the story of Uhtred son of Uhtred to a close. The Last Kingdom was based on The Saxon Stories, a novel series by author Bernard Cornwell, who has been writing rip-roaring historical fiction for decades. He wrote the Sharpe series about the Napoleonic Wars, which was turned into a terrific TV show that helped put Sean Bean on the map back in the early ’90s. And with the success of The Last Kingdom, he’s hotter than ever.

My personal favorite Cornwell series is The Warlord Chronicles, a trilogy about King Arthur Cornwell published in the mid-90s. It’s got all the elements you’d expect from the Arthurian legend — Merlin, Excalibur, etc — but written in a grounded way that feels less like legend and more like history. So I was thrilled when I heard that British network ITVX was developing a show based on the books!

And now we finally have our first look. Below, check out Stuart Campbell as Derfel Cadarn (a disciple of Arthur and the story’s narrator) and Ellie James as Nimue (Derfel’s childhood friend and a follower of Merlin’s):

No shears in Dark Ages Britain, I see. And here are a few more pics:

The Winter King TV show is coming sometime in 2023

If you’ve watched The Last Kingdom, Derfel and Nimeu definitely have an Uhtred-Brida thing going on, to the point where I suspect that the former inspired the latter. The show also stars Iain De Caestecker as Arthur Pendragon, Jordan Alexandra as Guinevere, and Nathaniel Martello-White as Merlin. And there are plenty more characters beyond that.

In addition to ITVX, The Winter King is also airing on MGM+, formerly known as Epix. If it’s good, I’d love for it to get distribution on a bigger platform like Netflix, but we’ll see how things go.

The Winter King is coming out this year, but we don’t have an exact release date yet.

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