Fables Television Show
ICV2 has some interesting news about a Fables pilot. David Semel will direct. The script is penned by Stu Zicherman and Raven Metzner, who wrote the tv shows Six Degrees and the terrible What about Brian, as well as, the movie Elektra. Take from that what you will.
I love Bill Willingham’s series about storybook characters run out of their world by a ruthless, cunning and blood hungry adversary. They settle in our world, living among us “mundies” while planning a return to their homelands and thwarting the Adversaries plans to invade their new settlement. It’s exciting and the imagination packed into the pages is outstanding. The plot is tight, the characters are complex and the color is gorgeous. How will that translate to the screen?
One problem I see is the amount of characters. Almost every fable I’ve ever heard of is represented and most of them play an integral part. There’s been criticism of David Semel’s Heroes (love it) for having too many characters and not enough time to develop them all. I don’t see how they can avoid that here.
Another problem is the Farm. The Farm is an annex in upstate New York where the fables who can’t fit in are forced to live. So the Three Little Pigs and the Three Bears and others are understandably a little upset at their exclusion from the rest of the settlement. In the second volume, they attempt a rather bloody coup. It will be hard to take this to real life without making it look like Babe meets Rob Zombie. I suppose the creators could make the farm animals cartoons. That might be kind of awesome.
Finally, I can forsee a problem with the atmosphere. Fables is, at its heart, a story about war and loss. There’s lots of humor and the spin off series Jack of Fables is fairly lighthearted but most of the original series is covered in a sense of fear. How do you make Rose Red seem fearful without being, I don’t know, hokey? Or have Snow White fall in love with the Big Bad Wolf without going all Lois and Clark?
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Yeah, Sadie, and don’t forget that good for nuthin’ Prince Charming, either! I’ve only read volume one of the collected trade paperbacks of FAbles, but I agree that this series is truly inspired. I plan to jump back in as soon as I catch up on that stack of graphic novels on my night stand.