D&D Movie/TV Joe Manganiello: Dragonlance TV Show No Longer In Development

Actor Joe Manganiello has confirmed that the anticipated Dragonlance TV show that he had been working on is no longer being developed. In an interview with ComicBook.com. According to Manganiello, following poor sales of Dragonlance: Shadow of the Dragon Queen and the Warriors of Krynn board game last year, "Dragonlance is not a property [WotC] are interested in developing further currently". This decision was also prompted by Hasbro's sale of its media studio, eOne.

In March last year, Manganiello confirmed during an official D&D video update that he was working on a TV show for WotC, and a D&D live action series was greenly by Paramount in January. It's not clear if these are the same property.

Manganiello also talked about his approach to the property, and the new designs he had for the world, the dragons, and even the casting. "I want to make [the show] because I want to see it and I just want to feel that excited and electric about something. The characters...like the casting, I have a look book with over 1,000 pages, but it's not what you expect. The design concepts I had for the world, for the armor, for the swords....I had a fresh take on what the dragons were going to look like, it was going to be nothing like anyone has ever seen."

He has been working on a script for years, and was told by TV executives that his pilot was one of the best fantasy scripts they had ever read. He even offered to buy Dragonlance from WotC.

You can watch the whole interview at the link above.

 

[WisdomOfWombats]

I loved Dragonlance in the 1980s. I find it interesting that Dragonlance: Shadow of the Dragonqueen and the board game didn't sell well. Which doesn't surprise me. They tried to pitch Dragonlance as "D&D at War". And I never saw Dragonlance that way. Dragonlance showed back then how special a D&D world could be. And the 5e version was an adventure instead of a sourcebook and desperately tried to get all the new classes (Sorcerer, Warlock, full caster Bard) somehow shoehorned in, instead of saying: they just don't exist. Dragonlance was cool because it narrowed down the choices and made the classes fit the world instead of the world fitting the Players Handbook. 5e adapts the world to the Players Handbook - and that doesn't work out. That's why Dark Sun wouldn't work if that's the approach taken. Eberron, Forgotten Realms, Greyhawk, Ravenloft and Planescape are kitchen-sink settings. Dark Sun, Dragonlance and Birthright are not. If WotC approaches these three settings as kitchen-sink, then it won't work.

 

[jerryrice4949]

I loved Dragonlance in the 1980s. I find it interesting that Dragonlance: Shadow of the Dragonqueen and the board game didn't sell well. Which doesn't surprise me. They tried to pitch Dragonlance as "D&D at War". And I never saw Dragonlance that way. Dragonlance showed back then how special a D&D world could be. And the 5e version was an adventure instead of a sourcebook and desperately tried to get all the new classes (Sorcerer, Warlock, full caster Bard) somehow shoehorned in, instead of saying: they just don't exist. Dragonlance was cool because it narrowed down the choices and made the classes fit the world instead of the world fitting the Players Handbook. 5e adapts the world to the Players Handbook - and that doesn't work out. That's why Dark Sun wouldn't work if that's the approach taken. Eberron, Forgotten Realms, Greyhawk, Ravenloft and Planescape are kitchen-sink settings. Dark Sun, Dragonlance and Birthright are not. If WotC approaches these three settings as kitchen-sink, then it won't work.

100%. They took what was unique about the setting and removed it and wondered why no one cared. They made it indistinguishable from FR. The Knights of Solamnia and Wizards of High Sorcery were so unique in 2nd edition they were truly exciting to play. Now WoTC strategy is to make everything so bland whether it be DL, Eberron or books like Fizbans and Bigbys that they fit anywhere but really have no meaning or uniqueness.

 

[Mannahnin]

First, I'm just going to take a moment here to lol at the idea of GRRM's writing being good. The man can come up with decent stories (though, like most fantasy writers, easily falls into pointless rambling instead of actually finishing them), but the writing itself is just painfully bad. And Jordan is worse. I couldn't even get through the first chapter of WoT.

Quality of writing is always somewhat subjective, but yeah, GRRM is a good writer. He could certainly use more editing, IMO, but his prose, plotting, and characters are evocative and compelling. The TV show took a NOTABLE nosedive in quality of writing once they couldn't crib directly from his material.

Jordan I can't stand, but he's still got virtues. I can understand why people like him.

I think the plot and basic concepts in the Dragonlance books are pretty solid. The dialogue is atrocious and the prose amateurish, but those aren't obstacles to a TV or movie adaptation. The terrible dialogue is almost a wash, because you won't feel like you're losing anything you cut.

 

[Osgood]

Really? The 1st game of Thrones book was written in 1996. LOTR and Hobbit way before that. Eye of the World (Wheel of Time) came out in 1990. So I don’t think the idea of things changing so much is a serious barrier. All things adapted for tv or movies have changes to make them relevant or fit the current Zeitgeist.

True, older works can ben updated to appeal to a modern audience... and luckily purist fans of the original are always very open to such changes. I'm sure they would never endlessly bemoan every alteration or omission as part of some plot to pander to some agenda/make unholy sums of money/destroy their childhood memories!

 

[Remathilis]

I loved Dragonlance in the 1980s. I find it interesting that Dragonlance: Shadow of the Dragonqueen and the board game didn't sell well. Which doesn't surprise me. They tried to pitch Dragonlance as "D&D at War". And I never saw Dragonlance that way. Dragonlance showed back then how special a D&D world could be. And the 5e version was an adventure instead of a sourcebook and desperately tried to get all the new classes (Sorcerer, Warlock, full caster Bard) somehow shoehorned in, instead of saying: they just don't exist. Dragonlance was cool because it narrowed down the choices and made the classes fit the world instead of the world fitting the Players Handbook. 5e adapts the world to the Players Handbook - and that doesn't work out. That's why Dark Sun wouldn't work if that's the approach taken. Eberron, Forgotten Realms, Greyhawk, Ravenloft and Planescape are kitchen-sink settings. Dark Sun, Dragonlance and Birthright are not. If WotC approaches these three settings as kitchen-sink, then it won't work.

WotC isn't in the business of selling settings that void out the majority of their other sourcebooks. They don't want to say "Buy our Dragonlance book and you'll never need to buy Bigby, Tasha, or Mordenkainen." And they certainly aren't going to support multiple lines of settings all cannibalizing off each other. If the unique part of a setting is what you can't use while playing it, it's not worth returning to.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

True, older works can ben updated to appeal to a modern audience... and luckily purist fans of the original are always very open to such changes. I'm sure they would never endlessly bemoan every alteration or omission as part of some plot to pander to some agenda/make unholy sums of money/destroy their childhood memories!

Sure, but you don't have to worry about that when you make a film/show. You just have to work on making it good, and most "fans" will come around. Take for example the Lord of the Rings - hardcore Tolkien fanatics will spit on those movies - but by any reasonably objective standard they are a Masterpiece (and they made gobs of cash!)

 

[Rystefn]

WotC isn't in the business of selling settings that void out the majority of their other sourcebooks. They don't want to say "Buy our Dragonlance book and you'll never need to buy Bigby, Tasha, or Mordenkainen." And they certainly aren't going to support multiple lines of settings all cannibalizing off each other. If the unique part of a setting is what you can't use while playing it, it's not worth returning to.

Yeah, that's why the AL totally never made rules saying you can't use all the books at the same time to make your character. WotC would never do something like that.

Also, literally no one is suggesting it cut out any of the other books entirely. Only specific options. There's no "All sorcerers and only sorcerers" book that would be cut off from use by a setting having a "no sorcerers" rule. So even if you were right, you'd still be wrong.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

WotC isn't in the business of selling settings that void out the majority of their other sourcebooks. They don't want to say "Buy our Dragonlance book and you'll never need to buy Bigby, Tasha, or Mordenkainen." And they certainly aren't going to support multiple lines of settings all cannibalizing off each other. If the unique part of a setting is what you can't use while playing it, it's not worth returning to.

I think that's short-sighted. A curated list of options makes a setting more manageable, more unique, and more interesting to a lot of people. It's not likely to damage the sales of other products.

When you're only likely to give a setting a single book (so as not to support multiple lines, which you're right that they don't want to do) then you're more free to make each self-contained, not less.

 

[Rystefn]

Quality of writing is always somewhat subjective, but yeah, GRRM is a good writer. He could certainly use more editing, IMO, but his prose, plotting, and characters are evocative and compelling. The TV show took a NOTABLE nosedive in quality of writing once they couldn't crib directly from his material.

Jordan I can't stand, but he's still got virtues. I can understand why people like him.

Hard disagree on every sentence of this. I'll give you the first half of the first sentence, but GRRM's prose is deeply terrible, and his plotting is extremely hit or miss. If you can count "lol, I don't have to care about plot, people will buy anything I put down, so I'll write a bunch of random nonsense with no real point to speak of and no end anywhere in sight" as plotting. The show took a hard nosedive in quality at the same point the books did, which is somewhere in season 3. It might have nosedived even harder somehow after they got to the end of the books, but I wouldn't know because I walked away years before they got there.

I can't see why anyone likes him, or Jordan. Or Salvatore. Or King, for that matter. But there's no accounting for taste. I'm not really in a position to judge. Sometimes, I listen to Fallout Boy on purpose.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

Maybe Sophia was his good luck charm. I mean how could she not be.

Wasn't going to touch on those woes, but yeah...

I would say ‘better’ is pretty subjective. While I would agree Jordan and Martin are more talented authors (though Martin can get too wordy) some people may prefer the DL novels. And aged better? So the incest and torture in the GoT aged better? I am not so sure about that.

If the Winds of Winter comes out, and it hasn't changed with the times, I do wonder how it will be received by audiences. Heck, Fire & Blood had three different and egregious accounts of violence against women on a single page.

And as far as the writing talents of Weis & Hickman are concerned, I would point out that they at least finished their series.