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Neil Gaiman's American Gods under consideration at HBO

Out Of My Vulcan Mind

Out Of My Vulcan Mind

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From Deadline Hollywood:

As HBO prepares to unveil its epic-sized series adaptation of George RR Martin's Game of Thrones this Sunday, the payweb has begun talks to acquire the Neil Gaiman novel American Gods to be developed into another fantasy series. The project was brought to HBO by Playtone partners Tom Hanks and Gary Goetzman, and it was brought to them by Robert Richardson. The plan is for Richardson and Gaiman to write the pilot together.

Richardson is the renowned cinematographer who just completed Hugo Cabret and whose recent credits include Shutter Island, Inglourious Basterds and Kill Bill. He is a regular collaborator with directors that include Martin Scorsese, Quentin Tarantino and Oliver Stone and has won Oscars for The Aviator and JFK. It is his first significant scripting effort. He'll do it in collaboration with Gaiman, a fanboy god for works like The Sandman, whose script work includes Beowulf. His novels Stardust and Coraline have been turned into films, and Neil Jordan is directing an adaption of Gaiman's The Graveyard Book.

American Gods, the 2002 book that won both the Stoker and Hugo Award among other prizes, lays out a battle between two sets of gods. One consists of the traditional gods and mythological creatures who got their power because people throughout history believed in them. They are losing steam as people's beliefs wane and are in danger of being supplanted by a new set of gods who reflect America's preoccupation with technological advancements and obsessions with media, celebrity, technology and drugs. The protagonist is an ex-con who becomes the traveling partner of a conman who turns out to be one of the older gods trying to recruit troops to battle the upstart deities.

Playtone just completed its run of the HBO series Big Love, and generated the miniseries The Pacific, John Adams, Band of Brothers and From The Earth To The Moon for the network.
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This would be an AWESOME miniseries, but I'm not sure if they can really do it justice. There is a TON of stuff going on in the book that may not translate well to film.
 
I don't know. Clearly an adaptation of the novel itself is best suited to a miniseries, but I can easily see the larger concept of a conflict between old and new gods expanding into a full series. Gaiman himself certainly hasn't hesitated to return to that particular well.
 
I really like the concept, but I just couldn't get into the book (although I will admit part of what got to me was the graphicness of the first scene with the sucubus. I've just never really read anything that graphic before).

I read another report that said it was it going to be a miniseries.
 
Fantastic news! I've been on a major Neil Gaiman tear for awhile (just finished The Graveyard Book) which included reading American Gods for the first time. I absolutely loved the book and I'm a huge mythology buff. I can't wait to see this project unfold.

Now if only the Good Omens film project would get going (with or without Terry Gilliam, but preferably with).
 
This sounds like it could be awesome. But I still can't shake the fact that, for me, none of the Gaiman adaptations have been quite as good as the books. I know not everyone feels that way, but hopefully this could be the one to break that for me.
 
This is great news. Neil has been hinting that something was in the works for American Gods, and HBO is as good as anything I could have hoped for.

I've been on a big tear through his work this past year, before which I'd never read/seen anything he'd done. And I actually got to see him speak at the main library here in Chicago this past Tuesday. So between this and the upcoming Doctor Who episode I'm pretty happy!
 
This would be awesome if it happened! Though I do agree I wonder how well some of it will translate. But more Gaiman is always a good thing.
 
Emh said:
Fantastic! I hadn't heard about that. BBC, HBO, someone else?
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No network has been announced yet, but it's the same production company that made the Discworld miniseries for Sky 1.

Dream said:
HBo is really desperate for a hit eh?
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Well, True Blood is a big hit for them and they're confident that Game of Thrones will be a hit, so they're looking to develop more fantasy material, which is great news for us. :)
 
Bishop76 said:
Didn't Boardwalk Empire do well for them too?
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It's done well - and it's been renewed for a second season - although it's not as big a hit as True Blood (although very few cable shows are as big as that). Boardwalk Empire averaged 3.165 million viewers per episode in its first season (compared to an average of 4.97 million per episode for True Blood). Whether Boardwalk Empire can run for more than two or three seasons given its high costs remains to be seen.
 
Showtime has Dexter, Weeds, Nurse Jackie, The Big C and United States of Tara.

AMC has Mad Men, Breaking Bad, and The Walking Dead (which was my favorite new show last season).

HBO has struggled to find another hit show after The Sopranos ended. I guess we will have to see how well Game of Thrones does.
 
Dream said:
Showtime has Dexter, Weeds, Nurse Jackie, The Big C and United States of Tara.

AMC has Mad Men, Breaking Bad, and The Walking Dead (which was my favorite new show last season).

HBO has struggled to find another hit show after The Sopranos ended. I guess we will have to see how well Game of Thrones does.
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True Blood is a big hit show for them, a much bigger hit in ratings terms than most of the other cable shows you've mentioned there (save The Walking Dead, which is on a par).
 
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