Idris Elba joins Dark Tower TV spinoff series, Wizard and Glass

Akiva Goldsman, producer of the upcoming first installment of the “Dark Tower” movie series set to hit theaters February 17, announced today that “Wizard and Glass”, the fourth book in the series that details gunslinger Roland Deschain’s backstory, would be developed into a TV series. The show will act as an origin story for the character and Sony is bringing on a younger actor to play that version of Deschain. Elba has already signed on for the series, with McConaughey’s involvement still considered a possibility.

Though a distributor is yet to be attached, the timing coincides with an anticipated gap in programming generated by the end of “Game of Thrones” in 2017.

Sony and production company MRC are going ahead with a 10-13 episode first season spinoff of The Dark Towerbeing released next year, according to Entertainment Weekly. And who would you cast as the younger Roland?

– Idris Elba will appear as Roland Deschain in the framing story, along with Tom Taylor as Jake Chambers. Then known as Marten, advisor to the ruler of Gilead (who just so happens to be Roland’s father), the Man in Black tried to manipulate the young Roland into destroying himself.

The Dark Tower director Nikolaj Arcel and co-writer Anders Thomas Jensen are writing the pilot script for the series, which doesn’t now have a network or streaming service to call home.

Goldsman will serve as one of the executive producers, along with Jeff Pinkner and Imagine Entertainment’s Ron Howard and Brian Grazer (who inspired McConaughey’s spiky, crow-feathered hair in the movie.) The film’s director, Nikolaj Arcel, and co-writer, Anders Thomas Jensen, are working on the script for the show and will be executive producers as well, but another showrunner will be hired to oversee day-to-day operations. As revealed in the first book of the series, The Gunslinger, Roland had an early encounter with the Man in Black.

EW reports that pre-production has begun on the TV companion series to the feature film. “The most concrete, personal, existential heartbreak a character can have”. The show will stick more closely to the books than the movie will, which has been described as a sort of sequel to the book series.