I didn’t read this series when I was a kid, but I finally got around to reading Roger Zelazny’s Chronicles of Amber.
Given it’s an older series, I wasn’t sure how much I’d like it (some of those older series age horribly), but it was actually REALLY good still, and the few minor things that’d aged too much wouldn’t be hard to update for a modern audience.
But the concept of Amber is fantastic, Corwin’s behavior and arc perfect, and I think a TV series could do it justice nowadays. Man, some CGI artists could do some beautiful work depicting a hellride through shadow.
I also would really, really love to see Anne McCaffrey’s Dragonriders of Pern adapted…but there’s a few parts that have aged pretty badly, so it’d need careful handling of things like Lessa and F’lar’s relationship and such. And maybe, you know, keep Jaxom the hell away from Corana.
But I think the whole idea of threadfall, and Impressing dragons, could be done beautifully on the screen. I think a run from Dragonflight to All The Weyrs of Pern (including the Harper Hall Trilogy) could be done. (Then leave the later books out, they don’t really add much, lol.)
The series would need a top-notch composer scoring it, though. I’d vote for Natalie Holt. She did wonderfully with Loki, and it’d be a nice touch having a woman score the series that’d have the Harper Hall Trilogy included in it.
Hyperion cantos. Ilium/Olympos. Lovecraft’s dream cycle.
On one hand it’s a risk that there would just be some terrible version that ruins all public things connected with the name, but on the other hand there could be something fantastic.
I guess sandman is already off the list. Haven’t seen the results though.
Another big risk in adaptations is that, like Peter Jackson’s Lott, it will make it very unlikely that someone else would come up and do it better after a big enough attempt.
I’ll come clean and say I haven’t read Sandman (yet) but I thought the show was really damn good. I’ve seen a lot of readers and critics praising it too. It’s definitely worth cheking out.
When you do, don’t judge the series by the first volume. DC told Gaiman they wanted a horror series. It was only after that they loosened the reins and let him take the story where he wanted it to go.
It does take some time to get going and a few stories are pretty dense. But it’s also a good re-read, especially after reading some notes about the things you missed the first time around. There’s a crazy amount of detail and characters.
The artwork is also legendary, of course.
Also my top choice. One of the best scifi series I’ve ever read, I enjoy reading very much but it’s rare that a book gives me such an emotional response. Apart from this it’s only been ‘The Kite Runner’… not scifi, a very very VERY sad, moving book about a boy in Afghanistan.