Building on the success of the alternate-history story of Philip K. Dick's The Man in the High Castle, Amazon is looking to develop three more "high-concept" science fiction shows for its growing repertoire of streaming television. According to a story broken by Variety, these shows are coming at the behest of CEO Jeff Bezos, who recently said he wants the company to make him a Game of Thrones.
I'm excited about each of these shows for very different reasons. I'll provide a few thoughts below.
Snow Crash, by Neal Stephenson
I first became a Stephenson fan back in college after reading Cryptonomicon. I went on to read his earlier novels, including both Snow Crash and The Diamond Age, both of which are excellent. While I had a bit of a hiatus in reading his works, last year I managed to polish off Anathem and the first two books in the Baroque Cycle (Quicksilver and The Confusion).
What I like about Stephenson's work is that the investment is always worth the payout. His books are not easy reads by any means, but the amount of time you put into them is going to reward you in the end. He manages to follow through with ideas and threads in a way that no other writer I know is able to. He is meticulous and his stories are intricate, as are his characters.
It has been some time since I read Snow Crash, but I remember liking it a lot. I'm hoping that the today's high-quality TV production standards will give it the treatment it deserves. And really, who doesn't love a story where the main character is a guy named Hiro Protagonist? (And apparently Bezos is a big fan.)
Ringworld, by Larry Niven
I first read Ringworld and its immediate sequel, The Ringworld Engineers, last year, so my memory of it is much fresher. I really liked the promise of Ringworld, but sadly neither book really followed through on that promise. However, I think that's precisely what makes this a great pick for development of a TV series. If Bezos is looking for a Game of Thrones-style show, I think it might do better with a book that leaves a lot to the imagination. Because it is in that imaginary space that the show's writers and directors (not to mention everyone else who works on it) will have an opportunity to really flesh out a great series.
The Ringworld itself (that is, the artificial ring-shaped cosmic construction that the book is about) is a massive structure that allows for a lot of different stories to be told. I will be interested to see if the Amazon series follows the premise of the books, following a group of explorers who "stumble upon" (in a space-travelly sense) the Ringworld, or if it goes a completely different route.
Lazarus, by Greg Rucka
I'm not really into comics, I admit. I liked The Punisher when I was a kid, but never bought them regularly, and at one point I collected Star Wars comics. I also keep up with the stories of various Whedon shows that have continued as comics after the TV series ended, including Buffy, Angel and Firefly. But other than those, I don't dabble in comics much.
But the people I know who are really into comics say Rucka is one of the best, and I've heard very good things about Lazarus. (One of these is the guy who turned me onto Neal Stephenson back in the day, so there's that...) If so many folks whose opinions I trust with respect to other stories like it, then I am inclined to give them the benefit of the doubt.
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