GAME OF THRONES stage play will tell the true story of the Great Harrenhal Tourney

In slightly bemusing news, a Game of Thrones stage play is headed to Broadway and the West End. The play will tell the full story of the Great Harrenhal Tourney in the Year of False Spring, the legendary event that spurred Prince Rhaegar Targaryen to "abduct" Lyanna Stark, the sister of Eddard Stark and betrothed of Robert Baratheon, and triggered the civil war that destroyed the Targaryen dynasty.

The play will be written by Duncan MacMillan and directed by Dominic Cooke. MacMillan's script will be based on a story outline provided by George R.R. Martin.

The project is notable as the first Game of Thrones-related project featuring a new story that will draw on established characters. Ned Stark, Tywin Lannister, Jaime Lannister and Barristan Selmy play major roles in this story, as do the briefly-appearing Lyanna Stark and Rhaegar Targaryen. However, these roles will be played by new (and, given the medium, regularly changing) actors.

The project is also interesting because it may indicate a change of direction from George R.R. Martin, who had previously shot down all suggestions for a spin-off or prequel about the Great Harrenhal Tourney or the succeeding Robert's Rebellion. Clearly he's now - at least partially - changed his mind on that, making a spin-off TV show or film about the Rebellion itself potentially more likely.

The stage play is expected to arrive in Broadway (New York City), the West End (London) and Australia in 2023.

AVATAR: THE LAST AIRBENDER creators depart Netflix live-action reboot after losing "creative control"

In a shock move, the original co-creators of Avatar: The Last Airbender have resigned from their positions as showrunners and executive producers of Netflix's live-action remake.

Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko, the creators of the original animated show, were tapped by Netflix two years ago to lead a live-action remake of the series. Their plan was to correct the mistakes that led to M. Night Shyamalan's badly-received 2009 live-action film and to deliver a story that was true to the spirit of the original series whilst also allowing for some changes due to the shift in medium.

In particular, DiMartino and Konietzko were keen to ensure continuity in terms of ethnic casting (the 2009 movie infamously "whitewashed" several key roles, replacing characters meant to be inspired by Inuit or Asian backgrounds with white actors) with the original animated show. It appears that Netflix has disagreed with some of their choices. It's unclear if casting itself was in dispute, but it is notable that for a show that was due to start shooting in the spring (before a pandemic delayed things) and which had already had sets and costumes created and some test-filming done, no final casting had been announced as of the start of this year.

DiMartino, in his statement, notes that Netflix promised to honour his and Konietzko's vision, but more recently had apparently rolled back on this statement. He notes that he and Konietzko were no longer in "creative control" of the project, suggesting that higher-ups at Netflix had enforced decisions on them that they were not willing to accept. DiMartino notes that the project is continuing and may end up being enjoyable, but it is not the project he or Konietzko "envisioned or intended to make." He notes that he and Konietzko had also resigned in June.

Intriguingly, DiMartino noted that they were "not done" with the Avatar universe and the recent surge in popularity of both Avatar: The Last Airebender and its sequel series, The Legend of Korra, had re-inspired them, hinting at the possibility of a third animated series in this universe.

Netflix have, so far, not offered any response.

It has been revealed that fantasy author David Eddings and his wife were jailed in the 1970s for child abuse

Note: this is a particularly disturbing story and I advise caution before proceeding

Last year a story broke in a few corners of the fantasy community which seemed to vanish almost immediately, which is surprising given how startling it is. Certainly I did not hear about it until this week. The story confirmed that fantasy author David Eddings and his wife Leigh were jailed for a year in 1970, having physically imprisoned and mistreated their adopted son and mentally traumatised their adopted daughter.

David and Leigh Eddings were the co-authors of the Belgariad, Malloreon, Elenium, Tamuli and Dreamers fantasy series, which cumulatively have sold almost 20 million copies. The Belgariad, in particular, is often hailed as a formative post-Tolkien fantasy series, serving as a frequently-recommended gateway book for new and younger readers to the genre.

The Eddings married in 1962. They adopted a son in 1966 and a daughter several years later. In 1969, alerted by neighbours to the sounds of mistreatment at their South Dakota property, police arrived to find the adopted son locked in a cage in a dirty basement (the basement shared with several animals) and being beaten by his parents with a belt. The Eddings were arrested and the children removed into protective custody (subsequently their adoption of the children was revoked). During the subsequent trial, exacting details of physical and emotional abuse emerged, with the children imprisoned in the cage for the slightest perceived disobedience and corporal punishment being regularly administered. Both children were traumatised by their experiences.

David and Leigh Eddings spent a year in jail in 1970, during which time they lost their jobs and relocated on release to Denver, Colorado. David Eddings tried to make a career as a writer, but his early attempts at contemporary fiction bombed. It was only when he saw a paperback copy of The Lord of the Rings on sale in the local grocery store that he realised fantasy was a big thing and began work on The Belgariad. Lester del Rey, hungry for more fantasy after the huge success of The Sword of Shannara by Terry Brooks and the first Thomas Covenant trilogy by Stephen Donaldson, snapped up the series and began publishing it in 1982.

It should be noted that the Eddings never made any mention of their time in prison at any point during their careers in the public eye, with David Eddings sometime joking about voluntarily quitting academia and getting a job in a grocery store because the pay was better.

Leigh Eddings passed away in 2007, David Eddings following in 2009.

This is a particularly unpleasant and sad story. Like many fans of fantasy fiction, The Belgariad was one of the first fantasy series I ever read in the 1990s. I never rated it quite as highly as others (I'd already read Pratchett and Tolkien by that time), but it was certainly a reasonably fun, early fantasy series. I disliked the sequel series and his later work, which felt massively derivative of what came before. I know there's a lot of people out there who are much bigger fans of Eddings and this is sad news for them. Along with the (even more disturbing) revelations several years ago about Marion Zimmer Bradley, it merely reinforces that authors are still people and sometimes extremely flawed and even criminal ones.

Both of their formerly adopted children appear to be in good health, which is good news. The beneficiary of the Eddings Estate is Reed College in Portland, Oregon, where proceeds from legacy sales of their books help educate students.

BBC America release first publicity images for Terry Pratchett's THE WATCH

BBC America has released the first publicity images for Terry Pratchett's The Watch and, well, yikes.

In this first image, Sybil Ramkin (Lara Rossi) appears to have either set someone on fire or are watching them on fire, plummeting through a hole in an Ankh-Morpork street. If you're thinking, "This never happens in the books," and "Why is a middle-aged, stout woman now a smoking hot vigilante?" you are not alone.

In this second image, we meet Constable Angua (Marama Corlett) and Constable Carrot (Adam Hugill) of the Ankh-Morpork City Watch, although they seem to have lost their armour. Carrot at least looks spot on, if a few years older than the character.

In this image, Sam Vimes (Richard Dormer) and Angua (Marama Corlett) visit an Ankh-Morpork market. This image is the clearest example of a major shift in the setting aesthetic. Whilst the books are set in a late medieval/early Renaissance-level city slowly transitioning into a steampunk one (albeit over the course of forty books), the series looks set to open in a full Victoriana environment, with no traditional armour and the Watch characters wearing lanyards in lieu of a uniform.

This image shows Carcer Dun (Sam Adewunmi) up to no good. His guards appear to have parachuted in from a mid-franchise Final Fantasy video game, but okay.

Angua (Marama Corlett) and Constable Cheery (Jo Eaton-Kent), the latter of whom doesn't appear to have a beard. Or be a dwarf.

The TV show has attracted negative coverage for its decision to only be "loosely inspired" by the books and instead pursue their own path with regards to casting, writing and setting. These images are not likely to improve this.

TRANSFORMERS finally gets a movie-accurate Unicron toy

It's taken thirty-three years, but finally a movie-accurate Transformers toy of Unicron, the Chaos-Bringer, is set for release...if Hasbro can drum up enough interest.

Introduced in Transformers: The Movie (1986) and improbably voiced by Orson Welles (in his last cinematic appearance), Unicron is a planet-sized robot which consumes entire worlds for fuel. Destroyed in the film but brought back numerous times in different continuities, Unicron is one of the most popular characters in the Transformers mythology. In 1988 his backstory was expanded upon by writer Simon Furman to make him a key part of the origin myth for the entire franchise.

A prototype Unicron toy made in the late 1980s for release as part of the original toyline. Rather fortunately, "Beer Belly Unicron" never made it to the shelves.

The only problem with Unicron is that his size, bulk and shape has made it extremely difficult to base actual toys on him...which for a franchise originally built around selling toys is a bit of a problem. A toy was prototyped to tie in with the release of the original movie, but it ended up looking a bit ridiculous and was shelved.

The first Unicron you could actually buy with real Earth money.

In 2003 Unicron finally did get a toy, albeit one based on his considerably more toy-friendly redesign from the Transformers: Armada animated series. This was re-released with a new colour scheme a year later for the sequel series, Transformers: Energon. This toy has subsequently been re-released several times with a colour scheme and different head design to be more reminiscent of the original Unicron design.

Apart from these, there have been a few non-transforming statues of the character, but never before has anyone attempted an actual, original movie-accurate, transforming Unicron toy. Until now.

"I have summoned you here for a purpose."

Takara and Hasbro have joined forces and created a monster of a toy. This new Unicron, released as part of the War for Cybertron range, is 27" tall in robot mode and 30" in diameter, making him comfortably the largest Transformers toy ever created in the entire history of the franchise. He features over 50 points of articulation and comes mounted on a large stand in planet-killer mode (a necessity given that mode's spherical shape). The toy weighs a whopping 19 pounds (8.61kg).

"Destroy the Matrix. And your bank balance."

If this sounds expensive, you would not be wrong. Hasbro are not mass-producing this toy for the mass market. Instead they are seeking funding it through their Hasbro Pulse initiative. To make the toy practical, they require 8,000 backers to pledge $574.99 apiece (that's about £463) by the end of August. Even given the fanaticism of the Transformers collectors' market, that may be a big ask but we'll see how it gets on.

If funded, the toy would be released in 2021.

Ryan Reynolds is playing Pikachu in the DETECTIVE PIKACHU movie

I mean, that's it, I can't even parse that headline or believe I went six months without being aware of this news, so that's it really.

This is a thing that's happening.

Three new STAR WARS movies and a live-action TV series announced

If you like Star Wars, then you'll no doubt be pleased to know that everything is now Star Wars from now until the end of time. If you don't like Star Wars, prepare to spend the next decade or so emitting long-suffering sighs.

First up, Disney are really happy with how The Last Jedi turned out. How happy? They've given director Rian Johnson the helm of a full new Star Wars trilogy of movies. That's three new films to launch after Episode IX is released in 2019. The three new films will not be part of the numbered "Skywalker Saga" but will instead explore a "new corner of the Star Wars galaxy not previously touched on by the lore", which seems a bit vague.

Johnson is in control of the new trilogy and will executive produce and co-write all three movies. I'm guessing he will also direct at least the first one, but maybe all three (or possibly the first and third ones, as if Disney stick to their two-year turn-around times that may be too fast for him to direct all three).

This is in addition to the less-formalised plan to have additional movies that will continue to explore the story of Rey, Poe and Finn even after Episode IX is released. It's unclear if these hypothetical movies will constitute Episodes X-XII or will be more self-contained adventures for the characters.

Arguably even more intriguing is the news that Lucasfilm are finally bringing a live-action Star Wars TV series to the screen. This will be one of several shows - alongside a Monsters, Inc. ongoing series and a new, high-end Marvel live-action series - that will launch Disney's new streaming service in 2019. This service will compete directly with Amazon and Netflix, and to bolster it Disney are also moving every single show and movie that they control over to it (including all previous Star Wars movies and animated series, plus their enormous catalogue of animated films, Pixar movies and content from other channels they own, like ABC). They are also currently pursuing a deal to buy 20th Century Fox outright, that would give them a staggering amount of content to transfer to the new service.

Nothing is known at all about the time period, setting and concept for the TV series. It's unlikely that the bounty hunter-focused TV show set in Coruscant's underworld that George Lucas was developing in 2005-10 will be revisited.

This makes the current Star Wars schedule look something like this:

December 2017: Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi
May 2018: Star Wars: Solo
December 2019: Star Wars Episode IX, new live-action TV series
May 2020: Untitled Star Wars Anthology Film (possibly the Obi-Wan Kenobi movie)
2021?: New Star Wars Trilogy Movie #1

So, if you like Star Wars, your face probably currently looks like this:

If you hate it, your face currently looks like this:

Rian Johnson's first Star Wars film, The Last Jedi, lands in cinemas on 15 December.

Tolkien Estate and Warner Brothers to collaborate on a new LORD OF THE RINGS TV series

In a surprising and unexpected move, the Tolkien Estate and Warner Brothers are teaming up to to produce a television series based on J.R.R. Tolkien's classic fantasy novel, The Lord of the Rings.

The news comes fourteen years after Peter Jackson completed his epic movie trilogy for New Line Cinema (now owned by Warner Brothers) and just three years after he completed a prequel trilogy, based on The Hobbit. The Lord of the Rings movie trilogy grossed just under $3 billion at the box office (and considerably more in merchandising sales) and considerable critical acclaim, including seventeen Oscars. The Hobbit trilogy, despite a much more mixed critical reception, actually made slightly more money at the box office but off the back of twice the budget, so was less profitable (although this is relative; WB were very happy with $2.3 billion in profit).

However, the Tolkien Estate was unhappy with the movies, with Christopher Tolkien feeling they were special-effects-focused and lacking the soul of the books (although this was before he'd watched them). The Estate was also unhappy with how their legal rights were respected. They ended up fighting at least three legal battles against the studio, the first to secure the correct share of the profits, the second to clear up the rights to The Hobbit and the third to resolve whether the original deal in the 1960s granted the movie producers the rights to make gambling tie-ins, when this was not part of the original deal.

The new deal is said to be enormous, with an up-front rights fee of $250 million and a guaranteed per-season budget of between $100 and $150 million, which would exceed the record-setting $100 million budget of Game of Thrones in its last three seasons. For this reason only three studios are in the running: HBO, Netflix and Amazon. HBO apparently took a brief look, but turned down the deal, feeling it would conflict with their plans to expand their Game of Thrones franchise (although the idea of a fresh Lord of the Rings adaptation, possibly with noted Tolkien fan George R.R. Martin in an advisory role for HBO, is intriguing). Netflix are still in the running but they are currently looking to strip back some of their excess spending in the face of a mounting debt bill, which would not be compatible with this project.

Instead, Amazon seem to be the most likely studio to pick up the deal. Jeff Bezos, the head of Amazon, is personally involved in negotiations and they come just after he mandated the need for a massive, high-profile show to directly compete with Game of Thrones. Bezos, a fan of science fiction and fantasy, is believed to have been eyeing the Wheel of Time TV series in development at Sony, of which he is also reportedly a major fan, but obviously a Middle-earth TV show would have a far higher profile. Amazon TV also have the money to afford to pay the enormous rights and not be too badly damaged if the show tanks.

The reported involvement of the Tolkien Estate is surprising, although it has been suggested that it might be Saul Zaentz's Middle-earth Enterprises (who have held the TV and film rights to both The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings since the late 1960s) that's involved rather than the Estate directly. This would explain why apparently only The Lord of the Rings is currently in play, possibly with an expansion to include The Hobbit. The rights to the other Middle-earth books, namely The Silmarillion, Unfinished Tales, The Children of Hurin and Beren and Luthien, firmly remain with the Tolkien Estate and are apparently not up for discussion in the current deal.

Given the immense popularity of the Tolkien books and the boost it would give Amazon, it's likely that this deal will go through. The only stumbling block will be the perception that this is far too soon after Peter Jackson movie universe was completed and a TV series launched in ten years might be a better proposition. It's also likely that a TV project of this magnitude will require a heavy-hitting showrunner and creative force to be involved, and unless there is it may founder for a lack of creative talent.

More damaging is the possible impact on Sony's Wheel of Time project, which seemed a natural fit at Amazon and would require the resources that only really Amazon can offer. If Amazon can take up this Middle-earth deal, it  may dramatically reduce the likelihood of the Wheel of Time adaptation continuing, at least in the short term.

Pornographic website offers to fund future seasons of SENSE8

Adult entertainment website XHamster has offered to pick up Netflix's recently-cancelled TV series Sense8, in an apparently serious proposal to series showrunner Lana Wachowski.

Sense8's second season aired earlier this year to apparently disappointing viewing figures, especially compared to the show's lavish $9 million-an-episode budget (the second-highest on American television, behind only Game of Thrones). Netflix regretfully pulled the plug, but after an intense fan campaign, agreed to produce a two-hour finale movie so Lana Wachowski and co-writer J. Michael Straczynski could wrap up the cliffhanger ending the show was left on.

Now XHamster has stepped in, posting an open letter to the Wachowski sisters (Lilly Wachowski stepped back from Season 2 of Sense8 after co-producing the first season, but may return for the finale) in which they make a serious offer to pick up the series properly, presumably meaning they would fund the remaining three years of the planned five-season run. Obviously this would require Netflix licensing the property to an adult website, but given Netflix's own history of giving a new home to previously-cancelled series (like Gilmore Girls and Arrested Development), they may be open to the notion.

Certainly XHamster has the financial firepower to make it happen. The website is one of the biggest and most heavily-trafficked on the entire Internet, dwarfing almost every single news outlet and bringing in colossal revenues from advertising. XHamster doesn't have much of an outlay cost, since most of their own content comes from other companies or is, er, crowd-sourced, so they end up making stupendous amounts of money and not doing very much with it. As the XHamster statement says, they can easily afford to produce Sense8 at the same level as Netflix was able to, which is mind-boggling.

Whether this idea goes anywhere remains to be seen, but I'm pretty sure that fans of the show would be happy to see the full five-year story concluded according to the Wachowskis and Straczynski's vision. We await their official response - and Netflix's - with interest.

CBS planning a second STAR TREK series...which is also a prequel

CBS's Star Trek: Discovery finally starts airing in September and it'll be interesting to see how well the show does. The series has already made a strong profit from overseas sales (mostly through Netflix) before it even arrives on CBS All Access in the United States, so it will be interesting to see how well it does. However, not willing to let the grass grow below their feet, CBS are already planning a second new Star Trek series.

Anyone up for 10 episodes of Khan hanging out in a spaceship in a desert? Anyone?

This new idea is...a bit unnecessary. Nicholas Meyer, who has been providing writing and production assistance on Discovery, is revisiting arguably his greatest triumph - Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan - to plan a series (possibly a limited mini-series) exploring what happened to Khan and his band of genetically-engineered exiles on Ceti Alpha V during the fifteen years between the Original Series episode Space Seed and the events of the movie.

I should, of course, point out that The Wrath of Khan answered this pretty well: the guys and girls played chess a lot, read Moby Dick way too much, and a bunch of them died. And that's kind of it.

CBS, please listen. What most fans want is a new series set 20+ years after the events of TNG, DS9 and Voyager, really exploring the Final Frontier and setting up new characters and events that should have the chance to be as iconic as what has come before. This constant stream of reboots and prequels is unoriginal and denying a new generation of viewers the chance to get their own crew of characters to relate to. I suspect Discovery will be good and this new Meyer series will probably be good, but neither have the freedom to tell stories the way they may want, as both are handicapped by canon and continuity (or risk ignoring it and irritating fans, as the unwarranted changes to the Klingons have already shown). Let's see something new, cool and interesting.

Alan Moore's million-word prose novel JERUSALEM gets a release date

Alan Moore is one of the most revered names in comics books, having written the seminal, acclaimed Watchmen, V For Vendetta and From Hell and contributed to many of the most famous names in the field, including Batman (most notably The Killing Joke), Superman (most famously Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?) and Swamp Thing. He has now announced that he has completed a one million-word prose novel for release this September.

Moor has been working on Jerusalem for over a decade and has occasionally dropped hints as to what the book will be about. One element the book deals with is the "consciousness event horizon", the idea that our individual consciousnesses cannot conceive of our own deaths, so at the moment of death our consciousness "rewinds" to the moment of birth and we get to live our lives over again. Some ideas suggest we are trapped into making the same exact decisions and living the same life through each time, others suggest we have freedom to change things. What version of this idea Moore will be exploring, or if that old idea for the book even holds true, is unknown.

Based on the blurb, I suspect this will not be an easy read.

In the half a square mile of decay and demolition that was England’s Saxon capital, eternity is loitering between the firetrap housing projects. Embedded in the grubby amber of the district’s narrative among its saints, kings, prostitutes, and derelicts a different kind of human time is happening, a soiled simultaneity that does not differentiate between the petrolcolored puddles and the fractured dreams of those who navigate them. Fiends last mentioned in the second-century Book of Tobit wait in urine-scented stairwells, the delinquent specters of unlucky children undermine a century with tunnels, and in upstairs parlors laborers with golden blood reduce fate to a snooker tournament.

An opulent mythology for those without a pot to piss in, through the labyrinthine streets and pages of Jerusalem tread ghosts that sing of wealth and poverty; of Africa, and hymns, and our threadbare millennium. They discuss English as a visionary language from John Bunyan to James Joyce, hold forth on the illusion of mortality post-Einstein, and insist upon the meanest slum as Blake’s eternal holy city.

Fierce in its imagining and stupefying in its scope, Alan Moore’s epic novel, Jerusalem, is the tale of Everything, told from a vanished gutter.

Jerusalem will be released on 13 September 2016.

R. Scott Bakker on maps and potential delays

R. Scott Bakker has posted the map that will accompany The Great Ordeal, the forthcoming third and penultimate volume of his Aspect-Emperor trilogy. Unfortunately, it comes with the caveat that the third book in the series may be facing a delay.

As is well-known, Bakker completed the then-final volume in the Aspect Emperor series well over a year ago, but there were substantial delays at his publisher Overlook. It took a concerted letter and email campaign by fans to get Overlook to finally schedule the novel. Finding the book too large, they decided to split it in two, with The Great Ordeal scheduled for July 2016 and The Unholy Consult for early 2017.

However, the editor at Overlook who was handling the novel has since departed and Overlook have not assigned Scott a new one. With publication only five months away and the full editorial cycle not yet begun, the novel hitting that date is starting to look doubtful.

Overlook's lacklustre handling of what is apparently one of their biggest-selling novel series is rather strange, and boosts the feeling that this series should really have moved to Orbit USA, who have much greater clout and the ability to get the books on shelves and promote them better. Overlook have done a splendid job getting Scott to this point but, as I've said before, it's clear they can't take him to the next level. Hopefully they can get moving and we'll see The Great Ordeal in its original publication slot or as soon as possible afterwards.

You can buy STAR WARS oranges

As a sign that the merchandising for The Force Awakens may have gone a tad overboard, Disney have released Star Wars-themed oranges for sale. Behold:

Guaranteed to boost your midichlorian count.

They're oranges. I was thinking maybe each orange had been carved into a replica of the Death Star, but no, they're just oranges. The only Star Wars link I can find is that BB-8 is on the packaging and he looks a bit like an orange, I guess? Maybe?

You can also get Yoda grapes.

"Nutritious, these are. Purchase, please do. A new conservatory, I needed. Just me not by my size, but paid, Yoda gotta be."

I'm going to extrapolate that the link here is that grapes are green, Yoda is green, etc.

The sales blurb:

Disney Consumer Products (DCP) brings the power of the Force to the produce aisle, unveiling new healthy Star Wars branded fruit and veggie offerings to celebrate the addition of Lucasfilm to The Walt Disney Company’s Healthy Living Commitment. Just in time for the December release of Star Wars: The Force Awakens, families can enjoy Star Wars-themed bagged apples by Sage, citrus fruit by Dayka Hackett, carrots by Kern Ridge and grapes with Yoda-themed packaging by Four Star, which all meet nutritional guidelines put in place by The Walt Disney Company. A sampling of the new product line will be revealed at the PMA Fresh Summit Convention & Expo October 23-25 in Atlanta, Georgia (Booth #5129).

John T. King, vice president of licensing, consumables, Disney Consumer Products comments, “Supporting parents by offering healthy, nutritious options for their kids is of utmost importance to The Walt Disney Company and adding family-favourite Star Wars to our licensed fruit and veggies portfolio is a natural extension of our commitment in this space.”

What.

More than 4.3 billion servings of Disney and Marvel-branded fruits and vegetables have been served in North America since DCP began tracking in 2006.

The prophecy has come true:

A Force Awakens flamethrower has not been officially confirmed at this time.

FINAL FANTASY VII REMAKE becomes a trilogy because of money

Square Enix have announced that Final Fantasy VII Remake has been split into multiple episodes (probably three) because it needs to make more money.

Players of the original game will remember that it came on three CD-ROMs on its original release on the first PlayStation in 1997, making for a then-astonishingly huge game given its graphical prowess. However, Final Fantasy VII was also a rather modestly-sized game in overall terms by modern standards. I beat the game in 32 hours on my first playthrough (not doing all the sidequests or grinding for chocobos) and 37 on my second (doing all of the sidequests and a bit of grinding). Most of my friends finished it in around 40 hours or so, which also seems to be the generally-accepted length of the game. For comparison's sake, a complete playthrough of the two-and-a-half BioWare Baldur's Gate games could take 200 hours when all sidequests and faction-specific missions were taken into account. The likes of Skyrim and Fallout 4 have well north of 100 hours of content apiece. Even the very linear and relatively modest Dragon Age II has a length of around 25 hours.

Trying to justify the split, Square have pointed out the fact that the original game had a lot of unique art. Transforming that into original 3D graphics for each location, with limitations on how much assets can be re-used as the game moves from urban to desert to tropical to jungle to arctic environments. This, to be fair, is a reasonable point. 3D games get away with their sizes by cleverly recycling content. Older 2D games (Final Fantasy VII had 3D characters moving over pre-painted 2D backdrops) could have unique art and assets in every location as the backdrops were simple paintings.

To give more bang for players' buck, Square have confirmed that each chunk of the game will be expanded, with new story material, side-quests, perspectives and other elements added. They pointed out that Midgar will now be a large, open-world hub rather than a series of distinct, linear sections, giving you more freedom to move around. Presumably other parts of the game will get the same treatment.

No release schedule for Final Fantasy VII Remake has been set, but one piece of good news about the split is that it means we might get the start of the game sooner. Square would be silly not to be aiming for the game's 20th anniversary in 2017 for the release of the first part.

TAWNY MAN trilogy gets spectacularly awful new covers

For inexplicable reasons, the American editions of Robin Hobb's Tawny Man Trilogy have been given some new covers which are quite remarkably terrible.

Fool's Errand: 17th Century gentleman out for a stroll after a hard day oppressing the peasantry.

Golden Fool: Benedict Cumberbatch playing a dapper version of the Witcher.

Fool's Fate: Art director trudges into Swiss mountains in search of John Howe to beg for his return.

This is a series of books that was once (in the UK) graced by cover art from the monumental John Howe. Even the original American covers were better than this. Urgh.

They also revealed a preview of the next reprint cover they are planning for the series:

(thanks to my friend Carol for that idea)

Preliminary Initial TitanCon Report Preview

 

More to follow.

ORPHAN BLACK Season 3 released in the UK

The third season of Orphan Black has finally hit UK screens, although in an unexpected way.

Helena was resolutely unimpressed at the BBC's dicking-around antics.

The first season of the critically-acclaimed SF show aired on BBC3, several months after the original Canadian/American transmission. Season 2 then aired just a couple of days after the North American airing. It was assumed that this pattern would be repeated for Season 3, but the BBC oddly sat on it and refused to say when it would air. And then today the first eight episodes of the season were released simultaneously on the BBC iPlayer.

The remaining two episodes should go up shortly. The season will also air on Sunday mornings on BBC3, with the first two episodes airing at, erm, 2.10am this coming Sunday. The rest of the season will follow in double bills.

The bizarre release pattern may be a test run for the future of BBC3. The channel will go off-air next Spring, its content instead transitioning to the iPlayer only. The BBC may be looking at the numbers from Orphan Black for an indication as to how well it will do. Which is nice, but I would submit that if they want this to be more successful they need to 1) actually advertising the show and 2) not wait until six months after the season has aired in the States and Canada.

Anyway, after a lengthy delay it's good to be able to watch the season at last.

Daniel Radcliffe stars in BBC drama about GRAND THEFT AUTO

Yes, that headline exists and I am not making it up.

In The Gamechangers Daniel "Harry Potter" Radcliffe is playing Sam Houser of Rockstar Games, one of the guys who took the struggling Grand Theft Auto franchise (after one classic, hit game in 1997 and a so-so sequel in 1999) and, with 2001's GTA3, created the biggest franchise in gaming history (until Call of Duty, anyway).

The game focuses on the clash between Houser and Jack Thompson (played by Bill Paxton of Aliens and Agents of SHIELD fame), an American lawyer who tried to get the games banned for being violent and inspiring real-life crime. Thompson's unsubstantiated claims and general lack of professionalism later (SPOILERS!) led to him being disbarred.

I don't know if it's going to be any good or not - the trailer is bizarre - but the sheer randomness of this project may make it worth checking out. Radcliffe's disturbing facial fungus does make me long for an alternate universe in which he plays a young Trevor from GTA5.

Meanwhile, the project gives Rock Paper Shotgun the excuse to check out Harry Potter/Grand Theft Auto crossover fanfic, which also exists.

The Gamechangers will air on BBC2 on 15 September.

Trailer for ASH VS EVIL DEAD

The first trailer has been released for Ash vs. Evil Dead, the TV sequel to Sam Raimi's classic Evil Dead trilogy of horror-comedy movies.

The new series, produced for Starz, will consist of ten episodes and will pick up some twenty-odd years after the events of Army of Darkness (from the setting, I'd guess that the non-apocalyptic one of Army's two endings is now canon). Bruce Campbell will repise the role of Ash, who has been living low and continuing to work in a hardware store. When the Deadites return Ash is forced to go back into battle against them, although age means he also needs to recruit some sidekicks to help out. Still, as the trailer indicates Ash is more than capable of fighting the undead hordes and both his trusty chainsaw and "boomstick" will return.

The series has also cast Lucy Lawless in it, immediately making it more awesome before it even airs.

Ash vs. Evil Dead will debut (of course) on 31 October. It looks extremely gory.

Scott Bakker's THE UNHOLY CONSULT delayed for no apparent reason

Fans of R. Scott Bakker's Second Apocalypse mega-series have been eagerly awaiting the sixth and (sort of) final novel novel in the series, The Unholy Consult, since it was submitted to Overlook Press in February 2014 for publication. However, since then there has only been a deafening silence from Overlook over a publication date. This has recently been compounded by the removal of the ebooks for the five previous volumes from sale.

The Second Apocalypse is divided into two sub-trilogies, The Prince of Nothing and The Aspect-Emperor. Bakker also plans a third series, currently a duology, although this is apparently more of a sequel to the first six books and The Unholy Consult will provide closure to the series as a whole if necessary. The previous novels in the series were The Darkness That Comes Before (2003), The Warrior-Prophet (2004), The Thousandfold Thought (2006), The Judging Eye (2009) and The White Luck Warrior (2011). Combined worldwide sales of the series to date are in the neighbourhood of one million books sold.

Overlook Press has been Bakker's primary publishers in the United States. However, Overlook are a relatively small and independent publishing company without the resources of many of the larger publishers to get lots of copies on the shelves. Sales in the United States have been relatively low compared to Bakker's performance in other markets: sales for Orbit Books in the Commonwealth territories (most notably the UK) seem to have been a lot stronger. Bakker's American sales through Overlook seem to account for only a quarter of total sales of the series, which is highly unusual. A move to a bigger publisher may be a good idea, although for in-progress (and in-contract) series that can be very complicated.

According to Scott, despite turning in the first draft, complete manuscript for The Unholy Consult in February 2014 (almost sixteen months ago now), Overlook are still to announce a publication date and have not yet even assigned an editor to the book. So if they began editing work tomorrow, it would still be unlikely for the book to come out much before the end of 2016 at the earliest. Other publishers, such as Orbit in the UK, are unable to proceed until Overlook have completed the final copy-edit of the novel.

Overlook have also not yet explained why the ebooks of the series have been pulled from sale.

To help the situation, it may be worth sending a polite email to Overlook asking a release date and explaining why the series appeals to you. Tweeting them may also be of use. If you haven't read the series yet because you were waiting for the final volume, it sounds like The Unholy Consult will give enough closure in case the sequel series never appears, so now is a good time to get off the fence. Tweets to Overlook to that effect may also be helpful. I would also recommend following Bakker on Twitter. Whilst Bakker uses Twitter more for philosophical musings than marketing (as he cheerfully admits), an increase in his social media profile would certainly help matters.

On the positive side, Bakker confirms that there is a lot of interest in the series from other publishers if Overlook do choose not to proceed with finishing the series. However, the Paul Kearney situation over The Sea-Beggars trilogy (where the US publishers have refused to publish the third volume but also refused to give up the rights to Solaris, who are very keen to finish it off) shows that a transfer of rights can be along-winded process in itself.

Updates as I get them.

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