More Movies That Could Become TV Shows

With "About a Boy" and "Bad Teacher" series coming up soon for midseason, and the proposed "Beverly Hills Cop" and "Zombieland" series having bit the dust, let's see what television adaptations of successful feature films are coming down the pipeline next.

Fargo - The Coens have signed on to executive produce this limited series for FX, envisioned as a ten-episode series. Billy Bob Thornton, Martin Freeman, Colin Hanks, Kate Walsh, and Bob Odenkirk have already signed on, and the show is tentatively scheduled for late next year. This actually isn't the first time someone has taken a shot at bringing "Fargo" to the small screen. There was a 1997 pilot that would have followed the continuing adventures of Marge Gunderson, played by Edie Falco. The 2014 series will be dealing with entirely different characters and a new set of crimes. That means it'll be far enough removed from the original that the series can hopefully strike out on its own.

12 Monkeys - This one's already in the casting stage. Aaron Stanford will play a man from the future who travels back in time to stop a deadly plague from dooming mankind, and Amanda Schull will be the female lead. Syfy the ordered pilot based on the 1995 Terry Gilliam movie. It's probably going to end up looking more like Syfy's Canadian acquisition "Continuum" than anything associated with Terry Gilliam. The original film's producers will be back, but the chief creatives in charge are Terry Matalas and Travis Fickett, best known for "Nikita," and "Terra Nova." I'm not really feeling this one, and apparently neither is Terry Gilliam, who has made it very clear he has nothing to do with the project.

Reality Bites - Frankly, I was never much of a fan of this Ben Stiller comedy, and found its angst-ridden post-grads insufferable. Stiller is back to executive produce NBC's upcoming attempt to turn the travails of Lelaina Pierce, originally played by Winona Ryder, into a single camera sitcom. It'll still be set in the early 90s, and still examine the life of a struggling Gen-Xer, NBC is trying a lot of different tactics to try and revive its struggling lineup, but I'm doubtful about the chances of a nostalgic "Reality Bites" series. We're really not far removed enough from the 90s yet, and the original movie didn't make much of a dent in the mainstream consciousness in 1994. Maybe they should sit on this a little longer.

Westworld - HBO recently ordered a pilot based on the 1973 Yul Brynner science-fiction film about a theme park where the animatronics run amok. Jonathan Nolan, who's been doing a great job with "Person of Interest," is set to write and direct the pilot. J.J. Abrams and his Bad Robot partners are producing. Yes, the movie just hit its fortieth anniversary, but it's built around an intriguing concept that is ripe for some reinvention. "Westworld" is another of those properties that people have been trying to remake for decades now. I hope that this one turns out to be successful and will inspire Hollywood to look a little further back in time for material to adapt. Is it too soon to hope for a "Logan's Run" series too?

Outbreak - Remember the 1995 pandemic movie that starred Dustin Hoffman and the monkey from "Friends"? Yeah, NBC is turning that one into a television show too. I don't understand why they didn't go for the more recent pandemic drama "Contagion," which is much fresher in the public's mind, but oh well. John Wells and Jack Orman, formerly of "ER," are writing and producing. "Outbreak" has been described as a new spin on a medical drama, and there have been a dearth of good ones lately, so this is welcome news.

Scream - Not much has been revealed about MTV's "Scream" television series since the pilot was greenlit back in July, though from what little has been revealed, it apparently won't have much to do with the film series. That film series is still going, by the way. "Scream 5" is still in the works, and according to Harvey Weistein is intended to be a final capper on the film franchise that is now seventeen years old. Whatever the fate of "Scream 5," it should have no effect on the television series' prospects.

And the rest - Still in the very early stages of development are are a "Gangs of New York" series over at HBO, "American Psycho" for FX, "El Mariachi" for El Rey, "From Dusk 'Til Dawn" for Univision, and "Rambo," "The Exorcist," and "L.A. Confidential," projects that have yet to land a network's backing. I should also mention the SyFy series "Dominion," which I'm not sure how to classify, but it's described as a sequel of sorts to the Paul Bettany supernatural film "Legion."

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