How much do you want to bet that none of the leads will be Asian?
Ken Liu’s steampunk (or as he calls it, silkpunk) fantasy epic series, The Dandelion Dynasty, has been picked up for a film adaptation by DMG, which has brought rights to the first three books.
The series is loosely based on the Chu-Han contention, and is modeled after the Romance of the Three Kingdoms. According to Variety, adaptation of the first in the series, The Grace of Kings, is currently being fast-tracked.
P.S. In case you’re wondering why the name sounds familiar, Nebula and Hugo winner Ken Liu is the English translator for The Three Body Problem.
Oh, I read this!
I was extremely excited at first – it’s Zhang Liang! It’s Han Xin! It’s Lv Zhi! But they have different hair colors and they’re disguised with different names! By the end though, I was a little bored – it was like a mildly more interesting history textbook. To be sure, I /like/ reading textbooks, but reading textbooks and novels are different :( I loved the Three Body Problem, this, not so much, but I’m glad it’s being adapted?
I share your sentiments 100% The novel’s fictional cultures are supposed to be based on Oceanic cultures(Polynesian, Micronesian etc. – Amta Zyndu/Xiang Yu’s sharktooth weapon for example), but why bother to make them blond haired and blue eyed? This is almost contrary to his proclaimed ideas of anti- Orientalism. Actually, you’re writing stories for the people “orientalizing” you in the first place. Are we supposed to find every single green eyed Mongol and blond haired Hmong and trident bearded Ainu?
I thought it was too similar to pre-existing texts without an exciting twist/angle. Also, if it’s going to be fantasy anyways, couldn’t he have made at least one of the main characters female? I think that given the history is interesting in and itself, though, a film could work, and the non-Chinese fantasy characters could make it easier to sell to Western audiences.
Yes, exactly! He did make Han Xin female, but he couldn’t do it without making her Zhang Liang’s romantic interest…and I was really quite disappointed in the characterization of Xiang Yu/Mata.