Margaret Weis, who with Tracy Hickman is accountable for the beloved Dragonlance Chronicles sequence of Dungeons & Dragons novels, has confirmed to Polygon {that a} secretive venture to create a streaming tv sequence set on the planet of Krynn is not going to transfer ahead. The information broke Wendesday at ComicBook.com, and included an emotional interview with its champion, actor Joe Manganiello (True Blood, Justice League).
“Every part occurred precisely as he mentioned,” Weis mentioned in an e-mail. “The rumor is floating round {that a} pilot was truly filmed. That didn’t occur and Joe doesn’t say that it occurred. The venture by no means bought that far.”
Rumors of a live-action English-language adaptation of the Dragonlance setting have circulated for years now, however issues got here to a head early 2023. That’s when Manganiello, talking throughout a D&D livestream presentation, appeared to point that he was engaged on a Dragonlance TV venture in earnest. On Wednesday he confirmed to ComicBook.com that the venture was actual, and that it wasn’t shifting ahead following the sale by Hasbro of its eOne entertainment arm to Lionsgate. That’s a transfer that Hasbro CEO Chris Cocks had been telegraphing to the corporate’s traders for years.
“Tracy and Margaret had been all about it,” Manganiello mentioned of the venture, which had a accomplished script for a pilot episode. The actor, clearly in mourning, mentioned there was a 1,000-page lookbook created that includes ideas for arms and armor, in addition to distinctive takes on the franchise’s iconic dragons.
“I [even] provided to purchase Dragonlance [from Hasbro],” Manganiello mentioned.
Along with the sale of eOne, Manganiello factors to the lackluster efficiency of final 12 months’s Dragonlance: Shadow of the Dragon Queen journey module. Following a fractious authorized battle over a brand new sequence of Dragonlance novels, neither Hickman nor Weis had been invited to take part in its creation. Manganiello, clearly pissed off, additionally mentioned that the module was weighed down by what he calls a “failed” board sport, Dragonlance: Warriors of Krynn, designed by Rob Daviau (Threat Legacy, Pandemic Legacy) and Stephen Baker (HeroQuest, Battle Masters).
Final we heard, Paramount Plus was mentioned to be engaged on a D&D streaming sequence with eOne. It’s not recognized to have had something to do with Dragonlance. Followers nonetheless have some thrilling new content material on the horizon, nevertheless: Dragons of Eternity, the third quantity within the Dragonlance Destinies sequence by Hickman and Weis, is due out on Aug. 6. Pre-orders can be found now, together with at Amazon. You may learn excerpts of the trilogy’s first two novels, Dragons of Deceit and Dragons of Future, on Polygon — alongside in-depth interviews with the authors.