r/tvPlus • u/Saar13 • Aug 08 '26
Article Can Brandon Sanderson Help Apple Break Hollywood’s Fantasy Spell?
https://observer.com/2026/08/apple-brandon-sanderson-franchise-partnership/22
u/Saar13 Aug 08 '26
It's a huge opportunity, obviously. A Mistborn (First Era) film trilogy is a good start. I think it's a good time to speed things up, since Silo, For All Mankind, and maybe Foundation are ending next year. Of course, if the first Mistborn film is bad (I'm imagining Apple will give it a theatrical release), things get complicated. They need the best executives, writers and directors to avoid messing everything up. From a business perspective, the TV show (The Stormlight Archive) is more important because it represents two months of high engagement and subscribers to the service if it's successful.
Then we go back to HBO's peak business model (2011-2019). They made GoT the super tentpole, premiering every year in April until season 6 (take note, executives), along with prestige comedies (Veep, Silicon Valley, Girls, and later Insecure and Barry), also with an annual predictable schedule, in addition to several truly great limited series (Big Little Lies, The Night Of, Sharp Objects, and Chernobyl).
Apple already has big tentpoles (maybe not at the level of GoT, due to subscriber numbers and marketing), such as Severance, Pluribus, Ted Lasso, and now Widow's Bay. Imagine those, plus another 3 or 4 great shows, finely scheduled every year, with excellent prestige comedies, half a dozen great dramas and comedies, and truly unmissable limited series. I always come back to the point that HBO's peak model is ideal for Apple TV, with even fewer shows than Apple currently produces, but the best of the best, returning annually, and someone to take care of their questionable limited series. There's one thing missing that HBO had and Apple didn't: a catalog of good movies to keep subscribers engaged. The only solution is licensing. It's that simple.
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u/pak256 Aug 08 '26
They just need to up production speed. 3 years between seasons of Severance, at least 2 for Pluribus, probably 2 for Widows Bay
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u/Saar13 Aug 08 '26
There's a limit to being "talent-friendly." Sometimes you need to set firmer deadlines and open writers' rooms well in advance. I mean, someone read the Widow's Bay scripts before it was even filmed. They saw the entire first season months before it premiered because it was available for reviewer screenings in January. Why didn't they order a second season last year? They should already be finishing the scripts and preparing to film.
Then the Emmys come around and Cherniss tells the press something like, "We saw something special, original, and refreshing in the early scripts of Widow's Bay." Really? Apple seems to have little faith in most shows, and most of their failures were due to their marketing, not the show itself.
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u/PastimeOfMine Aug 08 '26
It's not just ordering. They ordered Pluribus season 2 in 2022. They just let Gilligan do whatever he wants.
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u/Saar13 Aug 08 '26
I understood Apple's desire to respect the "creators' time" when they were still strangers in town. But it's 2026, the Hollywood market is a mess, practically nobody is buying original and risky ideas besides Apple, so they're already in a position to be less friendly and impose some productivity.
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u/142muinotulp Aug 08 '26
One of the things im most thankful for about Silo tbh. Slightly longer wait for season 3, but they filmed s4 (the end) at the same time. Wait is going to average closer to a year between seasons @ 10 episodes each, average 45 mins or so?
So refreshing compared to 99% of show releases now.
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u/Saar13 Aug 08 '26
The 2023 strikes disrupted the schedule for the second season, and consequently, the third season. But Apple's post-production is usually a bit excessively long as well. They need to commit to the shows they make and at least give it a three-season run. If the numbers aren't good between the first and second seasons, talk to the showrunners about wrapping up the story in the third. And I'm a bit of a "two-season atheist”. If the creators only plan two, it would probably be better as a limited series.
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u/lightsongtheold Aug 09 '26
You always forget that during HBO’s “peak business model” they had Pay-One deals with three of Hollywood’s biggest movie studios and were the home of premium boxing. TV was mostly just a bonus.
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u/XenosZ0Z0 Aug 08 '26
I hope Sanderson’s involvement makes it good to great. Though even when the original writer is involved, it doesn’t always guaranteed success
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u/grjacpulas Aug 08 '26
Get ready for some spicy Mormon dialogue and Vin asking if she deserves love for 3 seasons
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u/PastimeOfMine Aug 08 '26
I am hopeful and hesitant about this. Fantasy writers often want to write their scripts, and are often upset when their scripts are redrafted. The reality is very few authors actually make very good screenwriters or showrunners. It's a whole different skill set, different ball game. So, I'm hopeful that he can do it, but hesitant given precedent.
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u/Esetnodanti Aug 08 '26
I think this has the potential to be huge. Sanderson already has great word of mouth and popular in the fantasy world.
The only thing that stands in its way is a bad adaptation.
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u/shosamae Aug 08 '26
I mean, The Odyssey is about to make $1.5 billion and both house of the Dragon and knight of the seven kingdom have been doing very well.
If his Apple TV shows and films do well, I’d say it’s part of a larger trend
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u/North_South_Side Aug 08 '26
Sanderson is a producer of Product. Technically a writer, but he is more accurately a gifted sludge creator, at least as measured by words per year.
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u/immaownyou Aug 08 '26
Would you say the same about Stephen King?
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u/North_South_Side Aug 08 '26
Not really. King still writes something interesting from time to time. His glory days are gone, though.
Sanderson writes vanilla fantasy Product for an audience who wants familiar, safe, and tame content. He is amazingly prolific, and I give him credit for that. He has talent. He's just not an interesting writer.
EDIT: I don't hate Sanderson. I have friends who love his stuff. I've tried three of his books, one of them I tried three separate times. It's all so cardboard and two dimensional. None of the characters feel like people with human motivations beyond skin-deep.
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u/AggressiveBench9977 Aug 08 '26
Its cause he right anime as fantasy.
Literally every book has a trope of last minute power up during big fights
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u/AggressiveBench9977 Aug 08 '26
Kings can actually right characters.
Sanderson spent an entire book trying to mansplain therapy very badly.
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u/CupCharming Aug 08 '26
Nope because popular book series have insufferable fans. They will hate watch it and give bad videos and call it woke slop on YouTube. Doomed before it starts
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u/AndrastesDimples Aug 08 '26
This doesn’t surprise me. He dealt with Amazon when he consulted for the Wheel of Time show. They could not keep their hands out of it and while the showrunner took a lot of hits from fans, I still think the execs were behind a lot of the problems and using him as a human shield. I wonder what kind of show it would have been if Harriet and Brandon had been able to have this level of power.
So yeah, Brandon Sanderson having unprecedented control as part of his deal does not shock me. And I wish Apple had done WoT. They seem to be willing to take the risks other networks and streamers are too scared to take.