Willow Media: Consult the Bones!

[Meredith Quill]

Your Media Topic!

[BetterButter]

‘Willow’ TV Series Finds New Director in ‘I’m Not Okay With This’ Co-Creator Jonathan Entwistle

[BetterButter]

‘Willow’: Amer Chadha-Patel To Star In Disney+ Series

[ihartcoffee]

I recently found out they were planning to make a series based on Willow.  I'm not sure how you can top the original actors, but I'll give them a chance.  I saw the original in the theater, and had the VHS forever.  I made my daughter watch it growing up and she became a fan.  This and Wyatt Earp are my fav Val Kilmer movies. He was good in Top Gun too, but a bit of a jerk.   Strange side story my dog does not like being called a peck.  Discovered this totally by accident, he barks and gets all mad when I say Peck peck peck at him, lol. 

[BetterButter]

 

[BetterButter]

[Anduin]

Looks interesting! Worth watching.

[Bort]

Sorcha! I didn’t know they got Joanne Whalley to be in too.

[sharifa70]

I just watched the series trailer and I have to say I cannot wait. I, too, saw the original in the theater (in the balcony!) so many times I lost count, and also owned it on VHS. The line I drop into conversation most often is “Tempting…..but no.” 

[BetterButter]

[AnimeMania]

[AnimeMania]

Willow the 8 episode TV Series that streams November 30, 2022 on Disney+ is a continuation of Willow the Movie. Willow the 1988 fantasy movie starred Warwick Davis as a reluctant farmer / aspiring magician who plays a critical role in protecting a special baby, Princess Elora Danan, from the tyrannical queen Bavmorda who vows to destroy her and take over the world. They manage to destroy the evil queen and banish the forces of darkness. The TV Series takes place years after the events of the film. 

In the new TV Series, a magical world where brownies, sorcerers, trolls, and other mystical creatures flourish, the adventure continues, as an unlikely group of heroes set off on a dangerous quest to find Princess Elora and to save a kidnapped prince. They go to places far beyond their home, where they must face their inner demons and come together to save their world. But first the must seek out the legendary Willow Ufgood to help them.

(L-R): Graydon (Tony Revolori), Boorman (Amar Chadha-Patel), Dove (Ellie Bamber), Kit (Ruby Cruz), Willow Ufgood (Warwick Davis) and Jade (Erin Kellyman)

Warwick Davis as Willow Ufgood

Ellie Bamber as Dove, an unassuming kitchen maid who proves she is the “chosen one” as she embarks on the journey.

Ruby Cruz as Kit, daughter of Madmartigan, a disgraced knight and Sorcha, the warrior daughter of the evil Queen Bavmorda. Kit is a princess whose twin brother was abducted. She is destined to be a leader and ultimately the queen. 

Joanne Whalley as Sorsha 

Erin Kellyman as Jade, Kit's servant, best friend and moral compass. She is on her way to becoming the best young warrior in the kingdom.

Amar Chadha-Patel as Boorman, a thief and liar, he joins the quest in exchange for getting out of prison.

Tony Revolori as Graydon 

Talisa Garcia plays a queen who is the mother of Graydon 

Graham Hughes as Serius 

Annabelle Davis as Mims, Willow Ufgood's daughter and Warwick Davis' real life daughter 

Dempsey Bryk

Rosabell Laurenti Sellers plays a resourceful character with a sharp, acerbic wit.

Ralph Ineson as Commander Ballantine

Christian Slater 

Kevin Pollock as Rool

Rick Overton as Franjean

[AnimeMania]

[tv echo]

WILLOW - epic new Original series streaming only on #DisneyPlus.
FabTV   Nov 28, 2022

[nodorothyparker]

Val Kilmer wasn't written out of new Willow series until just before production

Quote

"We started building out the first season with the intent of having him appear," he says. "[It wasn't clear we couldn't get him] until pretty late in the process, frankly."

Of course, Kasdan's planning was all before the COVID-19 pandemic forced the world into lockdown and made film sets completely rethink their approaches to production. "As COVID overtook the world, it became insurmountable," he explains. "We were prepping in the spring of the year that it was most happening. And Val reluctantly didn't feel he could come out. We had to figure out a way to preserve the story we wanted to tell with him about how his story was playing out."

This actually goes some way for me in explaining some of the issues with the show so far if they thought until fairly late in the planning and plotting that the writing would be including Madmartigan and then had to quickly reconfigure as production was already starting. It also makes sense the way Boorman is dancing around the what happened to Madmartigan question if they're still hoping to bring the character onto the canvas if they get a second season.

[tv echo]

[tv echo]

[Cranberry]

Some new footage in today's trailer! Look at Elora's hair and what Kit's wearing. Also, Christian Slater finally appears!

New article about Kit and Jade after episode five, as well:

Quote

In building out a foundation for Kit and Jade’s relationship, Cruz and Kellyman spent a lot of time creating their own backstories for the characters, since much of their childhood remains untold. Kit probably snuck into Jade’s room almost every night for sleepovers growing up, which started stirring up confusing emotions as they grew older. Jade’s surrogate father, the commander of the knights that serve Kit’s mother, likely noticed his young charge’s budding crush and warned Jade to keep her relationship with the princess professional if she really wanted to become a knight. They’ve even decided that Kit and Jade’s kiss in Episode 1 was their first.

“I think for us, as queer people, it was really awesome to get the chance to explore queer friendships on screen,” said Cruz. “Those can be very confusing. For Kit, she definitely questioned a lot growing up. Do I want to be with this person, or do I want to be that person? That’s something that I feel like so many queer people go through.”

This (very mildly spoilery) bit was interesting:

Spoiler

“If Kit and Elora’s relationship was going to be a really deep and powerful platonic friendship, it made sense to me that Jade and Kit’s relationship would be something totally different and interesting and complicated for different reasons,” said Kasdan.

[AnimeMania]

What! No Serius poster?

[Cranberry]

 

[thuganomics85]

Looks like it's one and done.

Not surprised since it felt like there was no buzz for it whatsoever, so I imagine the streaming numbers or whatever metrics they use now weren't all that good.  It wasn't perfect, but I did enjoy parts of it, so I'm a little bummed we won't see how this all plays out.

[Mr. Sparkle]

Despite my 😲 emoji, I'm not really surprised. I never met anyone in real life who watched it, and I saw very little chatter about it online. An ok show based on an ok movie. 

Quote

did not have the zeitgeist cultural impact of the original but was well received by critics

This line from the article made me laugh. I'll grant the original a cult following at best. 

[nodorothyparker]

I'm a little disappointed as I thought there was definitely some potential there had they been willing to do a bit of retooling but also not really surprised. Willow was a 30-some-year-old movie that didn't have the following of oh say, the Star Wars franchise. The only people who really had any idea what it was were a mostly cult following of Gen Xers and older Millennials and then the show didn't even really play to that much.

There was no Val Kilmer (which to be fair was not the show's fault), too little Sorsha, and while Christian Slater was definitely one of the show's better ideas, he was much too little too late. Warwick Davis seemed to spend most of his time onscreen fighting to grumpily regurgitate absurd amounts of overly convoluted exposition. The next generation cast really struggled to establish their characters beyond the big bag o' fantasy tropes they were saddled with. It also didn't help that the show basically undid the more or less happy ending of the film and tanked so much of its original premise as Elora Danan was mostly underwhelming at best and felt like something hardly worth so many characters sacrificing so much for. Willow could tell us ad nauseum that "the world will burn" without her, but the show never really managed to show how or why.
 

[Bort]

13 minutes ago, nodorothyparker said:

The only people who really had any idea what it was were a mostly cult following of Gen Xers and older Millennials and then the show didn't even really play to that much.

Yeah, that was what I thought was their biggest mistake, as the built in audience for Willow was Gen Xers and Millenials but the end result seemed to be a show that was appealing for Zoomers — most of whom probably never saw the movie. I did know a few people who were excited for the show but bounced early because it was “too teenagery.”

Quote

Elora Danan was mostly underwhelming at best and felt like something hardly worth so many characters sacrificing so much for. Willow could tell us ad nauseum that "the world will burn" without her, but the show never really managed to show how or why.

I think we’d have seen how important Elora Danan was if the show had continued with its intended other volumes to tell, as illustrated by the bookshelf. Instead, we’re left wondering why.

[nodorothyparker]

35 minutes ago, kariyaki said:

Yeah, that was what I thought was their biggest mistake, as the built in audience for Willow was Gen Xers and Millenials but the end result seemed to be a show that was appealing for Zoomers — most of whom probably never saw the movie. I did know a few people who were excited for the show but bounced early because it was “too teenagery.”

So much this. I'll be honest that I probably hung in there mostly because I have such a ridiculous amount of nostalgic fondness for the movie. We subscribed to Disney specifically to see this series as Willow was my first toe dip into fantasy. My husband loved the idea of the series. He loved what he saw of the Christian Slater episode and had the show been more of that out of the gate, he might have stuck with it. But as he says, we have teenagers. He's not interested in watching somebody else's teenagers spending most of every episode doing teenage stuff in what should have been a familiar property.

[iMonrey]

Aww, I liked it. I'm sad.

[Mr. Sparkle]

A new hope? I'm not even sure what this article is saying. 

https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/willow-showrunner-takes-issue-word-133440093.html

[Cranberry]

Basically that there are no plans to film more of the show within the next year, but it hasn't actually been cancelled. More seasons could be filmed in the future if the first season continues to get views on streaming and if there's money to continue the story. The actors have been released from their contracts so they can take other jobs in the meantime.

It's better than nothing, I suppose, but a lot of people are viewing this as a nicer way to cancel a show, just putting it in limbo. It's similar to what happened with Mindhunter. In 2019, we were told that the show was on indefinite hold while David Fincher finished working on his next film. In 2020, Netflix released the cast from their contracts and said they'd maybe do another season in five years. Finally in 2023 Fincher said it was straight-up over.

[Bort]

1 hour ago, Cranberry said:

Basically that there are no plans to film more of the show within the next year, but it hasn't actually been cancelled. More seasons could be filmed in the future if the first season continues to get views on streaming and if there's money to continue the story. The actors have been released from their contracts so they can take other jobs in the meantime.

It's better than nothing, I suppose, but a lot of people are viewing this as a nicer way to cancel a show, just putting it in limbo. It's similar to what happened with Mindhunter. In 2019, we were told that the show was on indefinite hold while David Fincher finished working on his next film. In 2020, Netflix released the cast from their contracts and said they'd maybe do another season in five years. Finally in 2023 Fincher said it was straight-up over.

On the other hand, this has how Fargo has been handled. Years pass between seasons but it’s never officially cancelled and new seasons get produced when the show runners get around to it, That show has the benefit of needing a whole new cast each season, so it works out that way.

[Cranberry]

https://variety.com/2023/digital/news/disney-plus-hulu-content-removed-willow-dollface-1235618280/

Quote

Disney’s content culling from Disney+ and Hulu is coming as early as next week — with the media company pulling off at least four dozen titles, including series “Willow,” “The Mysterious Benedict Society” and “Dollface,” and movies such as “The One and Only Ivan.”

This is truly bad, not just for Willow fans, but for anyone who worked on the show and was collecting residuals and anyone who might want to see it in the future and now has no (legal) way to find it. This removal of content that has no physical release is a troubling trend in streaming.

[DanaK]

3 hours ago, Cranberry said:

https://variety.com/2023/digital/news/disney-plus-hulu-content-removed-willow-dollface-1235618280/

This is truly bad, not just for Willow fans, but for anyone who worked on the show and was collecting residuals and anyone who might want to see it in the future and now has no (legal) way to find it. This removal of content that has no physical release is a troubling trend in streaming.

The thinking is that it will be sold to a FAST (ad-supported) channel, like several of Warner Bros Discovery shows were, so they can get at least some money from it instead of it sitting around with hardly any subscribers watching (assumingly) but them still having to pay residuals. But note, the showrunner insisted it wasn't canceled, just that it would be more than 12 months before they could get around to making a second season. Well it's canceled on Disney+ for sure