There is so much on television these days, in the age of streaming, it is hard to keep up.\u00a0 The days when we had only three networks, and we pretty much knew what was on each of them every night of the week\u00a0 are long gone.\u00a0\u00a0 One thing is the same, though.\u00a0 It is always a joy to stumble on a show that you haven’t seen before, a great show that just blows you away, that sinks its claws into you and won’t let go.<\/p>\n
Parris and I found one\u00a0 just last week; an animated series called BLUE EYE SAMURAI.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n I hardly know where to start on this one.\u00a0\u00a0 Once we started watching it, we could not stop.\u00a0\u00a0 Binged the whole thing in three nights, and I am already hungry for the second season.\u00a0\u00a0 They are doing some amazing things with animation these days, as series like LOVE, DEATH, AND ROBOTS have shown… and this is coming from a kid who was weaned on the classic Disney features (my favorites being PINOCCHIO and DUMBO, but really, I loved them all — the originals, please, not these “live action” rehashes).\u00a0\u00a0 Even so, BLUE EYE SAMURAI<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0<\/em>has the most gorgeous art that I have ever seen.\u00a0 The story is terrific as well.\u00a0\u00a0 Set in Japan during the Edo period, it is violent, visceral, sexy (and more than a little kinky in spots), with amazing action sequences and a cast of well-developed characters, colorful and complex and real. \u00a0 Flawed heroes, villains who are more than cartoons (though they are cartoons, being drawn, after all).<\/p>\n It reminded me of some books I read… what was the title of that series, now? \u00a0 Something about a song…<\/p>\n Ah, never mind…<\/p>\n BLUE EYE SAMURA<\/em><\/strong>I is very much its own thing, and it is magnificent. \u00a0 Even if you don’t normally watch animation, give it a try. \u00a0 It’s terrific.\u00a0 If you like my own stuff, I think you’ll love it.<\/p>\n As it happens, HBO and I have our own animated projects, set in the world of A SONG OF ICE & FIRE.<\/em><\/strong> \u00a0 None of them have been greenlit yet, but I think we are getting close to taking the next step with a couple of them.\u00a0\u00a0 When this last round of development started a few years back, we had four ideas for animated shows, with some great talents attached.\u00a0\u00a0 Writers rooms and summits, outline and scripts followed in due course… but, alas, two of the original projects were subsequently shelved.<\/p>\n (Those of you who have read my reports in years past may recall that I prefer to say “shelved” rather than “killed,” as nothing is ever dead for good in Hollywood, and a project put on the shelf one year can be taken off the shelf a few years later).\u00a0\u00a0 (( I still have hopes of presenting the stories that we shelved in another form, perhaps as graphic novels)).<\/p>\n Work on the other two animated projects continues apace, however…and meanwhile, we have moved N<\/strong>INE VOYAGES, <\/strong><\/em>our series about the legendary voyages of the Sea Snake, over from live action to animation.\u00a0\u00a0 A move I support fully.\u00a0\u00a0 Budgetary constraints would likely have made a live action version prohibitively expensive, what with half the show taking place at sea, and the necessity of creating a different port every week, from Driftmark to Lys to the Basilisk Isles to Volantis to Qarth to… well, on and on and on.\u00a0\u00a0 There’s a whole world out there.\u00a0 And we have a lot better chance of showing it all with animation.\u00a0\u00a0 So we now have three animated projects underway.<\/p>\n Will any of them make it to air?\u00a0 happen?\u00a0\u00a0 No way to know.\u00a0\u00a0 Nothing is certain in Hollywood.\u00a0\u00a0 But if it does happen, with one or two or all three shows, I hope we can make them\u00a0 as good as gorgeous and gripping as\u00a0 BLUE EYE SAMURAI.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/em><\/strong>We will for damn sure try.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" There is so much on television these days, in the age of streaming, it is hard to keep up.\u00a0 The days when we had only three networks, and we pretty much knew what was on each of them every night of the week\u00a0 are long gone.\u00a0\u00a0 One thing is the same, though.\u00a0 It is always […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[218],"tags":[333,10,15,11],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/georgerrmartin.com\/notablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8525"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/georgerrmartin.com\/notablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/georgerrmartin.com\/notablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/georgerrmartin.com\/notablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/georgerrmartin.com\/notablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8525"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/georgerrmartin.com\/notablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8525\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8536,"href":"https:\/\/georgerrmartin.com\/notablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8525\/revisions\/8536"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/georgerrmartin.com\/notablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8525"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/georgerrmartin.com\/notablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8525"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/georgerrmartin.com\/notablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8525"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}