General TV News

[Raid]

https://fictionhorizon.com/amazon-teams ... r-phlebas/

I really hope this is good, as the Culture series (which I've gradually been getting through over the last few years, I'm on Surface Detail at the moment) clearly has the potential to be the next Star Trek. It's the setting most likely to be the top response to the regular Reddit threads of "Which fictional universe would you most like to live in", and I think it'd really suit a good anthology series. Consider Phlebas is arguably one of the worst entries and I've seen comments about how it's a bad pick, but an adaptation would have the opportunity of papering over some of the flaws in the narrative, and as it's set outside of the Culture itself, it may be an interesting way of introducing a new audience to it. Plus I remember it having more action in it, which could make it more attractive to a general audience - certainly moreso than Player of Games.

Plan B were partly responsible for the recent adaptation of Three Body Problem, which I think was considered pretty successful, so probably not a bad pick for trying to kickstart a Culture TV series.

[Animalmother]

It's great that there's finally a sci-fi Banks novel getting adapted, but they really could have picked any other one than Consider Phlebas. I remember reading it years ago not really liking it very much.

Am I right in thinking there was talk of Excession or another Culture book being adapted a few years back?

[Raid]

I think there've been a few "maybe we'll do this at some point" type stories cropping up over the last few years; I think the success of The Expanse has prompted a lot of the big streaming services to go hunting for sci-fi properties that haven't been adapted yet. You could argue that picking up The Culture isn't hunting very hard, but I imagine it's going to be viewed as a big-budget production, so I can understand their taking their time to greenlight it.

Honestly I'm not sure Excession would be a good jumping in point, it's *very* Mind-heavy, to the point where there are entire chapters written basically as instant-messaging chats between ships. As much as I don't think that's an especially difficult concept to grasp, it's maybe not the easiest thing to visualise and stick into a trailer, and modern sci-fi (and real life discourse) is very negative towards AI, so maybe that's a poor choice to bring in a general audience. I feel like one of the more pan-human focussed stories would be a better starting point, even if Excession was probably my favourite of the series I've read so far.

[Animalmother]

Yeah good point about Excession. Nearly all of the books have something in them that would be very difficult to translate into a TV show or film. Is Against a Dark Background the one with the heist crew and the self aware gun? It's almost a comedy in places.

[Raid]

It's more to do with easing people in, rather than bombarding them with the setting, even if that setting really isn't that complicated. I think Phlebas works because it has a single pan-human protagonist, a single pan-human antagonist, and from what I remember the only real Mind in the story is just a macguffin (the one that they're sent to retrieve after it escapes the destruction of its ship). Adapting it lets them have a scene where Horza explains what a Mind is and why it's important, rather than slamming the audience into a setting where AI is practically omniscient but benevolent, rather than the slew of stories we've had in recent decades where AI always has some nefarious purpose. You don't want the audience making assumptions because it could negatively affect the entire premise of the Culture series and why people love it so much.

I'm probably overthinking it, but I think Phlebas is a perfectly decent story to introduce the setting. It's a very simple story set amongst some action-heavy set pieces, and I think it'll translate well.

[ManBearSquid]

I've always disagreed with the viewpoint that people should start on Player of Games over Phlebas by way of introducing themselves to the Culture anthology. I agree with Raid's points above and think that, given it's the most space opera-esque of the bunch, it works well at easing into the universe even if it's a bit of a whirlwind at times.

Although the book may not be perfect - I wasn't sure how much I enjoyed it overall until I finished it, which was a first experience for me - I think it's a great book and a very hard-hitting look at war.

I absolutely love the Culture books, having read them all except the short stories. My particular favourites are Use of Weapons, Look to Windward and an honourable mention to The Hydrogen Sonata for having one of my favourite ships/avatars, Mistake Not.../Berdle. Top position goes to Sleeper Service from Excession.

[Mantis]

Agreed, Phlebas would make a great adaptation to screen because it is fairly straight forward and I think the plot is barmy enough that it would keep people engaged quite easily. I always thought that Player of Games was one of the weaker entries in the series, even if it does do a better job at setting the scene for what the Culture actually is.

I may be due a re-read of Use of Weapons soon. I really love that book.

[Sly Boots]

I've not read any of these books.

[Raid]

I found Use of Weapons borderline incomprehensible and didn't enjoy it at all, but then I tend to read to fall asleep so a narrative that darts around chronologically maybe wasn't the best choice. Look to Windward and Excession are probably my favourites, I'm also quite enjoying Surface Matter. I mostly enjoyed Player of Games, but it felt a bit disappointing as I was expecting another grand space opera - it was the second of the series I'd read and wasn't aware that they often had quite different themes and settings. I must admit I don't tend to like the ones set on planets at an early stage of development; I read sci-fi because I'm interested in the concepts that high technology brings, and the Culture interfering with a newly industrialised civilisation doesn't really do it for me. Matter was a little different as it's an early-industrial civilisation that knows its part of a grand space-fairing universe and their extremely limited understanding of the technology made for an interesting read, though the first half of the book may as well have been a fantasy novel.

The more I think about it, I do wonder how many of these would work as a TV adaptation. It's a fascinating set of books, but I wouldn't have said a great many of them were going to be easy to adapt to TV.

[Hatredsheart]

I read the whole series in one go and loved them apart from The Player Of Games that I was a bit lukewarm on. I wonder how they'll approach the dialogues between the various ai.

[Hatredsheart]

https://bsky.app/profile/charliebrooker ... bll46vzs2i