It’s been a bit since we heard anything about the Shannara TV series, but now some news has landed that’s certainly intriguing. While Manu Bennett is known more to some for his work as the orc king in The Hobbit films, more people probably know him better either for his work in Spartacus or more recently as Deathstroke in Arrow. Now Bennett is digging deeper into genre works as he’s taking on the role of the druid Allanon in the Shannara series, where he’s described as “a wise, perceptive and serious man, who knows something incredibly important has begun when the wise tree Ellcrys starts to die.”
The Shannara TV series is planned for a ten episode opening season run that will have its pilot episode directed by Jonathan Liebsman. It’s set to broadcast on MTV. The series previously cast Austin Butler as Wil Ohmsford, a half human half elf. Poppy Drayton is set to play Amberle, an elf princess.
Based on the lengthy run of books by Terry Brooks which are still coming out, Shannara is being developed by Sonar Entertainment and Farah Films. The project has brought on Al Gough and Miles Millar of Smallville fame to do the scripting.
It’s expected that the series will work off of the second book released rather than chronological with The Elfstones of Shannara.
Novels premises: The series blends magic and primitive technology and the books are set in the Four Lands which in some books is identified as Earth long after civilization as we know it was destroyed in a chemical and nuclear holocaust called the Great Wars. By the time of the prequel First King of Shannara, the world has now reverted to a medieval state and magic has re-emerged to supplement science as humans and other races live in a place known as the Four Lands, which is a future North America. Further into the novels science starts to become more advanced.
