The Neverending Story Reboot

I’ve wanted to do this newsletter for days now but time had gotten away from me. The popular bestselling fantasy novel “The Neverending Story,” by late author Michael Ende is up for a bidding war with streamers in America and Europe to be redone into a movie or TV series. I know I have said this multiple times and I’m sure many agree, while I’m sick of remakes, reboots, prequels and sequels, when it comes to movies and shows being remade based on books I am more lenient about it. We all know Hollywood a majority of the time butchers the movie versions of their books. In 1984 the first movie based on “The Neverending Story,” came out in theaters only the studio changed a lot about the book and only included the first half of the book. In the second movie it had the last part of the book and the third movie had nothing to do with the novel at all. While the first Neverending story movie made $100 million with mixed reviews, Michael Ende wasn’t happy with how the finished product came out.

Michael Ende sued the producers of the original movie because of the fact that it deviated very much from the novel. Ende himself called the movie a “gigantic melodrama of kitsch, commerce, plush and plastic”. Unfortunately for Ende he lost the legal battle.  I am happy that authors have smartened up over the decades when it comes to entertainment studios doing their work. Authors now are executive producers and now write the scripts. Although Michael Ende had passed away in 1995 due to stomach cancer, according to the article from Deadline.com , there seems a willingness from the estate to do business, emboldening film and TV companies, even if a stumbling block remains how much control the estate wants on the direction of the story.

I hope the estate does put their say in what happens and what doesn’t. While I understand some things have to be changed for entertainment purposes or any other reason, the majority of movie should have what made the book magical in the first place. I hope the second time around if/when The Neverending Story happens, it would be something Michael Ende would have been proud of. It’s the least Hollywood could do for him to honor his memory since they screwed over his work when he was alive.