Amazon's The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo Show Can Achieve Something The Franchise Has Yet To Do After 5 Movies
Larsson's trilogy is still the heart of the saga.
2009's The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo marked author Stieg Larsson's Millennium trilogy's first foray into live-action, and although there have been efforts that followed, Amazon's upcoming TV show stands a much better chance of achieving something the franchise has so far failed to do. Currently standing at 5 movies, the saga has already been rebooted and reimagined more than once, so Amazon's take on the iconic crime thriller book series must break the streak of dead ends. If not, the franchise's curse will seem even more prominent.
Although Amazon's The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo show has been confirmed, there's little available information about the project. That being said, Veena Sub has been named the showrunner, and Sud has teased what her take on Dragon Tattoo will look like. Unfortunately, there's still no word on who will be added to the list of actresses who have played Lisbeth Salander, but that will surely change some day soon. Regardless, however long said actress plays Larsson's punk-rock hacker will depend on the show's quality, and the longevity of previous live-action adaptations has been an ongoing issue.
Amazon's The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo Show Can Finally Make It Past Book 4 In The Millennium Series2018's The Girl in the Spider's Web brought the American movie franchise to halt
Sadly, Stieg Larsson passed away in 2004 at the age of 50, shortly after submitting the manuscripts for the first three books in the Millennium series - with franchise-starter The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo serving as the first installment. As such, these books, known collectively as the Millennium trilogy, are the only installments penned by Larsson himself. After that, several sequels have been contributed by different writers. The fourth book, David Lagercrantz's The Girl in the Spider's Web, was published in 2015. Unfortunately, it's still the furthest into the timeline the live-action adaptations have reached.
Since The Girl in the Spider's Web was published, the saga's name has been updated to be known as the Millennium series rather than the Millennium trilogy.
Since then, more books have been published, but the live-action branch of the franchise has been inert. Development on the Amazon show has been slow-going, but trepidation makes sense given past failures. It's too early to know if the upcoming adaptation will succeed, or how long it will run for. That being said, the format of a TV show would allow the nuanced story of Lisbeth Salander and Mikael Blomkvist to breathe far more naturally. If it thrives and continues to do so, there's no reason why book five or beyond can't finally be brought to the screen.
The US movies attempted what the Swedish efforts didn't dare to approach
The Swedish movies made the first three books into a live-action trilogy, and they were all released in 2009. The cast and crew never attempted to continue the story beyond book three, The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest. In 2011, Director David Lynch made an English-language version of the first book starring Daniel Craig as Mikael Blomkvist, but a true sequel never materialized. Instead, a soft sequel was made. It skipped two books and overhauled the cast and crew when The Girl in the Spider's Web became a movie in 2018. It flopped, and more films never happened.
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2007's The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' nest remained the final Millennium book until Lagercrantz's first sequel arrived in 2015. Given the 8-year gap between installments, it makes sense why the Swedish movies never continued. Many of the characters would have needed recasting, so another sequel would have felt very different to the first three movies. However, it's a little less clear why Daniel Craig and David Lynch didn't make any Dragon Tattoo sequels. It was a franchise ripe for the taking, but despite initial interest from Sony to continue adapting the trilogy, the underwhelming reboot for Spider's Web made that impossible.
Why Going Beyond The Original Millennium Trilogy Is Still A Risk For Amazon
The original trilogy is still highly revered as the franchise's best era. Although non-Larsson sequels have still sold well, part of their success has been due to their connection to the first three books and the acclaim they received. Therefore, venturing beyond the first three books still stands the chance of Amazon's adaptation grinding to a halt in terms of its quality due to the source material it'll eventually be based on.
Millennium Series Books In Release Order
Title
Author
Release Year
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
Stieg Larsson
2005
The Girl Who Played with Fire
Stieg Larsson
2006
The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest
Stieg Larsson
2007
The Girl in the Spider's Web
David Lagercrantz
2015
The Girl Who Takes an Eye for an Eye
David Lagercrantz
2017
The Girl Who Lived Twice
David Lagercrantz
2019
The Girl in the Eagle's Talons
Karin Smirnoff
2022
The Girl with Ice in her Veins
Karin Smirnoff
2024
To many fans, the non-Larsson novels are almost like optional reading. They're still rewarding adventures, but they fall short of the high standards established by the original author. Of course, many watching the new show will be unaware of the books' events, so the overall story will be completely new to them, and they will have an unbiased view of the Larsson era compared to the eventual sequels. Unfortunately, only time will tell how Amazon's take on The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo will perform and/or progress.
Your RatingGirl with the Dragon Tattoo
Showrunner
Veena Sud
Writers
Veena Sud
Franchise(s)
Millenium