Dragonlance author Margaret Weis confirms that Joe Manganiello’s secret TV series is dead
Margaret Weis, who along with Tracy Hickman is responsible for the beloved Dragonlance Chronicles series of Dungeons & Dragons novels, has confirmed to Polygon that a secret project to create a streaming television series set in the world of Krynn will not be moving forward will book. The news broke on Wednesday ComicBook.comand featured an emotional interview with his champion, actor Joe Manganiello (Real blood, Justice League).
“Everything happened exactly as he said,” Weis said in an email. “The rumor is going around that a pilot was actually filmed. That didn’t happen and Joe doesn’t say it happened. The project never got that far.”
Rumors of a live-action English-language adaptation of the Dragonlance setting have been circulating for years, but things came to a head in early 2023. Then Manganiello spoke during a D&D livestream presentation, seemed to indicate that he was seriously working on a Dragonlance TV project. On Wednesday, he confirmed to ComicBook.com that the project was real and that things weren’t moving forward after that Hasbro’s sale of its eOne entertainment business to Lionsgate. That’s a move Hasbro CEO Chris Cocks has been telegraphing to the company’s investors for years.
“Tracy and Margaret were totally into it,” Manganiello said of the project, which had a completed script for a pilot episode. The actor, clearly in mourning, said a 1,000-page lookbook had been created featuring weapon and armor concepts, as well as unique takes on the franchise’s iconic dragons.
“I (even) offered to buy Dragonlance (from Hasbro),” Manganiello said.
In addition to eOne sales, Manganiello points to last year’s mediocre performance Dragonlance: Shadow of the Dragon Queen adventure module. After a fractious legal battle over a new series of Dragonlance novels, neither Hickman nor Weis were invited to participate in its creation. Manganiello, clearly frustrated, also said the module was under pressure from what he calls a “failed” board game, Dragonlance: Warriors of Krynn, designed by Rob Daviau (Risk legacy, Pandemic Legacy) and Stephen Baker (HeroQuest, Warmasters).
Last we heard, Paramount Plus was working on a D&D streaming series with eOne. It is not known to have anything to do with Dragonlance. However, fans still have some exciting new content ahead: Dragons of Eternitythe third installment in Hickman and Weis’s Dragonlance Destinies series, will be released on August 6. Pre-orders are available now, also on Amazon. You can read excerpts from the first two novels of the trilogy, Dragons of deceit And Dragons of fateabout Polygon – in addition to in-depth interviews with the authors.