Greta Gerwig's Narnia movie

Going big:

According to Puck News, Gerwig’s Narnia movie “will hit about 1,000 IMAX screens worldwide on Thanksgiving Day 2026 and will not appear on Netflix until Christmas,” with a two-week IMAX run guaranteed and an option to add a third if there’s enough audience interest. Also, “there’s a chance” Narnia might also play in some non-IMAX theaters ahead of its streaming debut. In addition, “Netflix has committed to market the IMAX release like a typical theatrical tentpole movie and identify Narnia as a ‘Netflix/IMAX’ title from the outset.”

Adam Driver as Puddleglum

I love this model tbh

I just want to know if she's starting with The Magician's Nephew, like she obviously should, or just starting with LW&W like I am dreading.

huh

Re-sequencing the novels 25 years ago in chronological order was a terrible decision.

think we have discussed this at length elsewhere

The small thrill of learning six novels in that the Empress Jadis was the White Witch.

Anyway.

We already had Tilda as the White Witch -- go with Cate I guess?

Alfred otm xp

We already had Tilda as the White Witch -- go with Cate I guess?

― Ned Raggett, Friday, January 17, 2025

Rupert Everett or go home

there's so much in LW&W that lends itself towards the twee, like father Christmas turning up, and once you've set yourself tonally on that path it's hard to go back. also there are already 3-4 adaptations of LW&W, and none of TMN or TLB.

She's batting 1000%, I guess, but I have no idea what even the best version of this looks like.

I never saw the most recent adaptation of Lion, or the other two. They were pretty successful, weren't they? Do people/kids still watch them?

The first was successful in general, the following ones...not so much.

I just want to know if she's starting with The Magician's Nephew, like she obviously should, or just starting with LW&W like I am dreading.

Why on earth would she start with the sixth volume in the series?

Can't wait for the prequel series Charn.

I forgot I am in a minority of one on this! but I'm right, LW&W is a bore and TMN is brilliant and comes first.

TMN is by some distance the better novel, agreed.

He hadn't figured shit out the first time around.

I never saw the most recent adaptation of Lion, or the other two. They were pretty successful, weren't they? Do people/kids still watch them?

― Josh in Chicago,

The first one starring Tilda Swinton is pretty good even if Liam Neeson is closer to Father Christmas than Aslan. The little girl who plays Lucy is remarkable.

These books were read aloud to me by my mother when I was age 6-8, all of them. The effect of having Horse And His Boy’s first half take place in a mysterious land, at an unknown time in history, suddenly snap into focus as happening in King Peter’s reign was beyond-delightful, it was formative. The realization in TMN that Digory is none other than the Uncle Professor (from many volumes previous) was similarly relevatory. Denying children of these narrative delights is not just wrong, it’s blasphemous.

^^^ beautifully put

I was a freak for fantasy books as a child, and even then I got a weird Christian vibe from them and bailed on the first one.

I mean, aren't they pretty overtly Christian? I don't think I've ever read them.

we've discussed over and over again in the other Narnia threads. If reading Milton and Dante and Graham Greene bother you, skip Narnia.

I forgot I am in a minority of one on this! but I'm right, LW&W is a bore and TMN is brilliant and comes first.

If reading Milton and Dante and Graham Greene bother you, skip Narnia.

Yeah but those are cool and Narnia felt more like Jars of Clay :)

(sorry I know people like it, I'm out)

Aslan is Jesus, Peter is Cardinal Spellman, Narnia is Little Italy, and that's the extent of the allegory.

Aslan covers more ground than "Jesus" outside of LW&W. He is also the creator and ghostly and violent intervenor, which is still very christian but perhaps less Jars of Clay christian.

As a kid I didn't really notice how Christian it was because I was raised areligious. Starting with the Magician's Nephew is narratively stupid and treats kids like they're too stupid to understand a non-chronological storyline. None of the awesome big reveals in it land properly if you don't already know about Narnia from reading the previous five books!

And while yes, it being sixth in the series means it's unlikely to ever get made into a film, that also guarantees the mediocre Last Battle won't be either. Of course having Horse and His Boy being filmed third also presents problems with the age of the main actors... they can't go young-old-young, they need young-young-young (break for Silver Chair to age up a bit) and then older

respectowiggle

lol

I can think of a hundred franchises that need a reboot (or just a boot) more than C.S. Lewis, but have at it Greta

I’m waiting for Greta Gerwig’s Blue Adept movies

mumblecore fantasy would be cool, young adults trying to figure shit out while dragons and wizards fight in the background

That's just the fantasy version of Macross.

i'd much prefer greta's version of earthsea.

That would rule! But alas.

I remember reading this in the elementary school library around the same time I was repelled by Narnia, and it ruled: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pit_Dragon_Chronicles#Dragon's_Blood_(1982)

the sequence of the novels is such a key part of the storytelling -- to begin with the Magician's Nephew is to miss the point of the Magician's Nephew in large part. It happens where it happens so that the reader can put the piece into place and understand. I do understand that that's asking a lot of readers 50+ years later but I'm of the opinion that if you're not up for being asked for some extra once in a while, you need to up your game as a reader.

we've discussed over and over again in the other Narnia threads. If reading Milton and Dante and Graham Greene bother you, skip Narnia.

also Alfred wildly otm. Mrs Noothgrush is put off by Xian stuff too, that's any reader's right but it's not a good criticism of a work, it's a personal tic, like "I don't care for hi-hat"

that's a bit like saying that criticizing lovecraft for racism is a "personal tic"

I’m waiting for Greta Gerwig’s Blue Adept movies

omg

xp new rule?

Christian overtones = racism?

lol that's not what i was saying at all.

I thought I had misunderstood you!

I can think of a hundred franchises that need a reboot (or just a boot) more than C.S. Lewis, but have at it Greta

I am still (even more so, now, following the destruction in Altadena) patiently awaiting for Garrett Bradley/A24 to finish their Parable Of The Sower adaptation

I reject this Narnia timeline revisionism, give me old school late reveals every time, fgti and JCLC otm

it's literally one of the best parts of the series! a reward for close readers.

xp what i meant is that xtianity permeats and informs narnia as much (or more) as racism does lovecraft's works, so you can't just treat it as a minor or unrelated detail

---

i'm curious what Greta thinks of The Problem With Susan

Certainly the world of pop culture is awash in Christ allegories, including some of my faves, like "RoboCop." To be clear, I didn't avoid these books *because* they were infused with Christianity, and in fact don't think I actively avoided them at all, just never read them. But one of the things I knew about them was that they *were* infused with Christianity, and that it was a big part of CS Lewis's life. I suppose somewhere in the back of my mind as a non-Christian I've always been a little wary of capital-C Christians*, especially those in the more modern era (and not, say, Milton or Dante, who were not exactly analogous to Graham Greene) but I've never heard anything problematic about CS Lewis himself, his beliefs or his books.

*which is partly why I've listened to plenty of U2 but not Jars of Clay (lol) and other bands that explicitly identify as "Christian."

Bottom line is:

If you don't want to read a fantasy series that prominently, and immediately, features Santa Claus and a messianic character who is crucified and then resurrected a la JC then don't read CS Lewis

And if you don't want to read a fantasy series that descends (in vol 5 and 7) into some pretty-scandalous racism and sexism, including "that moment"* that is absolutely stomach churning, then don't read CS Lewis

*lipstick and party invitations ftw

in CS Lewis's case it's not just allusions or being inspired by - he was a theologist and a christian apologist, and his works very much reflect that. but you can certainly read Narnia as adventure / fairy tale books! i did. and Narnia is much less xtian than, say, The Space Trilogy.

And ya there is absolutely no argument for "chronological" over "narrative" order of books, it's just such a wrong headed argument, you'd have an easier time arguing "trickle down capitalism" afaic

It doesn't aid anyone's case, also, that TMN (vol 6, that is) is easily the most boring book in the series

An interesting thing about The Last Battle is that it has always been my favourite volume, like by a long shot. Despite the insane shift in tone and the puzzle of the overt Bible-thumping, it's extremely suspenseful and tightly-wound narratively and I remember finding it thrilling

I need to re-read The Screwtape Letters as an adult but wow what a book, iirc

it's a personal tic, like "I don't care for hi-hat"

I am also extremely picky about hi-hats.

xp i've got the book and been meaning to read it for years, i need to do that (and the essays and The Great Divorce)

Heh, I have no idea why but for a second there I was mixing up "The Screwtape Letters" with Beckett's "Krapp's Last Tape."

I'm also picky about hi-hats. Sometimes I love them, but then sometimes I hear tracks where they are mixed so low that I can barely hear them, and don't miss them. (I've noticed a lot more people playing 15" hats these days, too.)

My mother read The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe enthusiastically to us because it was an obvious Jesus analogy and then couldn't really see that there would be anything else in the rest of the books, though that possibly says more about the paucity of biblical knowledge in mid-century Irish Catholics.

There's a website, because of course there is, about how the Narnia books are tools of Satan because there's satyrs and talking animals etc in them: http://www.homemakerscorner.com/cslewis.htm

I think I heard about it when Freaky Trigger had their Narnia Week, way back when. Tom Ewing had an article that talks to some of the topic above - I'll quote it below but the comments are also worth reading: https://freakytrigger.co.uk/ft/2011/01/narnia-week-yours-is-a-younger-world

(or just search for Narnia on FT, they're all good to great I think)

I do prefer The Last Battle I think, because the stuff that's put into the mixer is wilder and weirder than the others - but it's been a few decades, I should reread them.

My favourite part of any subcreation is its edges – apocrypha, marginalia, the sketches and hints at grander unrealised designs. Tolkien’s Middle-Earth is detail-rich (to say the least) but I’d linger fascinated on the Blue Wizards, or Rhun, or Far Harad: the stuff he left only as names. If anyone did fill them in I’d be mortified – this is one reason I won’t let my Doctor Who fandom take me as far as the novels, where mystery seems regularly to be given a thorough and pedantic kicking.

One of the funny things about these holes in a built world is that they work just as well – perhaps even better – if they arise from carelessness as if they’re planned. It’s a tightrope – revealing the mystery is bad, but knowing something was intended to work as a mystery can kill it for me just as surely. The Narnia series has a few of these – most of the close encounters with Aslan’s kingdom never impressed or moved me much as a kid because (I now suspect) there was too much narrative heavy-handedness around them.

But the series is also rich in moments where Lewis touches on a much vaster universe which seems all the stranger for being set against the slightly chintzy fairyland of Narnia. Tolkien apparently found fault with Lewis’ slapdash treatment of mythology in the stories but this is one of the series’ greatest assets. I read the books very young – there is a picture of me taken the summer Al was born, reading Prince Caspian; I would have been 4 and a half – and their sudden shifts in tone made pleasurable sense. Minotaurs on one page, Father Christmas on the next; jumping from the desolation of Charn to the violent slapstick of Andrew, Letty and Jadis in London.

The tedious modern reframing of Narnia-talk around the books’ Christian allegories tends to ignore this playfulness entirely. Almost alone among worldbuilders, Lewis is forever restlessly pushing at the boundaries of his own creation, and the more he does so the better the novels get. He’s impatient with Narnia itself. Pressed for a sequel to a hit children’s book, Lewis opens Prince Caspian by showing its world as a moss-covered ruin. Everyone the reader and human characters knew from that first story is dead: Lewis doesn’t make much of this fact but it’s there in the background. By his third book (publication order) he’s left Narnia behind and is sailing East. In the fourth he heads North (and Down), in the fifth South, in the sixth we hop worlds and end up at the beginning of time, and in the seventh we at last get a third whole book set in Narnia… only to see it destroyed. I don’t know how much this willingness to test his creation to destruction chimed with my tastes, and how much it shaped them.

come on, we all know The Police would be a footnote if it wasn't for the hi hats

Never thought about it, but a case can be made!

As Aslan told Peter, we are spirits in the material wprld.

xxxp thank you AF!

the books are all so distinctive, my faves have always been the later ones i.e. 3-7, the only tangentially related run from 4-6 is prob my overall pick

should've stuck to One World (Not Three)

Sting as Uncle Andrew, singing 'Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic' to Jadis in a musical adaptation

(why did Sting stop acting? he was pretty good)

counterpoint: he wasn't

extra counterpoint: he didn't

He was quite sexy in Stormy Monday though.

He smouldered well in that one.

I read the first three books recently and didn’t find the Christian stuff overwhelming in any way. (I grew up in a non-religious Jewish household and we loved the cartoon but assumed the book was propaganda). If anything, the allegorical stuff prevents them from feeling twee, or like showoffy worldbuilding exercises.

On the other hand I was pretty surprised about how much of them seem to directly reference fascism and military/ police states. I don’t know anything about Lewis so this could be totally off the mark, but they read to me aa quite strongly and respectably anti-fascist.

(They also seem exactly like d&d stories for kids - here’s your costumes, your armour, your weapons, your spells, and a map - get questing!)

otm

Iirc there are some direct transpositions of well-known Christian allegories throughout. Aslan taking credit for various providential life-saving moments in Shasta’s journey, def a “these were the times I carried you” moment. I remember even at age 7 or 8 feeling comforted (? or something) that Aslan recognized that the Tash-faithful Calormene who sacrificed himself to his deity would end up in Aslan’s country in the afterlife, something something about “this act was in fact in the service of Aslan”. What is that? What brand of Christianity? Prob rushomancy has the right answer here

Not a contradiction, but the books are older than that lousy footprints poem, which only started popping up in the 1960s.

Now that I think about it, it's possible that the later books passed my mother by because they were establishing more granular distinctions of "no he's this kind of Jesus"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3fAcxcxoZ8

"That lousy footprints poem" I was delighted to read this haha

The bit in The Magician's Nephew that tears me up is when Aslan chokes up after Diggory's request to help his mom.

they're the only ones in this new world who know about suffering, etc.

I recently listened to them in the chronological order of the story, starting with The Magician's Nephew. It is fantastic series of books

HarperCollins, at the suggestion of Lewis's stepson, opted to use the series' internal chronological order when they won the rights to it in 1994. The narrators are Kenneth Branagh, Jeremy Northam, Patrick Stewart, Alex Jennings, Michael York, Lynn Redgrave, and Derek Jacobi

It is pretty great

savages ;)

https://deadline.com/2025/03/charli-xcx-greta-gerwig-netflix-narnia-movie-1236312002/

wtf kind of movie is this gonna be hahah

not for Peter?

The Lion, the Brat, and the Wardrobe

Hoping for full Brat musical adaptation.

Narnia and It's Completely Different but Also Still Narnia

Can't wait for the prequel series Charn.

― Ned Raggett, Friday, January 17, 2025

You laugh but

Who was laughing! It's probably already got a writer's room.

too bad Ian Holm couldn't play Uncle Andrew

or: Charn would consist of outtakes from The Ten Commandments and Atlantis: The Lost Continent.

turkish delight? meet me in the wardrobe if you're (bumpin' that)

Charn can be anything, have it be a wall-to-wall fuckfest directed by Bruce LaBruce or something.

the Deplorable Word: "condoms"

Now YOU laugh but

now I imagine Jadis muttering CONDOMS and throwing a fistful of them at the gates of Charn

As much as I liked Barbie, I've found her going from one movie based on existing IP to another kind of depressing. I want another Lady Bird.

Lady Bird 2: How I Met Your Nebbish

https://i.imgur.com/WzxhMCO.gif

"So it's a roman a clef about a roman a clef, and it'll get Oscar nominations." "Go on."

charn xcx

took long enough

so confusing

Vague tea leaves from Ted Sarandos:

Q. Greta Gerwig will be making “The Chronicles of Narnia” for Netflix, but it will get an exclusive Imax release in November 2026. Why did Netflix want this?

A. We gave Greta a world-building job [on “Narnia”] before she had built a world with “Barbie.” Her script was fantastic, and we have a great relationship.

Q. So this wasn’t something she demanded?

A. It wasn’t some giant deal we had to salvage. We wanted to support it and figure out something new. The one thing we haven’t really tried is a big Imax release. Imax is hugely differentiated from at-home watching. When I go to the theater, it’s getting closer and closer to at home. But Imax is super differentiated. The two-week run for “Narnia” will check all the boxes for awards qualifications and create a bit of an event. We’re happy to do it.

What does "When I go to the theater, it’s getting closer and closer to at home" mean?

Guessing he means bigger at-home TVs or the like.

Easy chair seating, snack refills, empty rooms.

Otm

your cats are at the theater knocking things down

There's actually an art house here that has selected events where they keep the lights partially up so viewers can do crafting (mostly knitting/sewing, IIRC) during the film.

#MorbsRollingInGrave

I read the books to my daughter and now am trying to get her to watch the BBC series (starting with TLTWATW). I thought it was the most magical thing in the world when I was a kid, and it still has some charm, but I don't know if she'll endure all 3 hours of it...

"What does "When I go to the theater, it’s getting closer and closer to at home" mean?"

It's odd, because the prevailing narrative du jour - that's French - is that cinemas are hellholes with people laughing, crying, clapping, roaring, watching other films on their mobile phones, livestreaming their trip to the cinema, noisily eating popcorn, being generally uncouth etc. And also that headlights are too bright. And grilles are too tall. Which is totally unlike being at home unless you have children in which case it is like being at home.

But he does have a point. Over the last couple of years the majority of my cinema trips have been to the IMAX at the Science Museum, or to a special 70mm screening or what-have-you, because if I'm going to the cinema I might as well make it an event. The same impulse killed off Butlins and Little Chef. "Lets walk down there and fuck em all". That's a film reference.

The hilarious thing about people who complain about the alleged hellishness of modern theater going is that these people insist on going at the same time as the hellraisers. I go to movies before noon and often have the theater to myself. If you have errands or whatever to run on a Saturday or Sunday...run them after the movie?

I think you're lucky to have a theater that runs shows that early. of all the theaters around me, arthouses & multiplexes alike, I dont think a single one does shows before 12:30, most of them dont go until 1

It's odd, because the prevailing narrative du jour - that's French - is that cinemas are hellholes with people laughing, crying, clapping, roaring, watching other films on their mobile phones, livestreaming their trip to the cinema, noisily eating popcorn, being generally uncouth etc. And also that headlights are too bright. And grilles are too tall. Which is totally unlike being at home unless you have children in which case it is like being at home.

Imo that stuff is 100% correlated to theaters replicating the "at home" experience, the bigger & more plush the seats, being able to order pizza & wings, etc, people act like they're watching a movie at their house rather than behaving as if they're in public. I remember noticing a change as soon as the first theater around me added monster reclining plush seats, right away the talking got louder, the shoes came off faster, people started bringing in takeout, etc.

Idk what’s up with your neighbourhoods but the multiplex in my neighbourhood (next to the Drake venue) is always empty and is great to see a Dune or whatever, and the local rep theatre is always super packed and is great to see some 70s American New Wave while experiencing communal cinephilia

I think you're lucky to have a theater that runs shows that early. of all the theaters around me, arthouses & multiplexes alike, I dont think a single one does shows before 12:30, most of them dont go until 1

Even 1 p.m. is early. Things don't get loud until after 5 p.m. unless it's a kids movie.

xp well exactly, im gonna assume your local rep theater is not selling cheeseburger baskets and large pizzas at the concession stand

I am an AMC A-Lister because hitting up matinees there almost guarantees I will be the only person in the theater, it's glorious, just me and Nicole Kidman

…huh.

https://deadline.com/2025/04/meryl-streep-aslan-greta-gerwig-netflix-narnia-movie-1236358278/

ughhhhhhhhhhhhhh

I mean, why not, really.

is 'low growl' one of meryl's accents

I mean, why not, really.

because to me, a Narnia film is much reduced by having recognizeable celebrities in the roles

The Voyage of the Dishwalla

Although I'm certainly no proponent of the chronological order, I am interested in seeing Magician's Nephew adapted for once.

Jadis is Emma Mackey:

https://variety.com/2025/film/news/emma-mackey-greta-gewig-narnia-white-witch-1236378761

apparently this is just called "Narnia"

well, yeah

What slow, spooky version of a popular song will be in the trailer? Maybe Katy Perry's "Roar"?

Double bass doing the hook from "The Lion Sleeps Tonight."

Also, via a summary from io9:

Appearing as a guest on The Garry and Kenny Show (via World of Reel), The Chronicles of Narnia producer Mark Gordon described the film as a “four-quadrant” project ,” and that it will “likely receive a PG rating.” Gordon also confirmed the involvement of actors Meryl Streep, Daniel Craig, Emma Mackey, Carey Mulligan, David McKenna, and Beatrice Campbell.

what does that mean?

Means it is literally meant for everyone. Men, women, kids, adults.

I would have gone with three quadrants personally but it's not my movie

Why stop at four quadrants when you could have gone four quadrants and one hydrant, for dogs.
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/71+iNzY4c9L._AC_SL1500_.jpg

Meryl Streep as Uncle Andrew

I heard that Meryl Streep will be playing Daniel Craig, Emma Mackey, Carey Mulligan, David McKenna, and Beatrice Campbell in a mo-cap suit.

Release date: next February.

https://www.netflix.com/tudum/articles/narnia-release-date

Means it is literally meant for everyone. Men, women, kids, adults.

i'm one of those, guess i'll see this

February = the Deplorable Word.

See it with a lion you love

Sounds like there was an early test screening, and the only news I saw reported out of it was that it apparently has an anachronistic rock song score!

a bunch of fauns play "More Than a Feeling."

"We're off to the witch / We may never never never come home"

the only news I saw reported out of it was that it apparently has an anachronistic rock song score!

Eh, the time frame was bumped up so I'm not THAT surprised.

The news could also be wrong, or the pop/rock songs could be placeholders.

it was all chili peppers

What I got, you got to give it to your Aslan

Will it have as banging a soundtrack as a Knight's Tale did though

It's just going to be the "We Will Rock You" beat for two hours.

Puddleglum of Mudd

we don't want no Scrubbs

lol

Eustace in the Sky with Dragons

I Walk the Lion

The Eye of the Lion

Faun faun faun auf der Autobahn

Mister Tumnus, won't you ride my white horse?
Mister Tumnus, it's symbolic of course

The Low Spark of High-Heeled Sons of Adam

treader than tread

Don't Fear the Reeper

Bring Da Tumnus

jmm at 8:34 2 Jun 26

"We're off to the witch / We may never never never come home

hell yeab

^that's deep magic for hell yeah

Blood Sugar Deep Magic

Sha Na Narnia

Ride a Horse (Save a His Boy)

You know, until this point in time I assumed that Pink Floyd's Piper at the Gates of Dawn was named after a chapter in The Lion, The Witch, And The Etc. But no! It's not. There's no connection at all.

"Lucifer Sam" would work as a theme for Aslan. He is a cat. Can anyone explain him? No.

Piper at the Gates of Dawn is the name of a chapter in Wind and the Willows

The best chapter of Wind in the Willows

i feel certain there is a black metal band or five called Charn

Stone Table Pilots

You know, until this point in time I assumed that Pink Floyd's Piper at the Gates of Dawn was named after a chapter in The Lion, The Witch, And The Etc. But no! It's not. There's no connection at all.

it's named after a (lovely) chapter in The Wind in the Willows. Although it does have Narnian vibes

oh yeah, other people already said that

anyway, the CEO of IMAX said this last year

This is a real blockbuster movie that’s being made for [IMAX and Netflix] and you know, I guess I do have to talk a little about why I’m so excited about it. This is not your mother’s or your grandmother‘s Narnia. The music in it is unbelievably contemporary music, which IMAX fans like. I’m not gonna say specifically, but things like Pink Floyd and The Doors. You know that kind of music which people go to see in IMAX.

unbelievably contemporary!

live at pompeii
in a sleigh
what else do i have to say

Careful With That Axe, Eustace

You know that kind of music which people go to see in IMAX.

lol, so, like, a laser show?

Pink Floyd and the Doors?? That's unbelievably contemporary!

https://whiteriverstatepark.org/wp-content/uploads/spinal-tap-2-general-graphic-jpg.webp

Turkish Delight my Fire

the Doors? didn't think Gerwig would fuck it up that badly

What Narnia really needs is a digital Jim Morrison cameo.

Val Kilmer's digital likeness might be OK with that.

I assume once you have a budget that size you lose most of the creative control anyway

The suits will okay anything as long as you promise to play some Floyd over it.

I heard the Narnia movie will sync up with "Dark Side of the Moon," or at least the parts with Pink Floyd in it will.

The Dark Side of Lokum

They should re-release the "Lazy Sunday" clip for a limited IMAX run.

is the setting of the film also supposed to be updated to be more “contemporary”?

The sleeping rulers of Charm are drag queens.

Maybe the contemporary part is how they're gonna remake the Floyd/Doors songs in a slow, minor-key piano style, as is required by Hollywood

We can only hope Muse does the soundtrack.

is the setting of the film also supposed to be updated to be more “contemporary”?

it's apparently set in the 1950s

Okay so

https://www.empireonline.com/movies/news/narnia-magicians-nephew-greta-gerwig-rock-opera-fantasy-bowie-exclusive/

Inside Alfred's head. Well maybe not.

https://images.bauerhosting.com/empire/2026/09/narnia-magicians-nephew-excl1.jpg?ar=16%3A9&fit=crop&crop=top&auto=format&w=828&q=80

The Deplorable Turd

Get ready for a transformative cinematic journey that only Greta Gerwig could make. “I don’t know how you went from David Jones to David Bowie unless you went to Narnia and you saw something,” she posits. Now, you’ll see it too.

narnia will just never be cool no matter how stylish a treatment you attempt to give it

Yeah but is that Narnia in that sketch? Looks more like Charn.

Bowie went to Narnia and saw a swastika.

I’m intrigued. And I wasn’t before. Could be a heroin-jab to the mannered coziness of Harry Potterified British kid’s adaptations. A sequined great white lion has more appeal to me than chewed-over Edwardian aesthetics I’ve seen a million times before.

If Jadis is like Sophia Loren or Twiggy, I am sold.

narnia will just never be cool no matter how stylish a treatment you attempt to give it

― ciderpress, Thursday, September 17, 2026 1:45 PM (fifty-nine minutes ago) bookmark

Hence why it rules.

drive like a demon from narnia to narnia

And Meryl Streep as Aslan!

I wasn't particularly excited about Gerwig doing another IP adaptation, but this looks like it could be cool.

lol this is gonna be nuts in the best way

Perhaps Greta cast Streep because she is so good at accents.

I just re-read The Silver Chair last week and got to be outraged all over again at the retconning of the book order. #6? GTFO

also the more recent cover art is so so bad

respectabiggle

Ah so there's the new Doctor Who

https://images.bauerhosting.com/empire/2026/09/narnia-magicians-nephew-daniel-craig-excl.jpg?ar=16%3A9&fit=crop&crop=top&auto=format&w=1440&q=80

Credit to that connection to my friend/podcast cohost Jared, who says the photos so far all give off that vibe and...not wrong.

very GDT with the cluttered production design

gerwig can do no wrong (i choose to see barbie as a scorching broadside satire targeting everyone who thinks barbie is good) but that looks awful

i think gerwig handled religion and revelation smartly in barbie, with just rhea perlman/ruth handler and a dark tunnel. i like pop movies that talk about religion in ways that aren't dismissive and dumb.

i was mulling lewis's explanation for representing god as aslan in narnia and simultaneously, thinking about what a lion meant to a child in post-war england (sigil of dwindling empire, decadence in both senses, a threadbare and musty and beloved toy, a grandfatherly thing just a few steps out of time/place, but still fanged and cool as hell). and the more i think about it, the more appropriate bowie seems as an aesthetic proxy in 2027.

the role Emma Mackey was born to play

https://i.postimg.cc/hPbBFDLj/jadis.webp

the queen of the realm she was born and raised in

Our founder Mr. Ewing had some interesting thoughts on this earlier today on Bluesky specifically due to that shot:

OK this has completely sold me on the Gerwig Narnia, Charn as 70s glam rock infecting 1950s England is a banger idea. It suggests that GG gets Narnia (ie agrees with me about it) - what makes it fascinating isn‘t how it’s an allegory but how its also a vessel for a lot of wild and pagan and sometimes horny stuff that Lewis loves/fears/hates, magic has always already compromised its Christianity. A thing that’s fascinating about The Last Battle is that Lewis recognises that “creating a fantasy world that enchants kids” gives him a sort of moral responsibility to wrap it in a way that allows them to exit without getting the cultural equivalent of the bends, and then completely fucks it. Though what he does makes for an amazingly weird book and is still better than “you can continue to exist in the childhood fantasy world you loved simply by buying the next instalment” which I think Lewis would have considered (correctly) an evil.

if an original story doesnt work any more without lifting it into a different comparative generational context and whatever

then

write your own new story

I don't see how the non-Narnia elements of Lewis work if they're not set in the period as written tbh

xp I don't think that's right. I mean you basically doom modern theatre, opera and ballet by your judgement there. why not movies as well? I think an adaptation of jane austen that is still the same kind of story but tries to write better words than her is a failed thing. but there are austen adaptations that shift, add meta layers, comment on the text and become worthwhile and interesting re-imaginings. similarly if a narnia adaptation simply tries to be more cinematic or trendy while telling the same story, it waters it down. if it represents the elements of the book surface level but just as an excuse to make LOTR lite (sorry to the 2000s adaptations) it adds nothing. but if there is a vision and a new reading of the story, it can most certainly be interesting.

I don't see how the non-Narnia elements of Lewis work if they're not set in the period as written tbh

― he composed genius songs and all the rest was a crap (Noodle Vague)

very confused by this post as iirc the non-Narnia elements are in fact set in 1950's Britain?

LWW set in 1940

i was thinking about the "injecting the 70s" stuff but i was also maybe misreading tbf

speaking of Our Founder, this was a+

https://i.postimg.cc/L6dW3BkG/narnikai.jpg

ha yes I loved that

Truly great.

xp I don't think that's right. I mean you basically doom modern theatre, opera and ballet by your judgement there. why not movies as well?

death to all fan fiction, basically

if you think that the loss of the IP to lean on dooms today's writers then they needed dooming.

Love fan fiction hate fan service is how I break it down to an extent

GG's deep love and engagement Little Women was apparent in the liberties she took in adapting that book for the screen. Don't really care for Narnia, but keen to see this purely as a Gerwig film.

"deep love and engagement for/with" obv.

I wasn't even aware of the Streep Aslan casting until I saw some evangelicals raising hell about it. Aslan is a MAN! Just like God and Jesus!

GG's deep love and engagement Little Women was apparent in the liberties she took in adapting that book for the screen. Don't really care for Narnia, but keen to see this purely as a Gerwig film.

― Maggy Scraggle, 21 September 2026 08:26 (six hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

i loved her LW adaptation without reservation

which decade did she move it to again, i forget

like is Streep doing the voice of Aslan or is Aslan just kinda a human being now?

It's Streep in lionface.

kramer vs tamer

well, it can't be worse than what Hollywood did to the Dark is Rising. the risk with someone trying to be as faithful as possible to Narnia is they will be as faithful as possible to Narnia and you'll get soppy Christian crap, I feel like an American just has no chance of not being like that, you need the lifelong casual contempt for Christian doctrine that falls short of actual atheism that you only get in the UK and its environs

Being as faithful -- I see what you did there -- as possible to Lewis' Narnia would result in a fantasy with Christian undertones, actually -- unless you mean that some unknown director with fundie leanings would, idk, nail Aslan to an actual cross.

I just think there are Christians who have to reconcile their hatred of paganism with the actual teachings of Jesus, and then there are Christians who have to reconcile their visceral desire to be pagans with Christian doctrine that says they can't be. And most US Christianities are the former kind, and you really need the latter to get you a Narnia.

i loved her LW adaptation without reservation

which decade did she move it to again, i forget

well she set in the same decade, but she gave it a new (fan fiction?) ending

she must be stopped!

f hazel otm

Saw a comment online that said 'I'm happy they're starting with the first book' and wanted to scream.

Santa Claus should show up in every book/movie like Stan Lee

And not everyone agrees that casting Streep is a problem: Christian writer Mary Pezzulo has pointed out the irony that some evangelicals think it’s perfectly all right for Jesus to be portrayed as an animal yet draw the line when he’s given a woman’s voice. “Very Online conservative Christians really think that portraying Christ as a lion, a carnivorous beast with notoriously smelly urine who sleeps 23 hours a day and steals meat from hyaenas, is beautiful sacred art,” she wrote. “But having Christ portrayed by a woman is sacrilege.”

....hmmmm.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m9_dSoX9BU8

should I click

do you dare eat a peach

Cueing the release of Jadis to a "Stairway to Heaven" needle drop is a choice.

Yeah, one that shows Netflix has more money than sense.

As Aslan creates Narnia we hear Spandau Ballet's "Gold."

My Tolkien podcast cohost Jared on Bluesky, and I tend to agree:

withholding judgement because I am charmed by the glam rock vibe and the Aslan stuff, but I will say this seems to be a movie fundamentally afraid of silence and stillness, and I am not sure if that makes for a successful adaptation

I think of all the narnia books, magician’s nephew is the one most invested in silence. the dead silence of charn, the silence of a long afternoon when you’re a bored child, the silence of the sickroom, of the wood between the worlds, of an uncreated world

adding too much noise and movement is…ehhh

Quite OTM. When the children are in the Wood Between the Worlds, Lewis comments that they imagined they could hear the trees grow.

cinema also has a loudness war, and we lost that one too

one wonders: is the trailer's noisiness a kind of overcompensation?

I wouldn't judge a movie's loudness by its trailer that needs to announce an arrival. The book has some pretty loud parts as well, in human land, let's be honest. And is very explicit about wildin' tunes bringing Narnia to life, which is were rock n roll would slot in. Gerwig, famously pretty good at the adaptation thing, has probably read enough to have a motivated take, in any case.

what generic boring bullshit

So is this a movie for children, or for 50-year-olds?

On the one hand, the protagonists are children: *BIG HINT: THIS MAY BE A KID'S MOVIE*

On the other, the trailer prominently features a 55-year-old Led Zeppelin song: *DON'T WORRY, OLDSTERS: YOU'RE STILL THE CENTER OF THE UNIVERSE*

it has the color palette of a college town New Age store

not exactly a tidal wave of views: 250 views in 2 hours

Well that's not the main Netflix embed.

ah okay

For the record the official upload has 305k views, in two hours. One of the comments is "please don't Marvel my Narnia".

Apt!

they wrecked a Wrinkle in Time the same way

Was encouraged by this being The Magician's Nephew (a novel I vastly prefer to TLtW&tW) but the trailer looks like expensive barf.

While Stairway being in the trailer does not necessarily mean it’s actually in the film, I have to respect Gerwig making one of her cinematic calling cards the rehabilitation of decidedly uncool songs, from “Crash Into Me” to “Closer to Fine” and now this

Feels weird for someone to refer to "Stairway to Heaven" as "decidedly uncool".

anybody on ILX calling a song “decidedly uncool” is indeed ironic

it's not like she used Hotel California

In the spirit of calling music other people like “decidedly uncool” I went and revived the my dick poll thread

(music doesn’t uncool. People are uncool)

This Avengers movie looks just as dog shit as all the others.

I don't have time to really think this out, but here's an observation that comes from a weekend conversation: many of my friends encountered the Narnia books at dusty public libraries, or in grandparents' studies, or tucked into small, embarrassed, often out-of-the way fantasy sections. the qualities of those spaces, antiquarian and furtive, infused the reading experience of the novels, and the metatextuality of the wood-between-worlds (silent portals to other places...) mirrored the qualities of the libraries/studies/bookstores themselves. the austerity of the magician's nephew, in particular, and the qualities of lewis's prose, in general, are at odds with contemporary 'event' moviemaking. no matter how the stories are dramatized, they're going to have to flesh out antique, elliptical, poetic writing . I want them filled with silence and stillness, and private discovery. It's how I first experienced Narnia. But that is itself a projection.

(I think the comparison to Wrinkle in Time is astute, although I have more faith in Gerwig than DuVerney, who I think was launched at Disney too early)

cmon folks i am not personally judging the coolness of any of those songs. But you don’t think Gerwig is playing with their reputations by leaning into them

What I read throughout this thread is that Narnia is too cool and nerdy to be made into cinema

That’s cool!

But like, don’t shit on people for trying

i think ppl are allowed to critique film

no

i agree with jared p. and soda, but evidently capitalism demands marvelization

also james bond as uncle andrew is pretty fuckin sweet

What slow, spooky version of a popular song will be in the trailer? Maybe Katy Perry's "Roar"?

― Josh in Chicago, Friday, May 1, 2026 5:50 AM (five months ago)

Still a chance if they do another trailer!

Anyway, about that song sync

https://consequence.net/2026/10/led-zeppelin-stairway-to-heaven-in-narnia-trailer/

rewatched Withnail and I awhile back and was marveling at the songs they were able to license for a fairly no-budget film... I guess Good Morning, Vietnam was around that same era, when classic artists were still probably pleased to get a thousand bucks or whatever

(if they still even owned the rights, I should add)

rewatched Withnail and I awhile back and was marveling at the songs they were able to license for a fairly no-budget film

Well when your film studio is run by George Harrison... (That explains the Beatles choice at least.)

I was unaware of the context for that Wayne's World bit

boy that trailer makes me kind of sad, i had some hope this was going to be something really unique like barbie, i don't know, i see that much CG shit now and i just sort of tune out :/

(This kind of makes me want to watch it, I had no interest before.)

looked more practical than I expected and I don’t expect the spectral lion made out of sparkles to be practical, etc

it would be very funny to make animal people not be cg and make adult humans wear animal onesies like the bbc series but I shudder to think ahout the furry community’s reaction

I wasn't particularly excited about Gerwig doing another IP adaptation, but this looks like it could be cool.

jaymc at 2:54 17 Sep 26

yeah never mind

I don’t exactly trust early trailers for stuff like this so I’m still down. the Led Zeppelin is a bit ok wut though

One thing the internet points out - and it might have been mentioned already in this thread - is that the action seems to have been updated from the turn of the century to the 1950s, which is curious because the kids in Lion, set twenty years hence, are evacuated at the outbreak of the Second World War, which is pretty crucial to the plot.

Assuming the sequels have the same relative timescale, it'll be interesting to see what the cast of this version of Lion will be evacuated from in twenty years' time.

My recollection is that a lot of lefties were disappointed with the outcome of the 1992 General Election, but not to the extent of evacuating their children to the countryside. Which in any case wouldn't have made sense because the countryside votes Tory. Evacuating inner-city children to Wiltshire and Dorset would not have saved them from John Major and Edwina Curry and the Cones Hotline.

the fact that they are evacuees is not really essential to the story, there aren't really parallels in Narnia.

My theory re what the Lion setting would involve is some sort of evacuation/isolation due to COVID. It would fit the time frame and Digory would be old enough to be an elderly professor type.

This looks like pure uncut slop. Here’s why that’s a smart choice

That's the fascinating thing. The internet is driven by two conflicting, contradictory impulses. On the one hand the great amorphous lefty hive mind of Reddit wants to love this film, because it's by their hero, Greta Gerwig. She can do no wrong. But on the other hand the looks awful.

So the internet doesn't know what to think. The stupid, stupid children of Reddit are waiting for someone else to voice an opinion, because like all children they're scared little wimps who are terrified of saying the wrong thing. This thread stood out:
https://www.reddit.com/r/OutOfTheLoop/comments/1x5y7ch/whats_going_on_with_the_new_narnia_movie/

Their tiny little child-like left-wing minds don't know what to think. On the one hand they laugh at US Christians for complaining that Jesus Christ is being voiced by a woman - I think that was the studio's intention - but on the other hand they're not keen on the film itself. Presumably the studio cast Meryl Streep as Lion Jesus because they wanted some sweet, sweet Twitter backlash, thus allowing them to plant stories in the media about the religious right and trauma etc, but it hasn't worked, because Meryl Streep is a distinguished actor. They should have picked Sabrina Carpenter instead. That would have really riled up US Christians.

This is why lefties are so funny. Instead of having one, homogenous opinion, they have lots of different opinions, some of which conflict. That's no way to run a political party.

my challops: it looks fine, it's just the music in the trailer that makes it annoying.

again the idea that greta gerwig is a hero of the online left as if barbie wasnt neutral at best on a lot of the topics it was very definitely thumbing its nose at

If you thumb your nose at something, how can you be neutral?

at best!

I suppose what’s going through my head is “can’t the internet chill, it’s just a trailer”, but that’s about as pointless a thought as I’ve ever had.

I’m guessing there’s no AI involved, but it did have that weirdly sharp, glossy oversaturated look of a generated image. Eh. Ideally I’m just looking for a fun, not-too-traumautic movie I can take my 7 year old to, I don’t really care if it’s faithful to the book. As long as it doesn’t have any terrifying face-peeled Terminator robots like Hoppers did last year, I’m happy.

Stairway sounded great - maybe it’s finally stopped sounding like the overplayed cliche it was in the 80s and 90s? Of course it’s not a patch on the Dolly version.

i dont think its changed at all tbh

Stairway is still bad and will always be bad IMO

Reveal Your Uncool Liberal Beliefs Here

(Hoppers came out in March ftr)

I thought this was exactly as I expected from a beloved tale about posh children in 50s England having magical adventures and meeting quirky characters.

Not sure who was expecting Andor.

rewatched Withnail and I awhile back and was marveling at the songs they were able to license for a fairly no-budget film
Well when your film studio is run by George Harrison... (That explains the Beatles choice at least.)

― Ned Raggett, Wednesday, 14 October 2026 21:54 (five days ago)

I was unaware of the context for that Wayne's World bit

― L'enfer, c'est les otters (Noodle Vague), Wednesday, 14 October 2026 22:05 (five days ago)

Scrolling back through this I assumed it was about Ralph Brown.

The article about Led Zep's forbearance would hit a little different if I hadn't just heard Black Dog all over The Wringing Dry of Cliff Boon.

(this all looks like a good movie to me)

So Uncle Andrew pops his head 'round the door, and mentions there's a little sweet shop on the edge of Charn...