Amazon Prime Video is partnering with JuVee Productions to develop a series based on Octavia E. Bulter’s sci-fi book ‘Wild Seed’, from her ‘Patternist’ series. The story follows two immortal and superpowered Africans, the male conqueror Doro, and the female healer and shapeshifter Anyanwu. Doro can control others and leaves a swath of death and destruction in his path. The “love (and hate)” struggle between these two immortals spans centuries from “pre-Colonial West Africa to the far, far future.” “For centuries, their personal battles change the course of our world as they struggle against the backdrop of time– master vs slave, man vs woman, killer vs healer.”
Award-winning Nigerian-American sci-fi/fantasy author Nnedi Okorafor will co-write the series, with Kenyan-born filmmaker Wanuri Kahiu (‘Rafiki’), who will also direct. The series comes from JuVee Productions which was co-founded by actor Viola Davis and Julius Tennon.
Davis stated:
“Wild Seed is a book that shifted my life. It is as epic, as game-changing, as moving and brilliant as any Science Fiction novel ever written. Julius and I are proud to have this masterpiece in our hands. It fullfills our promise and legacy to be disrupters. Octavia Butler was a visionary and we look forward to honoring the scope of her work and sharing it with the world.”
Okorafor and Kahiu shared:
“We love Octavia Butler and her work and have for decades. But Wild Seed is our favorite. It’s expansive, disturbing, and unique. Wild Seed stays with you. It’s a love/hate story of African immortals that connects people on the African continent to the Diaspora. It merges the mystical and the scientific seamlessly. You’re going to see shape-shifting, body jumping, telepaths, people born with the ability to defy the laws of physics, all in the context of our past, present, and future world.”
‘Wild Seed’ was actually the fourth novel published as part of Butler’s ‘Patternist’ series, but as far as story chronology, it comes first. In chronological order, the rest of Butler’s books would go ‘Mind of My Mind’ (1977), ‘Clay’s Ark’ (1984), ‘Survivor’ (1978), and ‘Patternmaster’ (1976).
Ernestine Walker and Merrilee Heifetz, the Octavia E. Butler Estate and Literary Executor, stated:
“We couldn’t think of more perfect partners to bring Octavia’s feminist century-spanning epic to life than Viola Davis, JuVee Productions and the brilliant creative team of Wanuri Kahiu and Nnedi Okorafor — and we are so excited to be working with the tenacious and passionate Amazon team, whose enthusiasm for Wild Seed seems immeasurable. We have complete faith in this vision for her work, which will thrill the readers who have loved these novels for decades, as well as bring new fans, both to the page and to what is sure to be an important and mind-blowing adaptation.”
Are you a fan of ‘Wild Seed’ or the rest of Octavia E. Butler’s ‘Patternist’ series? What do you think about Amazon adapting it to a series?
Source: Deadline
