now do we know what "breaking the arc" of Narnia means?
On not going through the wardrobe door twice
Earlier this month, I wrote a piece for Lorehaven about what’s presumedly the biggest difference between Greta Gerwig’s upcoming adaptation of The Magician’s Nephew and C.S. Lewis’ original story. The plan—as yet, unconfirmed, but deduced from numerous indicators—is to push the entirety of Digory and Polly’s adventure in Charn, London, and the budding world of Narnia from 1900 to 1950 or thereabouts.
Shifting a story fifty years from its original timeframe is no small undertaking, and is fraught with all manner of possible fallout in potential future adaptations of the Narniad.
In my Lorehaven piece, I used Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein film to make the case that time-shifting an adaptation of a story can be a good thing. Frankenstein (2025) is set roughly sixty years after Mary Shelley’s novel and turned out fantastic.
The same day my piece was published, Narnia Web dropped some comments from IMAX CEO Rich Gelfond that sent eyebrows as high as Fledge can fly. According to transcribed remarks on an investors call, Gelfond said:
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.
(You can go other places on the internet to hear the weeping and gnashing of teeth about how Greta Gerwig is “ruining” Narnia—despite the fact that we’ve heard nary a substantial peep from Gerwig, her team, or any of the actors involved in the production. Much less a trailer or any official imagery.)
Gelfond also claims that this Narnia film is “going to change the world” and is “going to create a cultural event.”
While it’d be wonderful for both of those latter inferences to end up true, it’s more likely Gelfond is speaking as a salesman aiming to boost confidence in his company at a time when lots of people are losing faith in the theatre model. I take his words to investors with a huge grain of salt. And I take the worst possible interpretations of the idea that Gerwig’s Narnia won’t be my grandmother’s and will also include “unbelievably contemporary music” with a similar grain of salt.
Let’s go back to comments Scott Stuber, then-Netflix Film chief, made about Gerwig’s production back in 2023: “…that’s what she’s working on now with [producer] Amy Pascal and Mark Gordon and they’re trying to figure out how they can break the whole arc of all of it.”
Scary words, for sure. But two years on from those comments, do we know anything more about what “breaking the arc” of Narnia really means? Even taking a fifty-year time-shift, some contemporary/rock music influences, and a guarantee that it’s not a film made for grandmas into account, I don’t think we’re any clearer on the final form Gerwig’s Magician’s Nephew will take or what future Narnia adaptations will look like under Netflix’s banner.
And maybe it’s not important that we know.
My cousins have been encouraging me to watch Rings of Power Season 2, the Amazon-backed adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings appendices and parts of The Silmarillion. Over Thanksgiving weekend, the topic came up again. Is it good? Does season two really improve on season one? How true is it to The Silmarillion and Peter Jackson’s beloved film adaptation?
During the conversation, someone said: You already know how the story ends. Plus, you have the books. So just watch it and enjoy it.
Essentially, it’s not that deep.
This view on questionable adaptations came to mind as debates about The Magician’s Nephew film—less than a year away now!—raged in other group chats over the past couple of weeks.
Friends, we will always have C.S. Lewis’ Magician’s Nephew.
And I think we will also have a great movie come November 2026. Whether it lives up to the adaptation in my head, or the one in yours, remains to be seen. We should probably get comfortable with the idea that Gerwig’s Magician’s Nephew will be an adaptation for children who haven’t yet had a reason to learn that it’s foolish to shut oneself into a wardrobe.
“I don’t think it will be any good trying to go back through the wardrobe door… You won’t get into Narnia again by that route… don’t go trying to use the same route twice. Indeed, don’t try to get there at all.” —Digory Kirke
I can’t help but think of BBC Merlin - atrocious in the light of adaptation, hilarious fun viewed as its own thing.