Neil Gaiman’s ‘Good Omens’ TV Series Gets Amazon Pickup for 2018
It was early last year that Sandman and American Gods creator Neil Gaiman finally got the chance to pitch a TV adaptation of his first novel Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch. Now, Amazon has finally picked up the tab for 2018, green-lighting a six-part limited series.
Per Amazon’s official announcement, Gaiman himself will write and showrun the hour-long Good Omens, based on Gaiman and the late Sir Terry Pratchett’s acclaimed novel of the same name. Good Omens will start as a global release on Amazon Prime Video, and eventually be broadcast on the BBC afterward.
For those unaware, Gaiman and Pratchett’s 1990 award-winner chronicles the angel Aziraphale and the demon Crowley attempting to prevent the End Times, as set in motion by the birth of Satan’s son. The novel was previously optioned in 2002 with Terry Gilliam directing stars Johnny Depp and Robin Williams, and again as a series in 2011 with Monty Python comedian Terry Jones and screenwriter Gavin Scott. Both projects fell through.
So reads the new synopsis:
Good Omens takes place in 2018 when the Apocalypse is near and Final Judgment is set to descend upon humanity. According to The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter Witch (the world’s only completely accurate book of prophecies), the world will end on a Saturday. Next Saturday, in fact. Just before dinner.
So the armies of Good and Evil are amassing, Atlantis is rising, and tempers are flaring. Everything appears to be going according to Divine Plan. Except Aziraphale, a somewhat fussy angel, and Crowley, a fast-living demon—both of whom have lived amongst Earth’s mortals since The Beginning and have grown rather fond of the lifestyle—are not actually looking forward to the coming war. And… someone seems to have misplaced the Antichrist.
Says Gaiman of the adaptation:
Almost thirty years ago, Terry Pratchett and I wrote the funniest novel we could about the end of the world, populated with angels and demons, not to mention an eleven-year old Antichrist, witchfinders and the four horsepeople of the Apocalypse. It became many people’s favourite book. Three decades later, it’s going to make it to the screen. I can’t think of anyone we’d rather make it with than BBC Studios, and I just wish Sir Terry were alive to see it.
Pratchett died in March 2015 from a rare form of Alzheimer’s disease, after which Gaiman swore off adapting Good Omens without the co-author by his side. Gaiman later revealed at a memorial event for Pratchett that the co-author left him a posthumous letter urging him to write an adaptation by himself, to which Gaiman recalled, “At that point, I think I said, ‘You bastard, yes.’”
Gaiman will also executive produce with Doctor Who alum Caroline Skinner and Fleabag producer Chris Sussman, alongside Rob Wilkins and Rod Brown. Stay tuned for the latest, and don’t forget Gaiman’s American Gods in the meantime.