NBC’s certainly not in Kansas anymore. Starting early next year, TV audiences everywhere will get to see a new take on the classic L. Frank Baum story with Emerald City. Given the Game of Thrones treatment, these new clips promise a decidedly fresh and far more mature take on the fable.
The first video focuses on Adria Arjona, who’ll play Dorothy in this new version, as well as Oliver Jackson-Cohen, who’ll play a version-of-sorts of the Scarecrow called Lucas, and Joely Richardson, who’ll play Glinda. It certainly teases something grand and expensive, but are fans really going to eat up a darker, moodier, sexier version of The Wizard of Oz? That remains to be seen, but NBC is, at the very least, confident that audiences at home will go down this weathered Yellow Brick Road.
The second promo finds Vincent D’Onofrio, playing a nearly-unrecognizable version of the Wizard, talking about how Emerald City is “a reflection on our society today,” through the point-of-view of their “fantastic” Dorothy. They also take a moment to compliment the “visual genius” behind it all; none other than Tarsem Singh (Immortals, The Fall, Mirror Mirror). As per usual, he’s created a visually-distinct world here, one which will hopefully be highlighted throughout the show, as it is in these preview clips.
Favoring fantasy, dark magic and menacing kings over the lighthearted approach of the original classic, Emerald City will, at the very least, be quite different. Good different? Bad different? A clear, shameless ripoff of HBO’s most popular series? That’s for us to determine when it hits NBC on January 6.