There is at least one character from American Gods who survived the recent cancellation of the show. A few months ago, news broke out about Starz ending the series after the third season. Now, someone else has picked one of the American Gods characters as Amazon has just ordered Neil Gaiman’s Anansi Boys adaptation (via SuperHeroHype). In American Gods, Anansi — or Mr. Nancy — is the West African trickster god portrayed by Orlando Jones. Production on the six-episode series will begin in Scotland later this year and the story will follow the adventures of Mr. Nancy’s sons. Amazon isn’t presenting the upcoming show as a spin-off, even though the two stories will share at least one character.
“Anansi Boys as a TV series has been a long time coming — I first started working with Endor and Red on making it over a decade ago,” said Gaiman in a press release. “We needed Amazon Prime to come on board and embrace our vision, we needed a lead director with the craft and vision of Hanelle Culpepper, we needed the creative and technical wizardry of Douglas Mackinnon (who worked out how we could push the bounds of the possible to shoot a story set all over the world in a huge studio outside Edinburgh), and we needed the rest of the amazing talents that nobody knows about yet.”
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Gaiman and Sir Lenny Henry will write for the series together with Arvind Ethan David, Kara Smith, and Racheal Ofori. The project will see Gaiman, Henry, Douglas Mackinnon, Hanelle M. Culpepper, Hilary Bevan Jones (Endor Productions), and Richard Fee (Red Production Company) as executive producers. Gaiman and Mackinnon will also serve as co-showrunners.
The description of Gaiman’s Anansi Boys reads:
“Fat Charlie Nancy’s normal life ended the moment his father dropped dead on a Florida karaoke stage. Charlie didn’t know his dad was a god. And he never knew he had a brother. Now, brother Spider is on his doorstep—about to make Fat Charlie’s life more interesting . . . and a lot more dangerous.”
Amazon has yet to announce an official release date for the series.
Have you read Anansi Boys? If so, what do you think about it? Let us know in the comments section below.
Recommended Reading: Anansi Boys: A Novel
