Thomas Wheeler and Frank Miller’s new spin on an old sword-and-sorcery tale is headed to Netflix next month.
The streaming service released its first full-length trailer for Cursed, its series adaptation of author Wheeler and illustrator Miller’s YA novel, which reimagines the Arthurian legend of the Lady of the Lake. The show is set to premiere on July 17.
The book tells the story of a young woman, Nimue, whose dying mother urges her to find a famed magician named Merlin and bring him a powerful, ancient sword. Along the way, she gets help from an acquaintance—a swordsman named Arthur.
The TV adaptation of the illustrated YA book was promoted at last year’s BookExpo conference, and the book itself was published by Simon Schuster in October. The show is sure to attract fantasy aficionados, but it’s also likely that a significant portion of the audience will be made up of fans of another Netflix show: 13 Reasons Why, based on the bestselling 2007 YA novel by Jay Asher. The reason why? Nimue is played by Katherine Langford, who played the central character of Hannah Baker in the first two seasons of 13 Reasons Why, which has a considerable fanbase of its own. She also appeared in the hugely popular 2018 film Love, Simon, based on Becky Albertalli’s 2015 YA novel, Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda.
Wheeler is a co-writer on the show, and he and Miller are co–executive producers. Wheeler previously wrote the 2004 fantasy-mystery novel, The Arcanum, and created the superhero TV show The Cape, which aired on NBC in 2011. Miller is famous for his influential work a comic-book writer and artist; the films Sin City, which he co-directed, co-wrote, and co-produced, and 300 are based on his comics series.
David Rapp is the senior Indie editor.
