In a recent live Q&A, Christopher Paolini spoke more about Disney’s upcoming television adaptation of Eragon for their streaming platform, Disney+.
When asked whether Eragon would be live action or animated, Christopher confirmed that the show will be live action. He also addressed concerns that a live action show would require too large of a budget, possibly leading to cuts in CGI, including reductions in Saphira’s screen time or less magic. This isn’t the case, says Christopher:
The plan at the moment is for a live-action television show, and one of my great concerns was: A. Can I be involved, will I have a say? Can I help make this as good as possible? B. Is it even possible to do what needs to be done on a television budget? They seem confident that we can do this, that we can have Saphira as a main character, and that all of the stuff that needs to be in the story can be in the story.
Now, again, we’re in early days, things may change. I can’t make any definitive promises. A lot will depend on the budget the show gets. But I do think it is possible to do live-action, and we’re going to do our best to make it as good as possible.
With a massive studio like Disney behind the production, who has incredible experience with large CGI projects on properties such as Marvel and Star Wars, it seems as though Christopher is working with the perfect group to tackle such a large-scale project.
We can look to projects like WandaVision, She-Hulk, The Mandalorian, Obi-Wan Kenobi, and others to see that large-scale Disney projects can be done on a television budget. In fact, Disney has made a huge bet on it by expanding the Marvel Cinematic Universe into television series, which have been wildly successful for the company.
Keep up on all of the Eragon TV show news, and learn even more, in our “Everything we know about the Eragon TV show” article!