The Seeker’s Omnibus

Interview from thetorchonline.com.

It’s hard not to be impressed by Rob Tapert. Along with his creative partners Sam Raimi and Joshua Donen, the man is responsible for some of the best, and most influential fantasy television of all time: first, Xena: Warrior Princess, which starred his wife Lucy Lawless, and now Legend of the Seeker, a surprisingly watchable adaptation of the Terry Goodkind’s The Sword of Truth novels.

Recently, I chatted with Rob via phone from New Zealand, and he soon made it clear what a perfectionist he is — which is an obvious source of frustration in the blindingly fast production pace of series television. As of this posting (and contrary to some other reports), Legend of the Seeker has still not “officially” been picked up for a second season (although it looks very, very likely), but that hasn’t stopped Tapert from micro-analyzing everything about the first season and gearing up for an even better second one.

TheTorchOnline: One of the things that’s really struck me about the Legend of the Seeker is how sexy it is, what with Bridget and Craig and Mistress Denna — how you’ve made fantasy a little more “adult” and sophisticated. Is that intentional?

Rob Tapert: The intention is always to try and make something sexy. The original source material, the Terry Goodkind’s books, they were in and of themselves very sexy, and they actually went much further in various sexual proclivities than we’re able to do on a syndicated show, so the original source material had that in it, and I think part of that was the original appeal to my partners, Josh Donen and Sam Raimi on this who both read the book and it was kind of Sam who said, “I’d love to take this material and, you know, make this our return to television.”

Then, of course, you get lucky in casting. Craig [Horner] and Bridget [Regan] were able to bring this to life wonderfully and, although you wouldn’t know it yet, as the season goes on, from where we are now, it actually gets better and kind of more sexy.

If you read the whole article, you’ll note that Tapert indicates that Seeker has NOT officially been picked up for a second season. According to a comment by the author of the interview:

Brent Hartinger, Editor says:
April 28, 2009 at 1:00 PM
Just spoke with a studio source, and they’ve confirmed my original reporting. The show has NOT officially been picked up, though they concede that, because the show is syndicated, many outlets misread some previous press releases announcing pick-ups in various markets. The ABC president is “looking forward” to a second season, but renewal has not yet been confirmed or announced.