2019 Rewind: Streaming Knight

So here's my completely random idea for how to turn the Tales of the Scarlet Knight series into a TV show.  With so many streaming services making original content, I feel it's a matter of time before this happens.

Since much of what I do at work doesn’t require a lot of thinking my mind tends to wander to other things.  The other day through a long chain that I don’t want to get into I got thinking that there’s probably no way in hell I could do a Scarlet Knight movie but what about a TV show?  There are so many streaming services now that maybe one would buy the idea.

So how would I go about doing it?

I think Season 1 would pretty much be the first book only with a few other things thrown in to pad it out to 10-13 episodes.  The first couple of episodes would introduce Emma Earl, her friend Becky, her coworker Dan whom she has a crush on, and her boss Ian.  It’d cover Dan finding a mysterious object, Ian’s family being murdered, and Ian becoming the Black Dragoon.  Then Emma would answer The Call to become the Scarlet Knight.

There would be the first battle between the Dragoon and Scarlet Knight that Emma wins through blind luck (see the comic book on Amazon).  Then later in the season they’d meet again and Emma narrowly escapes.  In the last couple of episodes Emma finds out Ian is the Dragoon and they have their final battle.

The end of the last episode would have Dan going off to Egypt with his assistant--Isis.  Then at the start of the next season Dan would uncover the artifact that possesses his assistant, giving her the powers of the evil goddess Isis.

So the second season would cover the third book.  A couple of episodes in would be the sort of “Red Wedding” where Becky’s fiance is murdered and then she becomes the new Dragoon.  Over the season Emma would have to unravel the web Isis weaves and then in the last couple of episodes there’d be the final showdown in the Temple of Isis.

That season would end with Becky and Emma’s friendship over and Emma losing her job.  In the start of the next season she would go to work for the secretive Russian businessman Bykov.  And eventually she’d find out he’s up to some scheme and have to stop him while at the same time repairing things with Becky and exploring her feelings for Jim, aka the Sewer Rat.  I’m not sure about doing the body-swapping that’s in the fourth book.  I think I’d probably combine the fourth and fifth ones into one story arc.  The fifth book had an evil businessman developing a bomb underneath a building that led to the Sewer Rat being driven out of his sewer home--and into Emma's.  So we could probably just have Bykov do that.  In the end of that the good witch Sylvia died to save everyone from the bomb; we might kill her off or maybe we'd kill someone else off, depending on if anyone wants a new contract or to go work on their movie career or something.

Another season would have Emma getting pregnant and trying to maintain her superhero career.  A couple of episodes would have her travel to the future to meet her daughter and deal with a resurgent Isis.  Like in the sixth book Emma would have the baby only to think she dies shortly after, when in reality agents of Bykov took the baby.  (The placement of this season might depend on if for instance the actress playing Emma would get pregnant in real life.)

The following season Emma would find out her baby is alive and along with Jim, the baby’s father, she’d go to Russia and work her way to Bykov and rescue her daughter Louise, though Jim is killed in the process.  At the end of the season though we find out that Isis has returned and to save Louise, Emma gives up the red armor.

The final season then would be a streamlined version of the 8th book.  As Isis’ power grows and she turns Rampart City into her playground, Emma would be drawn to a parallel world by a girl with special powers and then they do sort of an Into the Spider-Verse thing and Emma gets a new suit of armor before the final confrontation. 

I say that’s the final season because that was the last book but maybe there could be more.  The second book is my least favorite so I wouldn’t include much of that but I think it could be a two-part episode in season 1 to help pad that out.  A villain could fuck with time to create a time tangent where Emma isn’t the Scarlet Knight and her parents are alive and then she has to decide to sacrifice them to put things right.

So there you go, it all sounds extremely plausible.  Unlikely but plausible.