Walden Media is kicking butt when it comes to the children’s movie market. Sure, they’ve had a few less successful releases, like the revamped How to Eat Fried Worms or Hoot, but at the heart of their release plan is one franchise that’s almost guaranteed to keep things rewarding: The Chronicles of Narnia. Walden has already had great success with the first chapter in the series, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe and the next two books are already slated: Prince Caspian in 2008 and The Voyage of the Dawn Treader in 2010.
After the planned releases, what’s next for Narnia outings? Hard to say. Initially it had been announced that the Narnia movies would be coming out each May, creating an annual franchise for fans to rely on. Shortly thereafter, however, Dawn Treader was pushed off it’s inintial 2009 release date, ruining that plan. As Variety points out, the change also means there’s no longer a demand of promoting one film while filming another – but that also means there’s not the risk of filming one movie while the previous one is bombing at the box office. That risk increases as the franchise delves into the later, less known books in the series.
For right now, however, there seems to be little doubt for The Chronicles of Narnia and Walden President Cary Granat says it could be The Silver Chair or The Magician’s Nephew. ”There are a lot of stories to be taken from the seven books.” Well, pardon my math, but if there are seven books in the series and three are already planned or have been released, there are only four more stories to be taken from the books.
