Lisbeth Salander is taking a break from the big screen and planning a move to television in a new original series centered around the breakout character from Stieg Larsson’s Millennium book trilogy (via Variety). The literary franchise includes “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo,” “The Girl Who Played with Fire,” and “The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets’ Nest.” The original series is being set up at Amazon under the title “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo,” but the show will not be an adaptation of the Larsson novel and will “instead take Salander and place her in today’s world with a wholly new setting, new characters, and a new story.”
The “Dragon Tattoo” Amazon series is being produced by Amazon Studios and Sony Pictures Television. Left Bank Pictures founder and CEO Andy Harries (“The Crown,” “Strike Back,” “Outlander”) will executive produce alongside Rob Bullock (“The Night Manager,” “Wild at Heart”). Larsson’s book series has sold more than 100 million copies worldwide. The Amazon series does not yet have an actress attached to play the latest screen incarnation of Lisbeth Salander.
Prior to the Amazon series, films adapted from Larsson’s book series have starred Noomi Rapace, Rooney Mara, and Claire Foy as Lisbeth Salander. Rapace played the character in three Swedish films, while Mara debuted as the character in David Fincher’s U.S. adaptation of “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.” The 2011 movie was not the financial success Sony had been hoping for and plans for Fincher and Mara to continue the series with a “The Girl Who Played with Fire” adaptation were killed. Sony rebooted Lisbeth Salander on the big screen with 2018’s “The Girl in the Spider’s Web,” starring Foy in an adaptation of author David Lagercrantz’s entry in the Millennium franchise. The “Spider’s Web” film was a box office bomb with $35 million worldwide.
Both U.S. films featuring Lisbeth Salander at the center were box office disappointments for Sony, so it makes sense the studio is pivoting to television in an attempt to revive the Millennium franchise. Amazon has not announced a writer attached to the series either at this time.
