Red Eagle's relationship with Robert Jordan

[Majsju]

Excerpt from Dragonmount's interview with Red Eagle Entertainment in Fall, 2008:

DM: In one of his last blog posts, Jim made a negative comment about Red Eagle Entertainment that fueled a lot of speculation about Red Eagle Entertainment and your intentions with respect to THE WHEEL OF TIME. How will you convince Jim’s fans to trust you and give their full support to Red Eagle Entertainment’s WHEEL OF TIME projects?
REE: Let us first say that nothing Jim ever said did anything to diminish our great respect for him, his creative energy, and his vision for THE WHEEL OF TIME. He has set the bar very high, and we intend to honor his memory by carefully undertaking our film and other projects so as to meet the same standards of quality that he brought to his authorship of THE WHEEL OF TIME epic.


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We consider our specific dealings with Robert Jordan, Harriet and Mr. Jordan’s business successors to be private matters. I know that you would like us to provide additional information about any past disagreements we may have had, but we will not out of respect for Mr. Jordan’s memory and in consideration to all parties involved. What I can say is that the past issues you refer to have been fully resolved, and we are very happy with our current relationship as evidenced by a recent agreement expanding our video game rights, an agreement clearing the way for the New Spring comic to be completed, and Harriet’s kind words in support of this past week’s video game announcement by Red Eagle Games.

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Our Relationship with Robert Jordan: I’m very sorry [...], but for the reasons stated in my prior posting, our past relationship with Robert Jordan will remain a private matter. On this one point, we will have to “agree to disagree.”

[heinrich]

The quote from Robert Jordan's Blog is...
"I hear things now and then floating out in the air. For instance, I hear that word was floating about ComicsCon in San Diego that I am displeased with Red Eagle. Too true. Too very true. In a few more months that last contract they have with anyone on God’s green earth that so much as mentions my name will come to an end and we can see what happens after that. You see, among other things they forgot an old dictum of LBJ back when he was just a Congressman from Texas, when he famously, or infamously, said “Don’t spit in the soup. boys. We all have to eat.” Worse, Red Eagle though they could tell me they spit in the soup, or pee in it, if they wanted to and there wasn’t anything I could do to stop them. You can’t apologize your way out of that with me, not that they tried. There isn’t enough money in the world to buy your way out of it with me. Not that they tried that either. So they get no further help from me. Once they are completely out of the picture, we’ll see what happens."

I'm just wondering what exactly RJ was referring to. What did REE do to "pee in the soup"?

[Dragon]

Hello Heinrich,

I can certain appreciate the great curiosity you and others have about our past dealings with Robert Jordan. However, I really have nothing new to add beyond my prior posting in reply to a similar inquiry:

"I know that you would like us to provide additional information about any past disagreements we may have had, but we will not out of respect for Mr. Jordan’s memory and in consideration to all parties involved."

Please understand that our reluctance to say more on this topic is an exception to our general disposition about being open in the sharing of information with the Wheel of Time community.  In fact, the participation of Red Eagle Entertainment and Red Eagle Games in these forums is rooted in our fervent commitment to providing Wheel of Time fans with an unprecedented ability to reach us with their suggestions, ideas, questions (and even the infrequent diatribe) about our motion picture and video game ventures.

I know that this may not be the answer you were looking for, but we are putting all our energy toward making the very best motion picture and video games deserving of the support of Wheel of Time fans like yourself.  We treasure our current relationship with Harriet and we are doing everything possible to ensure that our film and video games honor the memory of Robert Jordan.

I thank you for your many postings here on our new Dragonmount forums.  I appreciate your active participation and I look forward to following your future contributions to these discussions about our Wheel of Time movie and video game projects.

With kindest regards,

Larry Mondragon

[heinrich]

ok fair enough

[vainebekonnes]

I understand why Red Eagle Entertainment wouldn't want to say anything more about the conflict they might have had with Robert Jordan.  I was wondering if things got worked out, seeing how they seem to still be moving forward with projects.  It seems like the previously mentioned time frame that Robert Jordan mentioned has expired, and yet the relationship between Red Eagle Entertainment and the Estate of Robert Jordan does not seem to have ended.  Does this means that Red Eagle Entertainment is and will still be in charge of none novel projects that deal with the Wheel of Time property?  Thanks.

[Dragon]

Hello Vainebekonnes,

Let me give you a quick answer to your question. 

First, Red Eagle Entertainment is working with Universal Pictures to make a feature film based on The Wheel of Time.  In addition, a separate, new company has been established (“Red Eagle Games”) to make Wheel of Time games for all major platforms (including the PC, Xbox, PlayStation and Wii).  And of course, all publishing rights for the Wheel of Time novels remain with Harriet and Tor Books.  Information about each of these projects can be found elsewhere in these message boards.

Basically, all this is good news for Wheel of Time fans, as there will be much for all of us to look forward to in the years ahead!

Best wishes,

Larry Mondragon

[Arbanblade]

With Regards to the comments from Red Eagle Entertainment. As long as Harriet and REE have come to the agreemtn I dont see any reason why deals cant and should not be made between RJ's works and REE. I look forward to more a deep and involved creative process for the works to be produced in te furture. Films, games, and etc. And of course the next two books.

[NoGuessing]

Hello Vainebekonnes,

Let me give you a quick answer to your question. 

First, Red Eagle Entertainment is working with Universal Pictures to make a feature film based on The Wheel of Time.  In addition, a separate, new company has been established (“Red Eagle Games”) to make Wheel of Time games for all major platforms (including the PC, Xbox, PlayStation and Wii).  And of course, all publishing rights for the Wheel of Time novels remain with Harriet and Tor Books.  Information about each of these projects can be found elsewhere in these message boards.

Basically, all this is good news for Wheel of Time fans, as there will be much for all of us to look forward to in the years ahead!

Best wishes,

Larry Mondragon

I bet thats the issue right there. "Based" is another way of saying "we're going to use poetic lisence and make changes" RJ probably got the pip when he saw that the script was not going to be very faithful to the books and focus on fight scenes and other hollywood rubbish.

Or, possibly even worse, try and fit two or three books worth into one movie in later installments. That would fail.

[Unstrunghero]

I am pretty certain there was no script at that point as we still have no real news of progress about the films, we know they did hire someone to script video games for them and it hasnt been confirmed wether Chris Morgan I believe it was, was going to be involved with both the games and the movies.  I am alos sure that if Harriet is okay with these guys then we should give them our support too, I am sure she wouldnt of agreed to anything that wouldnt add to the greatness of the WoT

[Isabel]

Unstrunghero : We don't know exactly what the relationship is and what options Harriet had.
It's also possible that it is supported , because it's going to be made anyway and you want to make sure it's going to be as good as it can get.



 

[Unstrunghero]

last I heard they had hers and Brandons blessing to go ahead with there projects