Hulu No Longer Moving Forward On “A Court Of Thorns And Roses” Series

It’s been over four years since 20th Television revealed that the studio was working on a new series adaptation of the fantasy book series, “A Court Of Thorns And Roses”, which tells the story of a huntress who agrees to travel to a magical realm with a faerie lord in return for her family’s safety, only to fall for him and ultimately fight for that love when an ancient curse threatens to destroy the faerie and human realms.

The family-friendly project was in development for Hulu and Disney+ internationally.  It was created by Ron Moore, who had an overall deal with 20th Television. He was also developing “Swiss Family Robinson” and “The Society of Explorers and Adventurers” shows for Disney+, neither of which ever came to anything.

This week, it’s been revealed by Deadline that the project is no longer moving forward at Disney.  There had been speculation that this was going to happen when Ron Moore’s overall deal with 20th Television expired, and he returned to Sony Television, where he worked creating “Outlander” for Starz and “For All Mankind” for Apple TV+.

Following Ron’s exit, 20th Television tried to find another writer for the project, but ultimately the project was cancelled. 

This is one of many projects announced during the streaming boom, when Disney was commissioning as many projects as it could to build enough content to compete with Netflix’s output. Since then, we’ve seen Disney drastically cut back on its spending each year and reduce the amount of content it creates. 

The book series consists of “A Court of Thorns and Roses” which was first published in 2015, and it was followed by “A Court of Mist and Fury” (2016), “A Court of Wings and Ruin” (2017), “A Court of Frost and Starlight” (2018) and “A Court of Silver Flames” (2021).

Rogers Take: We can add “A Court Of Thorns And Roses” to the large pile of abandoned projects revealed during the pandemic.  “A Court Of Thorns And Roses” is a popular fantasy book series that could have been competition for Disney’s “Percy Jackson” and “Descendants” franchises.  It’s unfortunate that this show never got off the ground, but it also highlights the problem with signing these expensive overall deals with creators that sometimes don’t result in anything.

What do you think of Hulu cancelling development on “A Court Of Thorns And Roses”?  Let me know on social media!