Terry Pratchett’s Discworld City Watch Is Coming To BBC America

Terry Pratchett’s Discworld City Watch Is Coming To BBC America

Earlier this year, we learned that BBC Studios was planning to bring a slice of Terry Pratchett’s wonderful Discworld novels to TV in the form of a series based around the City Watch of Ankh-Morpork. Now, we know a little more — and that its plans have been expanded ever so slightly.

BBC America has now officially confirmed that BBC Studios will bring The Watch to the channel as an eight-episode series, up from the six mentioned in early murmurs about the show. Written by The Musketeers and New Tricks’ Simon Allen and executive produced by Luther’s Hilary Salmon and former Doctor Who producer Phil Collinson, The Watch will follow the titular guards of the city-state of Ankh-Morpork.

The dysfunctional crew emerged as the premiere policing force on the Disc over the course of several of Pratchett’s beloved fantasy novels. Here’s the new logline, teasing a few familiar names coming to the “punk rock thriller” take on Pratchett’s world:

The Watch is a punk rock thriller inspired by the legendary ‘City Watch’ subset of “Discworld” novels. This disruptive, character-driven thriller centres on Terry Pratchett’s misfit cops as they fight to save a ramshackle city of normalized wrongness, from both the past and future in a perilous quest. Modern and inclusive, The Watch features many famous “Discworld” creations including City Watch Captain Sam Vimes, the last scion of nobility Lady Sybil Ramkin, the naïve but heroic Carrot, the mysterious Angua and the ingenious non-binary forensics expert Cheery together with Terry Pratchett’s iconic characterization of Death.

It would’ve been an uneasy task to imagine a City Watch series without the likes of Vimes or Carrot, so it’s good to see them being name-dropped already — but it looks like this will be a first step into the much bigger world of Discworld beyond just the misadventures of the Watch.

It’s not the first time Discworld has made its way to TV, but The Watch has the potential to be the start of an unprecedented exploration of Pratchett’s most iconic work.

The Watch doesn’t have a production date just yet, but we’ll bring you more as we learn it.


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