Clive Barker’s Weaveworld in development at The CW

Last Updated on August 2, 2021

The CW, a network that's already home to horror-related series like SUPERNATURAL, iZOMBIE, THE VAMPIRE DIARIES, and THE ORIGINALS, is looking to add more genre shows to their schedule. Already working on bringing Jason Voorhees to the small screen with a FRIDAY THE 13TH TV show, they're now teaming with legendary horror writer and HELLRAISER creator Clive Barker to develop a series based on his 1987 dark fantasy novel WEAVEWORLD.

The novel's description: 

Weaveworld begins with a rug–a wondrous, magnificent rug–into which a world has been woven. It is the world of the Seerkind, a people more ancient than man, who possesses raptures–the power to make magic. In the last century they were hunted down by an unspeakable horror known as the Scourge, and, threatened with annihilation, they worked their strongest raptures to weave themselves and their culture into a rug for safekeeping. Since then, the rug has been guarded by human caretakers.

The last of the caretakers has just died.

Vying for possession of the rug is a spectrum of unforgettable characters: Suzanna, granddaughter of the last caretaker, who feels the pull of the Weaveworld long before she knows the extent of her own powers; Calhoun Mooney, a pigeon-raising clerk who finds the world he's always dreamed of in a fleeting glimpse of the rug; Immacolata, an exiled Seerkind witch intent on destroying her race even if it means calling back the Scourge; and her sidekick, Shadwell, the Salesman, who will sell the Weaveworld to the highest bidder.

In the course of the novel the rug is unwoven, and we travel deep into the glorious raptures of the Weaveworld before we witness the final, cataclysmic struggle for its possession.

Barker will be an executive producer on the show, which has been updated to modern day by writer Jack Kenny, who will also executive produce, as will Angela Mancuso. 

The show's synopsis:

an app designer teams up with a young pastry chef who has just discovered that she is destined to be guardian of a mythological realm that can be accessed through a portal in an old Savannah mansion. Together, they fight an epic battle with evil forces who are vying for control of the magical world.

Bringing WEAVEWORLD to television has been a twenty year process, with the property having been set up as a mini-series at Showtime for several years. Michael Marshall Smith and Stephen Molton both wrote scripts for the mini-series at different points. At one stage, it was set to be eight hours long, at another six hours. In 2001, Russell Mulcahy was attached to direct. All attempts to get it off the ground fell apart. 

Here's hoping that things will actually work out this time, and that Barker's fans – some of whom fear it's impossible for any kind of adaptation to even come close to the novel – will be satisfied with the version that plays out on The CW.

HELLRAISER's Ashley Laurence