Amazon series The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo won’t draw plot from the books

Last Updated on August 5, 2021

There are twenty-one books about the character Jack Ryan, but the Jack Ryan television series on Amazon isn't based on any of them. It has taken the character and dropped him into new stories crafted by the writers of the show. Now Amazon is taking the same approach to a series that will feature Lisbeth Salander, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.

Although this Amazon TV show is being called The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, it will not be based on the Stieg Larsson novel of the same title. Instead, it will

take Salander and place her in today's world with a wholly new setting, new characters, and a new story that will resonate with fans of the original and thrill a whole new generation.

Amazon Studios will be producing the show with Left Bank Pictures, in association with Sony Pictures Television. Andy Harries, founder and CEO of Left Bank, will be executive producing with Rob Bullock.

Larsson's novel The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo was previously turned into a Swedish film directed by Niels Arden Oplev and an English-language film directed by David Fincher. Oplev also directed adaptations of the follow-up novels The Girl Who Played with Fire and The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest. 

Since Larsson passed away before his novels were published, David Lagercrantz took over the Salander series and has written three further entries – The Girl in the Spider's Web, The Girl Who Takes an Eye for an Eye, and The Girl Who Lived Twice. Spider's Web served as the basis for a film directed by Fede Alvarez.

Salander was played by Noomi Rapace in the Swedish films, by Rooney Mara in Fincher's film, and by Claire Foy in Alvarez's film. No actress is currently attached to play the character in the Amazon series.

I'm always going to be disappointed that Mara wasn't brought back to play the character in more films.