FX to turn Don Winslow’s epic drug-war trilogy into a TV series

Last Updated on July 30, 2021

Over the course of "The Power of the Dog," "The Cartel," and "The Border," author Don Winslow crafted an epic trilogy which followed DEA agent Art Keller throughout America's decades-long war on drugs. Naturally, Hollywood was eager to give the novels the big-screen treatment and 20th Century Fox signed Ridley Scott to helm the project and Shane Salerno (SAVAGES) to pen the script back in 2015. However, it seems that there was "too much story" to fit into a single film, and with the upcoming Fox-Disney merger, Deadline has reported that the project will now be transformed into a TV series courtesy of FX.

Ridley Scott and Shane Salerno will serve as executive producers on the series with Salerno also co-writing the pilot with a showrunner who is expected to be announced shortly. Per Deadline, the trilogy "spans a 45 year period and follows a DEA agent named Art Keller through America’s long running war on drugs. The through line is a blood feud between the DEA agent and Mexican drug kingpin Adan Berrera. Much like the actual drug war, the books are often shocking in brutality and raw in humanity, portraying Mexican cartel power struggles, narcos and cops on both sides of the border, traffickers and drug mules, lawyers, journalists, junkies, teen hit men, asylum-seeking children and political corruption from Mexico poppy fields to the White House." In a statement, John Landgraf, CEO of FX Networks and FX Productions, said:

I have known and respected Shane Salerno and Don Winslow for almost 20 years, and am beyond thrilled to be working with them again on the series adaptation of Don’s magnum opus – the trilogy made up of his three critically beloved and commercially successful novels. Don has masterfully woven his intricately detailed research into cartel’s and America’s war on drugs into what is widely regarded as one of the great crime epics of all time. Nothing excites the team at FX more than the daunting challenge of helping great creators make a television show as ambitious and good as the epically acclaimed books on which it will be based.

In their own statement, Shane Salerno and Don Winslow added, "We have long admired the excellence that John Landgraf and his creative team have built and sustained across many years at FX, which makes them the perfect creative partner for us. These books represent over twenty years of our lives and we care deeply about how they are adapted. We are excited to work with John and his team on what we hope will become the definitive television series on this subject matter." Although I was looking forwards to seeing what Ridley Scott could do with it, perhaps a television series will be the best fit for the sprawling story. What do you folks think?