AMC may preside over two of the hottest flesh-munching shows in town in The Walking Dead and Californian offshoot, Fear the Walking Dead, but the network is expanding into original content both now and into 2017, and today brings word that The Son has added acting veteran Sam Neill.
Pitched as a multigenerational family drama, Neill will take point as the proud patriarch of a Texan family. Currently, AMC has ordered ten one-hour episodes of the series, and it’ll look to tell the rise and fall of an empire.
Based on Philipp Meyer’s acclaimed novel of the same name, The Son takes place during the formative years of the United States, just as America was coming into its own as the world’s leading superpower. Think the gold rush of the mid-19th century; a time of remarkable excess and expansion as North America become an awful lot smaller thanks to its network of railroads.
That’s mainly context, though, with the crux of Meyer’s story centering on Eli, the charismatic patriarch of the McCullough dynasty. In the author’s novel, Eli was “kidnapped and raised among the Comanche Native American tribe and applies the brutal Comanche worldview to his business dealings. He was born on the day Texas became an independent Republic, earning the nickname “First Son of Texas” and is a relic of the Wild West.”
AMC will set the wheels in motion come June, with filming primarily taking place in Austin, Texas. Also on board the bandwagon are Sydney Lucas, Henry Garrett, Zahn McClarnon and Paolo Nunez.
Spanning a total of ten one-hour episodes, expect The Son to premiere via AMC at some point in early 2017.