THE DARK TOWER Casts One of Its Main Characters, The Young Jake Chambers

After a worldwide search, Sony and Media Rights Capital have cast actor Tom Taylor as the young Jake Chambers in the upcoming film adaptation of Stephen King's The Dark Tower.

Idris Elba and Matthew McConaughey are already on board to star as gunslinger Roland Deschain and the mysterious Man in Black (respectively). The film won't be a straight adaptation of the first book in the series (which is called The Gunslinger), but will instead jump into the middle of the multi-book story of Roland's quest to find the titular tower. Since this movie will apparently take place largely "in our day, in the modern world," fans speculate that it might be more of an adaptation of the third book in the series, which is titled The Waste Lands.

In the story, Jake Chambers is a young protege of the gunslinger's. Taylor is a relative newcomer with only a few episodes of television to his name; he appeared in a British series called Doctor Foster, and as a young version of Sean Bean's character on TNT's Legends.

Nikolaj Arcel is directing The Dark Tower, and the film is set for release on February 17, 2017. As far as I know, plans are still in place for this to be at least a trilogy with a TV show component as well, but as of right now, this movie is the only one that's received an official greenlight. I guess they're waiting to see how it does before they fully decide to go ahead with a continuation of the story. 

Mad Max: Fury Road actress Abbey Lee already has a role, and Breaking Bad's Aaron Paul is rumored to be joining the production as well. Shooting begins in South Africa in six weeks, so I expect we'll hear some more casting news soon.