‘Criminal Minds’ Producer Bringing ‘The Seven Wonders’ to ABC

1 year ago by Kevin Yeoman

matthew reilly seven ancient wonders abc Criminal Minds Producer Bringing The Seven Wonders to ABC

Not to be outdone by the proposed Romancing the Stone series from NBC, rival network ABC has ordered a pilot for the globetrotting adventure series The Seven Wonders – based on the Jack West Jr. novels.

The books hale from Australian writer Mark Reilly, who published the first story in the series, Seven Ancient Wonders (also known as The Seven Deadly Wonders in the US) in 2005. Since then, Reilly has completed the series with The Six Sacred Stones in 2007 and The Five Greatest Warriors in 2009.

The television series is being sold as a mash up of Indiana Jones and the National Treasure films starring Nicholas Cage. However, for those not familiar with Jack West Jr. and his quest to bring together seven artifacts promising 1,000 years of peace and prosperity, even the more outlandish aspects of National Treasure pale in comparison to how out-of-bounds The Seven Wonders series may be willing to tread (depending on how close it sticks to the source material). For example: Jack West Jr. has a robotic arm filled with C4 explosives, and a falcon buddy.

Bionic enhancements and avian BFF’s aside, the main premise of the series focuses on the race to acquire the seven pieces of a capstone, formerly resting atop the Great Pyramid of Giza that can absorb the catastrophic energy from a sunspot, which occurs every 4,000 years or so. The capstone was divided up by Alexander the Great and placed in different locales across the globe – which is sort of like breaking up a pacemaker and spreading it around your house after surviving a heart attack.

indiana jones seven wonders abc Criminal Minds Producer Bringing The Seven Wonders to ABC

Will 'The Seven Wonders' be anything like Indian Jones?

Competing for these capstone fragments are three teams: One from Europe, representing the interests of the Catholic Church, the CIEF – or Commander-in-Chief’s Extremis Force (basically the Freemasons), and one led by Jack West Jr. – who, unlike the others, plans to use the capstone for the good of mankind, instead of personal gain.

Depending on what spin the series puts on the source material, The Seven Wonders will either end up as pulp-inspired goodness, or a snicker inducing mess.

Given that the project is being produced by film and television veteran Mark Gordon, who has had great success with shows like Criminal Minds, Grey’s Anatomy and Private Practice, as well was theatrical releases like Saving Private Ryan and this year’s sci-fi trip Source Code, The Seven Wonders should not find it too difficult to attract an audience.

With The Seven Wonders joining Revenge, Missing (starring Ashley Judd) and Jerry Bruckheimer’s proposed Navy SEALs project, ABC may start calling itself the Adventure Broadcasting Company.