I think there's also a way to present the deep friendship in The Last Battle. I think the way that CS Lewis presents it actually fits. Kids can see the good in loyalty and true devotion (Tirian and Jewel) and also the bad in treating a friend more like a servant (Shift and Puzzle).

Preserving the characters in the way Lewis portrayed them is obviously important. For example, Jewel being a faithful friend is an important aspect of his relationship with Tirian. 

Posted by: @jewel

Preserving the characters in the way Lewis portrayed them is obviously important. For example, Jewel being a faithful friend is an important aspect of his relationship with Tirian. 

It's a very crucial part in the story. It shows that a relationship can be defined through deep friendship instead of romance. I know that a lot of people are into shipping these days, even more so than about 20 or 30 years ago. I've seen so many shippings of Tirian and Jill, and I'm getting so tired of it. I would like it to be about the deep friendship of Tirian and Jewel. It would be like how the TV series Sherlock explored on the deep friendship of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. John Watson.

I think another challenge fro The Last Battle is on how to deal with multiple endings. It's a very hard thing to do. Return of the King struggled with multiple endings. There was a lot of criticism for it, fans had a hard time figuring out when the movie ended. I can kind of see how The Last Battle, while it would be the most logical ending, would have the same struggle.

Another challenge for a film based on The Last Battle would be preserving the fact that it is a children's story yet making it darker than the other Narnia stories to the point that it feels more like The Lord of the Rings. I have felt for a long time that The Last Battle is closer to The Lord of the Rings than are the rest of The Chronicles of Narnia series. 

Oh yes. Another concern for Narnia movies is how they tackle on the different issues.

In The Horse And His Boy, you have this thing about Shasta getting abused and abused almost by Arsheesh. There's also the situation where Aravis is about to be married off to a much older man Ahoshta. So they're both in a hopeless situation. I can almost see as they make the journey to Narnia and the North, they're making a discovery about themselves. As Shasta is making this journey to find out about his true identity, he arrives in Narnia and Archenland, and he learns some wise lesson. Then he hears a voice in the background, "Remember who you are." Then it goes into, "Look how we all tied it together."

It isn't like Shasta and Aravis running away from traumatic moments in their lives. By the time they reach Narnia, Shasta learns about his true identity and Aravis learns humility, it's like, "Oh yeah." I almost feel like there's the moment when there's the "Remember who you are" line, where they have Bob and Larry come out to give us the moral of the story. I think art should speak for itself, though. 

So a lot of hopes and fears for future Narnia movies. There's a challenge ahead- whether it'd still be Netflix or some other company that will eventually pick it up.

I think another challenge would be is to have tension without adding big action scenes. I think this was mentioned in the Talking Beasts Podcast about "Twists and Turns In the Chronicles of Narnia" (a big shout out to @gp and @risto), but the scene where Shift tells the crowd, "Hey, a wicked beast has dressed itself up in a lion skin. He's wandering about, pretending to be Aslan. It's a Donkey." The intention that Tirian and the gang were going to reveal Puzzle and hang Shift on the highest tree in Narnia. Now there's a concern at that moment, they add a big action scene. I don't know, maybe Rishda ordering his Calormene soldiers to go after the Narnians (given his line, "Listen, the rest of you Narnians, unless I command my warriors to fall upon you with the edge of the sword!") I think there's a creative way to have tension there without having big action scene.

When talking about our hopes and fears of what will happen in Narnia movies, we have yet talked about how they would do the transitions. That's not very easy to do on screen.

In the Walden movies, they got the stumbling into the wardrobe about right. The train station and the picture in the bedroom were actually both creative. In Prince Caspian, it was creative to have all the train station disappear and the train go by. At the next moment, the Pevensies are in Narnia. In Voyage of the Dawn Treader, they had the water gushing out of the painting and flood the bedroom. Then the kids get sucked in the water, and come back out in Narnia.

I think there's a lot of creativity you could do with the transitions. Though for the most part, I would like the transition to be somewhat simple. The transition in The Lion, The Witch And The Wardrobe would obviously be simple, because just climbing into the wardrobe. The Silver Chair could be simple as well. The Magician's Nephew could be creative with the magic rings. I suppose you could show Eustace and Jill on the train in The Last Battle, then cut to where they appear before Tirian in Narnia.

Even though I am in favor of creativity of how they would do the transitions from Earth to Narnia, and back (except for The Horse And His Boy and The Last Battle, that is, unless they want to end The Horse And His Boy movie with the hunting of the White Stag and had the Pevensies climb out of the wardrobe), I don't think they should go overboard with it.