Apple TV’s Next Fantasy Epic Could Run 10+ Seasons—And Keep Going Into the 2040s

Apple TV+ might be signing up for a marathon, not a sprint. If the streamer really goes all-in on Brandon Sanderson 's Cosmere, a Stormlight Archive series could run well past 10 seasons and still be airing in the 2040s. That sounds ridiculous until you look at how much story there actually is to adapt.

Why Stormlight could run forever (in a good way)

Sanderson's The Stormlight Archive is already five doorstoppers deep, each clearing 1,000 pages. He's also planning a second five-book arc after that, plus a handful of novellas that can slot in as extras. If Apple TV+ keeps it clean with one season per book, you're easily in double digits. And honestly, these books are so massive you could see some of them spilling into multiple seasons. Remember when Game of Thrones stretched A Storm of Swords across two? Same energy here.

That kind of runway would naturally push a full Stormlight adaptation into the 2040s, especially because those back-five books still need to be written. And if Apple builds out the broader Cosmere while Stormlight is running — dropping spinoffs from other novels in between seasons — the whole thing could run for decades without running out of gas.

So what actually happens first?

There is no production date or premiere window for a Stormlight series yet. The first stop for Apple appears to be Mistborn — as it should be. Mistborn is the cleanest on-ramp to the Cosmere, and Sanderson is actively involved there, including writing the screenplay. He also has the next Mistborn era (three more novels) on his desk. Put all that together, and it would not be shocking if Stormlight doesn't really get moving until the 2030s.

• Now: Mistborn looks like the priority, with Sanderson writing the movie screenplay and planning Mistborn Era 3.
• Stormlight TV: No production timeline yet; a realistic start could be sometime in the 2030s.
• First arc (books 1–5): With typical 1–2 year gaps between seasons, getting through the first five alone could push you to around 2040.
• Second arc (books 6–10): Has to wait for Sanderson to write them; in the meantime, Apple could mix in other Cosmere projects like Elantris, Warbreaker, or the Secret Projects.

The writing backlog that will set the pace

Sanderson has been clear he doesn't want adaptations to leapfrog the books. In his 2024 State of the Sanderson — posted around the time 'Wind and Truth' landed — he laid out the order of operations:

'My plan is to finish the entire Ghostbloods trilogy, along with Elantris 2 and 3 (which will finish that series), before jumping back to Stormlight.'

He doubled down in his 2025 State of the Sanderson: Mistborn and other sequels remain the main focus. Translation: the second half of Stormlight is going to wait its turn. That actually gives Apple time to adapt other Cosmere books, or even tuck in Stormlight novellas as specials.

The clever part: a built-in time jump

Sanderson designed a roughly 10-year in-universe gap between 'Wind and Truth' (book five) and the back half of Stormlight. For TV, that's a gift. If there are long pauses between seasons or the cast turns over a bit, the story can absorb it without feeling awkward.

Big picture: this is a rare shot at a decades-long fantasy run

Plenty of fantasy properties look like they could run forever — there's even a planned animated Wheel of Time remake floating around — but streaming cancellations are brutal, and very few series make it to a real ending, let alone past a decade. Supernatural is the outlier. Even juggernauts like Game of Thrones, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and The Vampire Diaries wrapped around the 7–8 season mark.

If Apple sticks with Sanderson, though? A Cosmere slate that stretches across the 2030s and 2040s is absolutely plausible. Between Stormlight's sheer size, the planned time skip, and all the side-series options, Apple would have a long-term fantasy anchor. Given how popular Sanderson is, I don't hate those odds.