Everything's an Adaptation: You Won't Believe How Many Current TV Shows Began as Something Else

Earlier this week, we learned that HBO is looking to develop a TV series based on Martin Scorsese's film Shutter Island, which itself was based on a novel by Dennis Lehane. And it was only the latest in a long line of recent "[X] Is Adapting [X] for TV" headlines; last week, news broke that NBC is developing a show based on the 1997 movie The Devil's Advocate (which, like Shutter Island, was based on a novel), Steven Spielberg is developing a show based on the 2002 movie Minority Report (which was based on a short story), and ABC is developing a show based on Castle's Derrick Storm novels (which were written written by a fictional TV character yet have been published in real life). The onslaught was enough to spark a 100-percent-friendly, not-at-all-window-breaking discussion here at TV.com about the slow death of original thought and the number of adaptations either currently airing or set to air on TV in the near future. And hoo boy, there are a lot of them.

If you don't believe me, perhaps you'll believe the photo gallery below, in which I've compiled as many current adaptations as I can think of (excluding A&E's upcoming adaptation of French TV series The Returned because it's too new to have photos). If a show it based on or inspired by a book, film, comic book, or TV series—international or otherwise—it's in here. Take a look, and prepare to be surprised by just how many of your favorite series started out as something else.

Crazy, right? And I didn't even consider spin-offs like NCIS: LA and CSI: Cyber and Chicago P.D., or "new" mash-ups of preexisting characters like Once Upon a Time and Penny Dreadful!

Ed. Note: If you know of a (current!) adaptation that we've missed, please feel free to share it in the comments!