Personal rant: Unnecessary changes from books to movies

[spark]

The only one I'm really vocal about is Disney's The Black Cauldron, based off of parts of Lloyd Alexander's Prydain Chronicles. Namely, the movie plays out as though they ran the first two novels (of five) through a paper shredder, glued their favorite parts together, and turned that into a movie.

AMEN. Also whoever wrote the music for it was high. That is the only possible explanation for it. What's going on in the music doesn't match what's happening on screen at all, not even a little bit. It's weird and atonal and non-musical and just plain unlistenable, and makes an already bad movie completely and utterly unwatchable. I could maybe forgive them for butchering the plot, and I could forgive them for the clunky voice acting and the kind of bad animation, but the music was just the last straw for me.

I usually have a pretty high tolerance for futzing around with books, I mean I even liked the Studio Ghibli version of the Earthsea books, and that was like "let's take three already kind of bizarre books and make them into one great big completely insane story!" Or maybe four, though the second of the four books only got a reference, none of the plot elements from it were actually used. But it's at least got good music, and I had some fun watching it. Though I hear from others that people who haven't read the books just ended up completely confused by it.

[Mikkel]

Lord of the Rings! I liked the first part though Elrond certainly didn't look "as noble and as fair in face as an elf-lord, as strong as a warrior, as wise as a wizard, as venerable as a king of dwarves, and as kind as summer" but Faramir in Two Towers! Wasn't he supposed to be incorruptible in contrast to Boromir?
I own Return of the King but have never had the nerve to begin watching it.

[SongsOfDragons]

Ohhh, Earthsea. I really feel for Ursula Le Guin, having this fantastic old setting with some great stories - my favourite is Tombs of Atuan - and there is no adaptation that even comes remotely close to being anything like it. Even the Studio Ghibli one she said something along the lines of 'it's nice, but it's not really my book, is it?' The two biggest points of contention I know of for adapting Earthsea is 1. it's closer to an ancient setting than a Medieval one, and 2. the protagonist is black!!

XP

I remember a TV miniseries of Tombs of Atuan some years ago. It was more like a soap opera. I couldn't finish watching it.

[AccountingDrone]

I know there are a couple of Bujold fans here ...

Back about 15 or so years ago, a studio bought the option on one of her Vorkosigan universe books. They set a screenwriter to work on it. I would assume they held meetings about it. They sent a copy of the script to Lois for approval.

She will never again consider having anything of hers turned into a movie.

They had the fur wearing Barrayarrans building fires in the passageways of spacecrafts to cook food.

Yes, they had fallen to barbarism in the centuries they had lost contact with Earth, but only to the equivalent to the Middle Ages, and they had bootstrapped themselves back to just pre-atomic 20th century just as the wormhole reopened and the planet was rediscovered. They quickly made it back to building spacecraft and having a space able navy and space merchant shipping.

Yup. Barbarians in space obviously means ug grunt scratch fleas and build fires in the passages to cook with.

[fireheart]

Ohhh, Earthsea. I really feel for Ursula Le Guin, having this fantastic old setting with some great stories - my favourite is Tombs of Atuan - and there is no adaptation that even comes remotely close to being anything like it. Even the Studio Ghibli one she said something along the lines of 'it's nice, but it's not really my book, is it?' The two biggest points of contention I know of for adapting Earthsea is 1. it's closer to an ancient setting than a Medieval one, and 2. the protagonist is black!!

Imagine what would've happened if Studio Ghibli were allowed to make cuts. Apparently after they completely shredded the adaption of Nausicaa (sic?) Studio Ghibli sent the English distributors the next film with the rule: "No cuts". The only time they were allowed to change anything was for Pom Poko, when they changed the word "testicles" into "raccoon pouches". You can still tell that it's testicles though because all the MALE raccoons have it

[Sapphire Silk]

I have only 2 words to say on this subject:

Starship Troopers.

Amen, brother. Amen. That movie was a travesty. Heinlein is spinning in his grave.

The only one I'm really vocal about is Disney's The Black Cauldron, based off of parts of Lloyd Alexander's Prydain Chronicles. Namely, the movie plays out as though they ran the first two novels (of five) through a paper shredder, glued their favorite parts together, and turned that into a movie.

Another travesty of a movie. That was during a very bad period at Disney, where pretty much everything they made was crap. The execs thought they just had to add a cute animal to the story and it would sell itself.

I love that series, too. One of my favorites.

I'm gonna add the movie version of Avatar: The Last Airbender (don't know if anyone has mentioned this one yet).
My friend got me into the anime and I loved it (Toph kicks massive ass!). And to see them shred it to bits. *shudders* I'm just so glad I didn't pay to see it.

They tried to shove too much into the first movie, and using white actors was an utter, utter, mistake. The only guy in the whole movie who was any good was the guy who played Zuko (he's my favorite character in the whole series because of all of them he shows the most change and growth).

Lord of the Rings! I liked the first part though Elrond certainly didn't look "as noble and as fair in face as an elf-lord, as strong as a warrior, as wise as a wizard, as venerable as a king of dwarves, and as kind as summer" but Faramir in Two Towers! Wasn't he supposed to be incorruptible in contrast to Boromir?
I own Return of the King but have never had the nerve to begin watching it.

I almost cried when I saw those scenes in the Two Towers with Faramir turning into such a sniveling little shit. They completely ruined his character just so they could have a scene of a Nazgul confronting Frodo on the winged beast. It was a stupid, stupid, stupid scene, and it took out Faramir's later nobility in going into a hopeless battle, and took away from Denethor's behavior when Faramir fell under the Black Breath.

I was fine with Elrond though. I thought he did a good job. I saw the trailer for the Hobbit today, and it rocked. I hope the got the same guy for Elrond.

I did see a big, gaping hole, however. Galadriel is in it. She doesn't appear in the novel. I can only assume they added a scene of the Council Meeting where Gandalf finally convinces the Council to move against Dol Guldur (Galadriel was on the Council and IIRC did play a decisive role in pressuring Saruman to act).

I'd really like to see if Legolas is in it, at least as a cameo since he's the son of the Elvenking.

[firecat88]

I did see a big, gaping hole, however. Galadriel is in it. She doesn't appear in the novel. I can only assume they added a scene of the Council Meeting where Gandalf finally convinces the Council to move against Dol Guldur (Galadriel was on the Council and IIRC did play a decisive role in pressuring Saruman to act).

I'd really like to see if Legolas is in it, at least as a cameo since he's the son of the Elvenking.

From what I know about the first Hobbit movie, there will be a scene of the Council Meeting and otherwise showing exactly what Gandalf was up to when he parted ways with Bilbo and Co. Also, Legolas will be getting a cameo and both he and Elrond will be played by their respective actors from the LotR movies.

The only thing I'm seriously disliking so far that I've heard about the Hobbit movies is that there will be the inclusion of some random elf-chick named Tauriel.

[spark]

The only thing I'm seriously disliking so far that I've heard about the Hobbit movies is that there will be the inclusion of some random elf-chick named Tauriel.

I'm sure she's somebody's love interest. Because heaven forbid a movie not have a romance sub-plot. That was one of the things that bugged me the most about the Lord of the Rings, was Aragorn's mooning after Arwen. Yes they were a thing in the books, but he didn't act like a lovesick teenager over her. Saving the world first, then romance!

Though that only bothered me as much as it did because of how much screen time it got. The Faramir thing wasn't too terribly long but AUGH! I nearly shouted insults to the screenplay's writers in the theater when I saw what they did to him! The entire POINT of his character was as a foil to Boromir, and to show the way his father deludedly valued Boromir's shallow nationalism over Faramir's real herosim. And instead they made him into just Boromir II. Ugh. Completely disgusting and horrible and the one thing I cannot forgive them changing. I'm not going to flip out because this or that is a little different, but when you re-write a character into being the exact opposite of himself, for no bloody reason at all, I am going to be pissed. If they really wanted Frodo to stare down a Nazgul they could have found a way that didn't butcher one of the best and most nuanced sub-plots in the whole bloody story.

[firecat88]

I'm sure she's somebody's love interest. Because heaven forbid a movie not have a romance sub-plot.

If that is what it is, all I can say about that is...ugh. I like romance, but random romantic sideplots where there shouldn't be one? I'm so sick of those. It happened in the new stage version of Newsies too.

For those unfamiliar: Newsies, a 1992 Disney movie musical, tells the story of a newspaper strike that actually happened in 1899 New York. In it, they are aided and supported by, among others, Bryan Denton (a writer for the New York Sun) and Sarah Jacobs (the sister of one of the newsboys). Now, there is some cutesy fluff romance between Sarah and Jack, the movie's main protagonist, but it takes a backseat to the real story- The strike.

In the new stage version of the show...well...a crapload of changes were made. Over half the lyrics of every song was changed, Jack is now a painter instead of an aspiring cowboy, and, probably worst of all, Denton and Sarah get replaced. Who replaces them? A spunky girl reporter named Katherine, who rebels against her job by covering the strike instead of girly things like florist shows. Along the way, she falls in love with Jack. Two birds, one stone, everyone's happy except the fans of the original. That is, of course, until the terrible, completely predictable, throws-her-full-into-Mary-Sue-status secret about her being the daughter of Joseph Pulitzer, the show's main bad guy, and working for him at the New York World is revealed.

[Shalom]

Now onto my own rant regarding Chobits. Yes, Chobits. The manga itself only went for 8 volumes, so ranting about the "true ending" is irrelevant. There are SO many stupid changes however, that it just makes me wonder if they were doing it for fun. The worst part involved the ending. In the manga, if Chi's software activated, it would've shut down the personal recognition systems of every persocom. In the anime, it would've been that ALL persocoms would've shut down. Why make such a stupid plot change for no other reason? There has been NOTHING to indicate otherwise and on top of that, the little love scene between Zima and Dita was perfect. There were some other minor stupid changes, including having the entire "Shinbo has run off with our cram school teacher and is going to marry her" bit moved a lot further away from the events than in the manga, although I suspect that this was so they could treat the whole "Chi goes to a strip show" as a separate incident and put more focus on that. .

You have to remember, the anime of Chobits finished when the manga was only half done, so they had to write their own ending based on what was in the first half of the manga.

I liked both stories, but they weren't the same story.

Still waiting for Alien Nine to be finished, though it doesn't look very likely at this point. The original DVD even included the manga so you would know how it ended.

[cinema guy]

I can't think of a book/film adaption that I get worked up over. I tend to recognise that the director or script writer has a valid reason for the change.

Time Traveller's Wife - the whole shooting/death scene kind of got mucked up in the change over. But I kind of liked the last hug.

I like the Starship Troopers movies. I love the book. But recognise that they aren't the same thing.

Lord of the Rings - love both. Some of the changes to Two Towers seemed odd, but then the special edition makes it better.

The Hobbit - I'm kind of expecting a whole load of new, unneccesary stuff to pad the movie out to two films and bring back favourite LotR characters.

So all that said, what really gets my goat is crap sequels and remakes. mutter, mutter George Lucas mutter

[Tama]

Speaking of books butchered for TV...

The Dresden Files.

Yes...from what I have been told, he defended it, saying you shouldn't expect it to be the same.



I cannot watch book-movies anymore. If my books are made into movies, damn it all I don't care if I only make $5, I am GOING to be involved!


I could handle LOTR's romance. It was a reward, not the whole plot.

[EricKei]

Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - EVERY adaptation changes something, but it's justified. The author specifically wanted it that way.

When talking about Manga and Anime, you have to bring up Akira. It is the law.

True. Even when discussing just anime, there's always the "Japan to Anywhere Else" factor, especially with regards to shows like Macross (et al) >> Robotech (tho, to be fair, even in Robotech form it was still pretty damn good). The sad thing is, Harmony Gold (or whoever owns the name in the US now) *still* enforces the name change to Robotech -- if it gets released in the US, it MUST be called "Robotech"/include RT in the name, and use the US names for characters/places/tech.

As for anime and manga changes in general - I've gotten used to it. It seems to be standard practice, tho it does get annoying when a series that has been completed in one form gets a contradictory ending in the other form. As was stated above, Chobits was a situation where this was unavoidable.

Lord of the Rings!

Much has been covered already ^_^ Some other bits...

- iirc, a fight at the beginning of TT got moved to the end of the Fellowship movie

- Arwen *did not have any spoken lines* in the books, unless I an terribly mistaken; supposedly, they gave her some because Liv Tyler came to the set and promptly began teaching herself how to speak Sindarin and/or Quenya, and she turned out to be good at it (plus, you know, she's not bad looking Maybe they just wanted an excuse to give her more screen time). She couldn't cast spells, either; the "river horses" event was more of a "Mother Nature is pissed" thing.

- Leaving out the Barrows and how Frodo got his sword entirely

- The changes/more or less elimination of the sequence with Aragorn's undead sailor allies

- One change that I would say was justifiable was the complete omission of everyone's favorite weirdo in yellow, Tom Bombadil. I really don't think the general moviegoing public was, or is, is quite ready for him >_> I maintain that he would have scared off too many of the Normals.

- Overall, I'd say that Jackson's film version of the books is as close as anyone can reasonably expect such an adaptation to be, warts and all

[Tama]

I would have liked to know more about Bombadil, though. He is such a mystery...he is an "Elder," whatever that means..

[Geek King]

I would have liked to know more about Bombadil, though. He is such a mystery...he is an "Elder," whatever that means..

There's a whole volume of liturature about Tom, but to keep it [really] short and [really, really] simple, He's sort of a minor god who was allowed to stay on Middle Earth with the stipulation that he remain within the confines of his forest. It is generally accepted that Tom is the most powerful individual on Middle Earth during the events of LOTR.