What does one do when frustrated by altered adaptations?

[Nadz1lla]

Why, make a Grumpy Cat meme, of course!

http://qkme.me/3ut8ja

It's things like this that stop me from watching Game of Thrones season three. I know I should just chill out and watch it for what it is and not get huffy about the things they change, but unfortunately I'm one of those annoying purists who have a hissy fit when things get changed unnecessarily.

Like when Faramir took the Hobbits to Osgiliath in the LOTR movie.... or when Arwen turned up instead of Glorfindel.

I'm old and grumpy before my time.  :lol:

Please tell me I'm not alone. PDT_038

[WezV]

I have decided not to care.

quite frankly GRRM  waffles on to much and his books often feel like they lack direction, it may turn out that he is some genius spider playing with a million strands of cobweb and manages to pull it all together when its done... but that will likely be long after the TV series is finished.   

They needed to make the TV series a little more focused, and not having more than a rough guide for the last 3rd of the story it makes sense to do some trimming now.   To be fair the first series was about as accurate as an adaptation can realistically be.. it is diverting more and more but i really don't see how they could do it any other way and keep it interesting on the screen... clearly they couldn't leave half the characters out of the story for a series the way the books do


I was a bit disappointed by the lack of a major event in last nights episode... it was more of a trailer for the next


anyway, LOTR raised the bar for the quality of screen adaptations GOT has continued that.   we get better, more faithful adaptations now than we ever have before and I am grateful for that


When you go watch Shakespeare you expect to see a directors stamp all over it and the interpretations can vary massively.... why don't we allow directors of modern works of fiction the same freedoms???

[WezV]

also, talking about GOT character changes.   Asha becomes Yara for the tv series... but i can forgive them when you also have a character called Osha and everyone is speaking in northern(ish) accents

[Ian Price]

I have only one thing to say about this.

Hodor.

[Lezard]

Not gonna read any of these posts until I've actually watched the offending episode, but has anyone seen the adaption they did of Terry Goodkind's "The Sword of Truth" ...There's not a cat grumpy enough to Memeify my distaste for that series.

[WezV]

Not read the books on that one but i have seen Legend of the Seeker.  It is complete pap, but i found it enjoyable pap, with kinda like a xena/hercules feel

[blue]

I admit, I haven't read the books, I've only recently started the first one, but I've been thoroughly enjoying the series.  Doesn't hurt my enthusiasm that much of it is filmed within a few miles of my house.  In fact, they're renting some land from us in August for the next series :)

Others have told me that there are changes from the books, but I don't find that massively offensive, if it's done well.  If anything, it adds interest.

LOTR may have (arguably) raised the bar for adaptations, but The Hobbit has brought it crashing down!  There is a perfect example of unnecessary changes to the original text ruining the whole thing

[Nadz1lla]

Oh dear.  :?

I was going to buy the DVD too, thanks for saving me the money.  :lol:

[Philly Q]

LOTR may have (arguably) raised the bar for adaptations, but The Hobbit has brought it crashing down!  There is a perfect example of unnecessary changes to the original text ruining the whole thing

I was a big Peter Jackson fan from the very start of his career, loved all his films up to and including LOTR - which wasn't a 100% accurate adaptation of the book but was, I think, as good an effort as anyone could have made.

Unfortunately, in making those LOTR films he lost (a) the ability to edit and (b) the ability to use CGI tastefully.  King Kong was a bloated mess, The Lovely Bones was...... words fail me :( .  I can't even bring myself to watch The Hobbit, I'll probably just get the box set when it comes out in a couple of years (and leave it unopened on the shelf). 

But anyway, I think on the whole adaptations of books tend to be much more faithful nowadays than they were many years ago.  Partly because today's viewers aren't put off by films more than 90 minutes long, partly because CGI makes it possible to realise "big" stories on lower budgets.

When you go way back to old Hollywood adaptations of classics like Treasure Island, Moonfleet, any Dickens novel etc they bear almost no relationship whatsoever to the books.  Even when I was a little kid that used to drive me crazy!

[juansolo]

Let's face it he peaked at Braindead* ;)







*Not entirely true as Beautiful Creatures was excellent and I really enjoyed The Frighteners. But it was pretty much downhill from there.

[Philly Q]

In a way that's almost true!  I love Braindead, it's massively frustrating that there's no really good home video version available.

But The Frighteners is a really wonderful and underrated film.  Great cast (Jeffrey Combs!), perfect balance of comedy, horror and thriller elements, a strong storyline, terrific pacing.... So many directors go to Hollywood and lose what made them special in the first place (John Woo springs immediately to mind).  Jackson did as well, but at least it took a while.

[blue]

yes, seeing the man that made Braindead end up making an embarrassing mess like the Hobbit is like if the maker of the Evil Dead ended up doing, say, a bad version of The Wizard of OZ!  oh, hold on...

[Philly Q]

 :lol:  I haven't seen the Oz film, I'll take your word for it.

To be fair to Sam Raimi though, his career has been a lot more diverse - different types of films, variable budgets, variable commercial success.

Whereas Peter Jackson's films have gone in one direction - they've just got more and more bloated (ironically as he personally has got less bloated).  At some point it's going to go "POP"....

[Alex]

It seems that unlike most people I actually enjoy changes and adaptions. For me, a movie is always the director's interpretation, and new twists can make a known story fresh and exciting once again. After all, if you've already read it, why would you need to watch a 1:1 version of it?

Dreamcatcher followed that lead (a Stephen King novel), but the movie turned out horrible. THe Shining is much better.
With LOTR I think the movie is better than the book because it cuts out some annoying (and boring) parts of the book, and the actors imbue their own personality on the characters.
The Hobbit - haven't read the book. I thought the movie was fun and quite fast-paced/action-orientated, which I liked.
GOT - George Martin has many flaws in his writing, I think most changes were for the better (Rob's sexy girlfriend, for example). I did miss Vargo Hoat with his speech problem. Cersei is much better as a character on TV than in the books, thanks to the actress's convincing job. I actually hope they cut out as much of Brienne as possible in the future movies, as I think her character could have been edited out of the books anyway.
Romeo & Juliet - I like the DiCaprio version a lot.
Fight Club - awesome "Jekyll & Hyde" adaption

[Alex]

ignore