Godawful Adaptations

Yeah, I like G.I. Joe. Every now and then you need to unwind with an unambiguous story of good and evil, especially if it's got ninjas and snarky redheads in it. I did not like G.I. Joe: Rise of Cobra. In fact, I didn't like it so much that I actually wrote papers on adaptation theory for my film class specifically laying out why it sucked. (Aced the class.) But the issue of crappy film adaptations is hardly confined to one ninja-intensive franchise.

For example, I recently saw the film version of Percy Jackson: The Lightning Thief. It's the first in a series of young adult novels featuring the offspring of the Greek gods, with the central premise being that if the gods sired bastards all over the place in the ancient world, they sure as hell wouldn't stop just because it's modern times now. The Percy Jackson series displays a pretty good knowledge of Greek mythology, right down to the gods being power-hungry jackasses and Tartarus being number one on the list of places you do NOT want to be. The film adaptation, however, is . . . bleh.

It started out not bad, I thought. They had to compress the book's timeline somewhat, but that's understandable; you've only got so much screentime, and a few things can stand to be cut down a bit. The further it went, though, the more "WTF?" I encountered. By the time I got to Steve Coogan as Hades, I was pretty much done with it.

(Digression and spoilers below)

Spoiler:

So what about you guys? What are your favorite examples of "good book/comic/song/myth/idea, bad movie"?

I love Batman comics, but the movie 'Batman and Robin' sucked. So did 'Batman Forever', though not as badly.

^ Lol, but not all Batman comics are good either. Hundreds of them are just shitty.

*cough* Riddler's Romance *cough*

Having read and loved Hannibal, I was beyond pissed at how the filmakers butchered it. Oh, also Red Dragon--or should I say, Manhunter?

Avatar The Last Airbender

...Yeah, I shouldn't really have to add why.

The Talented Mr. Ripley. It looks more like the adaptation of a vague description of the first book somebody made to the scriptwriters- I could bet they hadn't even read it, mostly because of the blatant character rape. They killed the keys to Tom Ripley working as a protagonist, such as the remorselessness, lack of scruples whatsoever, "being a forgetable nobody" factor, and the sexual repression bording on asexuality, and butchered him into a brittle, depressed, unstable and blatantly gay Matt Damon who

Spoiler:

And speaking of film adaptations completely missing the point, The Neverending Story comes to mind. That's so not what the book is about.

Lady Anne wrote:

'Batman Forever'

Whenever I see that movie, I keep comparing Tommy Lee Jones' dancing, mugging Two-Face with Batman: The Animated Series' Two-Face.



It's a pretty sad state of affairs when the live-action version of Two-Face is more cartoony than a literal cartoon Two-Face.

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

Old news, I know, but I still haven't forgiven them for it. The first two were brilliant, brilliant adaptations. Then the third movie came along, they got a new director and he apparently had a brain malfunction that caused him to shit all over everything. Seriously, any time you have to take plot content out in order to have time for your OH SO FUNNY GUYS joke scene, you are doin' it horribly, horribly rong.

How about Half-Blood Prince, where major plot details (like, oh, the explanation of who the half-blood Prince was) were dispensed with in order to focus on the romance. The problem is, they assume everyone's read the books and knows what's going on, which is fine if you have actually read the books, but if you haven't (or haven't in a while and forget the details), you won't have a clue.

The 2004 version of Salem's Lot, anyone? They should have just called it Salem's Lot: In Name Only.

Any time I hear "in name only" I think of Republicans, 1970s Battlestar Galactica fans, and No Mutants Allowed. Is that really the company you want to keep?

EileenK98 wrote:

How about Half-Blood Prince, where major plot details (like, oh, the explanation of who the half-blood Prince was) were dispensed with in order to focus on the romance. The problem is, they assume everyone's read the books and knows what's going on, which is fine if you have actually read the books, but if you haven't (or haven't in a while and forget the details), you won't have a clue.

You know, I would have listed that one, but the book was such a shitstorm itself that even the shitty adaptation couldn't really make things worse.

Half-Blood Prince was Rowling's unfortunate dalliance with the CAPSLOCK key.

Penguin wrote:

Half-Blood Prince was Rowling's unfortunate dalliance with the CAPSLOCK key.

I thought that was Order of the Phoenix?

Gamma Vector wrote:

EileenK98 wrote:

How about Half-Blood Prince, where major plot details (like, oh, the explanation of who the half-blood Prince was) were dispensed with in order to focus on the romance. The problem is, they assume everyone's read the books and knows what's going on, which is fine if you have actually read the books, but if you haven't (or haven't in a while and forget the details), you won't have a clue.

You know, I would have listed that one, but the book was such a shitstorm itself that even the shitty adaptation couldn't really make things worse.

I wonder if they'll make Deathly Hallows better actually. Shouldn't be so hard...

myeerah wrote:

Penguin wrote:

Half-Blood Prince was Rowling's unfortunate dalliance with the CAPSLOCK key.

I thought that was Order of the Phoenix?

Naw, that's when she found out it existed.

A Kid in King Arthur's Court was (technically) supposed to be based on A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court. However, aside from a slight resemblance between the titles, there was nothing in Kid that resembled the original work by Mark Twain.

Sheba wrote:

Having read and loved Hannibal, I was beyond pissed at how the filmakers butchered it. Oh, also Red Dragon--or should I say, Manhunter?

Yes, thank you. Augh those movies.

I could rant a bit about all the Dracula movies and The Count of Monte Cristo movies for hours.

Cyberwulf wrote:

Lady Anne wrote:

'Batman Forever'

Whenever I see that movie, I keep comparing Tommy Lee Jones' dancing, mugging Two-Face with Batman: The Animated Series' Two-Face.



It's a pretty sad state of affairs when the live-action version of Two-Face is more cartoony than a literal cartoon Two-Face.

Why does he knock the vase off of the table? It wasn't in the way or anything.

Poor vase.

ETA: The Count of Monte Cristo movie was good. I've never read the book, but fuck the book.

The remake of 'Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.' There was a time I actually liked Johnny Depp (Benny and Joon is both funny and heartwarming), but turning him from Gene Wilder's sarcastic, genuinly sadistic, more than a bit mad genius into a pale, Gothic, misjunderstood little boy who just wanted to be loved was a an insult to the character and the book.

The man needs to get away from Tim Burton while he still has a career left.

I liked Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, and I feel that, as a standalone, left uncompared to the previous movie and appreciated for what it is, it's a good film.

InkWeaver wrote:

I liked Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, and I feel that, as a standalone, left uncompared to the previous movie and appreciated for what it is, it's a good film.

I like the way the children and parents were updated in the remake, and the visuals were fab. The rest was pretty whatever.

Lurv wrote:

Gamma Vector wrote:

EileenK98 wrote:

How about Half-Blood Prince, where major plot details (like, oh, the explanation of who the half-blood Prince was) were dispensed with in order to focus on the romance. The problem is, they assume everyone's read the books and knows what's going on, which is fine if you have actually read the books, but if you haven't (or haven't in a while and forget the details), you won't have a clue.

You know, I would have listed that one, but the book was such a shitstorm itself that even the shitty adaptation couldn't really make things worse.

I wonder if they'll make Deathly Hallows better actually. Shouldn't be so hard...

I'm not sure they can make it worse.

InkWeaver wrote:

I liked Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, and I feel that, as a standalone, left uncompared to the previous movie and appreciated for what it is, it's a good film.

If you leave it uncompared to the book, too, yeah, then it's a...stupid movie well done.

The Oompa-Loompas alone made me cringe. What's the whole thing with that single guy? Yes, I lolled the first time I saw 20 exactly similar tiny people, but by the time they started raping the songs, which were so cool in the book, for the sake of screen time for the Oompa-Loompa dance...ugh.

And what's with Wonka's 'Tortured Past' wank? It didn't add anything but a feeling of replacement shame and awkwardness.

So maybe that's a personal thing, but Willy Wonka the sadistic genius stands a long way removed from Willy Wonka the Micahel Jackson clone with childhood issues, and I hated Depp's version.