#with many of the adaptational choices

[heyclickadee]

Weird confession, probably an unpopular opinion, but: I actually like a lot of the concepts and basic designs behind the costumes in the Rings of Power series more than I like the concepts and basic designs behind the costume in the PJ Lord of the Rings films (with the costumes for the rohirrim and the people in Gondor being the exception). Don’t get me wrong, the costumes in the PJ Lord of the Rings series look amazing. They’re gorgeous and, on the whole, better made than the Rings of Power costumes. It’s just that the there’s something very dungeons and dragonsy about the PJ Lord of the Rings costumes (especially for the elves), and I know that’s because there was a twenty year feedback loop where there was a slight DnD-ness to the PJ Lord the the Rings elf outfits which then just became standard Elf Clothes in LOTR fanart which then fed back into the people making art for the DnD handbooks, but still. And I’ll admit I’m biased—it just so happens that that aesthetic is one I don’t particularly like. So seeing the costumes in Rings of Power make a clean break from that was really refreshing. And they mostly look like clothes people would wear. And I love the ideas in the designs! Elrond’s brown cloak with the feathers? That’s a sweet little tribute to his mom. The gold dust makeup on Disa’s hands and her robe (which honestly looked better in action than it did in the promo shots)? Neat concept. Tar-Miriel’s crown (and all of her outfits, actually)? Stunning. I’m in love. I just wish the designers and costume makers had been given all the time they needed to really make every costume look as good as they probably looked in their heads.

#rings of power #a lot of them did look very nice on screen #some of them just needed a little more time in production #also you know what #I’m okay with elves with short hair #the shaving of the sideburns looks exceedingly silly #I’ll admit that #but elves can have more than one haircut #(I’ll admit that the long iron straightened half tied back in elegant twists look #is not an aesthetic I particularly like #either #and that I have kind of #weeeeeelll #ambivalent #feelings towards the PJ elves #I adore those movies but I do cordially disagree #with many of the adaptational choices #Tolkien adaptations #this is only tangentially related #but in my head Glorfindel has very long very curly floofy hair

[winepresswrath]

hi! i always love your MDZS/CQL takes; can i ask what are the questions you think CQL is asking, as compared to MDZS?

I haven't actually revisited either canon in ages, which is making me nervous. what questions the novel is interested in can be pretty contentious all on its own! @mikkeneko has an excellent answer in the notes here which I reccomend to everyone. My own thoughts are honestly pretty scattered- I keep on deleting things and going hm, that's not quite right.

So, for the obvious-to-me example, people reasonably zero in on the creation of innocent doctors/radish farmers who Wen Ruohan is holding hostage. In CQL it's easy to infer that Wen Qing and Wen Ning are maybe the only cultivators and almost certainly the only combatants among the Wen remnants, and their status is much more ambiguous in the novel, which I personally think is asking, essentially, "and so what? were they wrong to run, when they had a chance? Do they deserve what Jin Guangshan will do to them if they go back? Aren't they just people, actually?" Whereas the question that CQL is asking is more to the effect of "What does Wen Qing owe these people, when she is their only defence? What is she entitled to do to save them, at other people's expense? If she fucks up that moral calculus, what then? Does it matter if she's personally fond of some of the outsiders who are going to get hurt? If one of them saved her brother? Later, this question will flip to what Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng, and the parallel to Jiang Cheng's situation in particular is, I think, genuinely pretty fun. You're giving up the Wen as soldiers who've laid down their arms in exchange for Wen Qing also grappling with leadership and the question of how many horrors she can stand to look the other way on to protect her own people. one reason I keep deleting so much is that a lot cql's changes were motivated at least in part by censorship, which I think we mostly share a general and justified distaste for! but I also think that within the bounds of that censorship the creative team put a lot of work into actually doing something interesting with those changes. Or, for another example- nieyao! There's a much greater emphasis on the nmj-jgy relationship, it's unambiguously very close and they are clearly extremely important to one another, and I think that's because the cql team has a lot to say about love, trust, power, and the ways those things interact, and that reflects back on all of the other relationships in play, including Wangxian. Almost every time, when CQL chooses change a relationship they make the characters in question closer- that's true for Jiang Cheng and Lan Wangji, for Wen Qing and the Yunmeng contingent, for Zixuan and Mianmian, and Huaisang and Meng Yao. It's even true for Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian, who have a close and trusting relationship in first life! CQL puts a much greater emphasis on "all right, so you care, what next?" How do you choose someone and then choose to be good to them? What if there's a massive power disparity between you? What if you seriously disagree about your priorities and morals? How do you trust someone who's betrayed you? When is it a stupid choice to trust at all? How do you have faith that you know someone well enough for that trust to be meaningful?

for legal reasons i would like to specify that it's not that mdzs isn't interested in these problems. i do remember wangxian's literal trust fall. cql is asking these questions all the time about everyone. also for legal purposes i'm not suggesting that cql lwj and jc love each other. but! they establish a three month wartime partnership looking for wwx and then jc immediately drops him on wwx's say-so despite apparently having a positive enough opinion of him to tell wwx he thinks they should make up twice. lan wangji will later tell wwx he thinks he should loop jc in on the second flautist! these are people trying to navigate some kind of relationship/shared interest/community, as opposed to a hateful void. cql wants to say hey, how do you go about this? while I'm here and rambling cql also puts a lot of emphasis on wwx's connection to yunmeng and changes things up so instead of feeling alienated right before he leaves our last glimpse of him there is happily picking lotuses and playing with a kid! in both stories the narrative is asking who do you protect? who do you leave behind? can you ever get it back? but the angles are very different.

#why are there so many people who simultaneously argue that cql dumbs down mdzs and also that mdzs is the slow reveal of how wwx is a #perfect angel who has never done anything wrong in his life #being let down by everyone around him #surely you have to pick an option #but lan wangji and wei wuxian being close friends in the first life really does change everything #i have seen people (reasonably) be annoyed with this as an adaptation choice #but! i like this change a lot and i think they do interesting things with it #There's still a lot of emphasis on what makes them so particularly perfect for each other but imo moving Lan Wangji into the category of #people wwx loved in the first life #shifts the focus from #when will they get together #to #What it would take and what would they have to do for these people to have to do to have a successful partnership? #If loving someone is the first step what comes next? Who do I want to be to the people around me? #i love the focus on wwx's trust issues as trust issues! problems that he's had with lwj specifically before! #and the solution isn't just oh well lwj is perfectly trustworthy #though that's obviously part of it #wwx has to like. decide for himself to do some things differently this time around in order to reap the rewards of being really in it with #someone. and lwj does too! it's a journey they're on together #i have simply rambled in all directions i'm sorry anon

[rotisseries]

rick riordan dickriders on here will be like "why are you complaining about the pjo tv show, go watch the movies and see what a bad adaptation really looks like" ok well listen to the musical watch it on youtube and see what a good adaptation looks like bitch. it can be done. as a fucking stage musical. what did that 15 million per episode do for disney that chris mccarell couldn't

#this is such a mean post from someone who does genuinely like the show I'm sorry #like there are aspects I really love!! and aspects I really don't!! which makes it mid for me #but I do genuinely like it overall. at least enough to continue watching #it's just that I see sooooo many people who seem to have this attitude like you can't critique it at all?? #and their arguments are usually just. “movies were worse” (so we'll take anything now as long as it's not that?) #or “rick was involved in the writing” (<- NOTTT guaranteed to be a good thing lmao) #anyway it's pissing me off. I'm gonna bitch. “if you like the books so much read the books” I WAS PROMISED A BOOK ADAPTATION #AM I WRONG FOR COMPLAINING WHEN I DON'T GET WHAT I WAS PROMISED #“oh but changes are okay as long as it preserves the spirit of the books” since when was the *spirit* of the books a FUCKING BORE🤨 #also the cast doesn't deserve this. stick leah and aryan and walker in a better show #pjo #pjo tv show #pjo disney+ #percy jackson #percy jackon and the olympians #the lightning thief musical #anyway all this to say some of the changes and choices are Actually Bad and it won't kill you to admit that I think #rereading this post in the drafts and editing before posting when I was handwringing about how mean it was bitch this is mild

[raina-at]

I think it's fascinating that Denis Villeneuve says he wants to make a movie out of Dune: Messiah, and then stop. It's a bit like if Star Wars had said after Empire Strikes Back: Yeah, that seems a good place to leave it.

#don't get me wrong he says the books become too esoteric and he has a point #but stopping after messiah makes no sense #messiah ends on sort of a cliffhanger #there are so many open story threads #weird choice there to end your adaptation of a book trilogy on the middle book #I hope he doesn't do that because Children of Dune is bonkers but it's really really really good #don't get me wrong nobody's saying you should do god emperor #cause that shit is insane #but stopping after messiah is WEIRD #dune part 2 #dune movie

[ueinra]

Kartal Tibet as Kemal "Valjean" from SEFILLER (1967) Turkish film adaptation of Les Misérables, set in Turkey

#les miserables #les mis #jean valjean #Sefiller 1967 #I don’t understand many things bc I didn’t find it with English subtitles #but GOSH this adaptation is so interesting if I start talking about the choices I won't finish it’s so different #maybe I’ll post more about it later idk

[shima-draws]

Me, after finishing a romance anime: Okay well now what do I do

#Maybe I should just rewatch Shirayuki again 🤔 #The goat of romance anime. Imo. #Anyway I just finished Sugar Apple Fairy Tale #It was VERY cute #Also very cliche but Challe's hot so it's fine. LMAO #And Bridget's a bitch I hope she rots. Tbh. #Shima speaks #I've also heard Horimiya is another really good one? #Idk I'm just in the mood for romance anime rn whoops haha #It really fucking sucks that the only HnKnA content we got was a movie. And it's not even a GOOD movie #It's confusing as hell 😔 #Wish we got a proper adaptation from the main manga #GODDD I gotta read Love Labyrinth of Thorns again. #They were really pushing the Ace/Alice/Julius agenda with that one and it makes me SO fucking happy #I should just reread all my Alice manga honestly it's been a hot second lol #I'VE ALSO been thinking about rereading Kamichama Karin too that one has also been on the brain #Oof. So many choices. Haha

[crehador]

brother crab's spring 2024 first impressions: tadaima, okaeri

slapping my wrist rest against my desk screaming THIS IS THE CUTEST SHIT I'VE EVER SEEN ok. ok ok so

i read i think the first 1 or 2 volumes waaay back and didn't really remember anything specific, but did remember that it was very cute and wholesome. then when i heard about the anime announcement i was like WHAT wow good for them, then when i heard asnm had been cast i was like WHAT i must reread immediately

so i did i reread it just a short while back and ue ue ue soung of crying it was even cuter than i remembered, i loved it to bits, hikari is the cutest moe blob in the world

suffice it to say i was really looking forward to this one, and the first ep of the adaptation has not disappointed at all! i feel like it's an excellent adaptation so far, really looking forward to more. the casting is just ugh chef's kiss, perfect really. i had it in the back of my mind that matsuo was torichan so while i was doing my reread i could literally hear him and it is as perfect a fit as i'd expected lmao

anyway tl;dr CUTE AS FUCK

#crab watches #spring 2024 #first impressions #tadaima okaeri #i'm still a bit stunned an omegaverse is getting an adaptation at all ngl #but this one is a VERY safe choice #setting aside the omegaverse and the bl factor it is basically just as slice-of-life romance and i LOVE it as that #like we've had a lot of good romance series lately #but so many of them focus on the getting together #(some of the ones i've enjoyed more like horimiya do have more of the being together part which is great) #but here with tadaima okaeri we get to go STRAIGHT INTO the being together part #the being a family part in fact! #and i really love that #i think it's not going to be everyone's thing #not just because it's omegaverse but because it's very sweet and extremely low drama #but to me it's just perfect. watching this family grow (not just the literal married couple and their kids family #but the found family they build in their community as well) really is such a treat #ok. ok enough rambling lol i still have other series to catch up on #UWAGHHHHHHHHHH I'M REALLY HAPPY WITH THIS ADPATATION SO FAR #LOOKING FORWARD TO THE UDON FAILGUYS SCENE

[colloquialcolors]

god fucking dammit, what a wildly devastating TLOU episode. It was always going to be! And yet. And YET.

- Having experienced the game, theres a moment I saw the paintings and the art around the door and immediately- oh- its Ish's place! oh, its beautiful! -and then right on its heels- oh, oh, Sam and Henry aren't making it much further, are they. if this is here.

-- this makes sense with the Kathleen narrative being fleshed out, wanting the stories to wrap together, they can't make it out proper. cant make it away, not really. but also. but also.

- ellie talking to sam is- well. goddammit. fuck. he reveals his bite and her first move is to. draw her blood, try to use it as medicine. ellie wants so badly to not be alone. ellie wants so badly for the people she loves to stay. ellie would draw the immunity out of her blood and give it to others if she could. she tries to. its such a naive move. its all she can do. it does nothing.

- The scene is almost verbatim from the game and it cuts to the core both ways! impeccably! ow.

-- the choice to stay on ellies face is. yeah.

- Bloater does the head rip thing and my only thought was "oh thats such a nice homage to the game, where i got joels head ripped off/in half a solid 8-10 times :)"

- is your person worth more than others? more than mine? more than the world? haha. shit.

#sysfandoming #tlou spoilers #tlou hbo spoilers #tlou #the last of us #the last of us hbo #i dont know what my tagging for this will be i just wanted to store this somewhere #what a good episode. so many choices! i remain very pleased with most of the deviations and shifts. truly taking advantage of this #being an adaptation to a different medium. #tlou episode 5 #... i maybe should have put this on the cr blog #but oh well #too late now

[darkfrog24]

The one that got away

Still haven't seen the new Percy Jackson show but I have seen some fan reaction and here's what I'm getting:

In the show, there's a lot more Poseidon+Sally interaction. In the show, Sally Jackson is the woman he loves.

In the books, Sally is the ex who very much dumped him.

#I'm all for stories about exes who became for-real friends #Riker and Troi on TNG #Chloe and Daniel on Lucifer #adaptation #Percy Jackson #Percy Jackson TV series #when the adaptation adds to the original #Poseidon is never shown as too stupid to understand that Sally makes choices to protect Percy #including marrying Gabe #but it still had to be an ego hit #he's gotta be like 'okay so many she didn't want to settle down at the bottom of the sea for my albeit divine ass' #'but COME ON' #don't get me wrong I don't think book Poseidon doesn't care about Sally at all #but she's not the love of his life #she's one of his many girlfriends #yeah he respects her and might love her in his way #but her getting older and marrying Paul is something he very much takes in stride #kind of like Riker and Troi in early TNG 'cool bro I'd love to see her happy'

[saph-yells-into-the-void]

the amount of DISDAIN I get from some ppl saying that blue flag is written for the straights.

girl I did not stay up til 6am reading this manga, tearing up and crying bc of how much I saw myself in characters like touma and masumi and how painfully relatable their pain/struggles were just for you to say that blue flag is for the straights

be so fr rn

#the usage of queer pain in blue flag was done so so SO fucking tastefully and with care towards ppl who experience similar struggles #there were so many very well done nuanced discussions not only relating to queerness but also towards other topics such as heteronormativit #and societal standards and choices and change #hell I even thought that the whole discussion on homophobia towards the end was done with care- there I said it #bc it isn't just like: HOMOPHOBIC PPL BAD!! #there's layers and different sides shown that some ppl may not agree with but Jesus Christ ITS PART OF THE FUCKING DISCUSSION #yall NEED to hear these other sides and stop closing your eyes to everything that isn't just like- homophobia bad >:( #bc god forbid we have nuanced talks about touchy subjects #sorry I'm just so annoyed that this is a fandom-wide agreement that the homophobia talk was handled badly #bc imo I don't think it was it was just trying to shine the topic in a different light #anyways this manga is brilliant and amazing and I need more ppl to read this #I'm even hoping for an anime adaptation idc if itll most likely be mediocre I just need more ppl to find this story #this manga resonated with me on such a deeply personal level as a queer person that I didn't even know was possible #'blue flag utilizes queer pain as a tool for the straights-' stfu speak for your fucking self #this manga wasn't written for the straights it was written for ME actually #blue flag

[drowningparty]

Four of them should be able to kill the fifth. He's executed, accused of treason. The four who have shed blood will be bound forever.

Les possédés (1988) dir. Andrzej Wajda

#andrzej wajda #les possedes #demons #бесы #dostoyevsky #fyodor dostoyevsky #jerzy radziwilowicz #jean-philippe ecoffey #lambert wilson #laurent malet #mine #jutta lampe #took ages but finally found a faithful adaptation! #you can tell it was made with love so many perfect choices made like starting with ivan digging a grave for the printing press? #chefs kiss #love the casting for ivan shatov and pyotr verkhovensky #the way this novel will root its way through your heart is maddening I swear you can't finish this book and be normal about it #you don't even have to Enjoy it this book WILL afflict you in some real and indelible way #I wrote a 350k word novel inspired by it but I can't be the only one #avoid the recent radio 4 adaptation though its awful they managed to cut out everything decent from the book #camus also leaves out so many good bits in his no shade #love the 2014 one and all the direct quotes but it has some... odd directorial choices. still 100% convinced they watched this #so many scenes in this movie I went “oh so the 2014 one just. directly copied those visual huh. this staging is. identical.” #anyway thank you wajda you were so real for this #only complaints no darya and they forgot to film the ending #but that's a mistake anyone could have made

[dramawatchinggoblin]

kinda losing it over the change to seol dongbaek always having been a man

what an absolute power move of an adaption choice

#the director who buys me dinner #like are you KIDDING ME??? #THATS SO!!!! #i havent read the webtoon but i did check it out slightly because i was confused about the curse/set up lmao #which what great timing #because then i got to lose my MIND in real time over them changing this part #kdrama webtoon adaptations keep outdoing their origin (in my opinion) #SO many good choices made across show adaptions

[littlestsnicket]

time of contempt!yenralt is geralt not trusting yennefer and being too scared of upsetting her to say it and sleeping with her anyway and the way netflix!geralt is different, that would never work.

i don't think the writers aren't fighting yennefer's arc in season 2 nearly as much as they are fighting this other version of geralt. and well... i wish some nuances of character interaction had gone a bit differently in season 2, but the thing that irritates me more than anything else in adaptations is when changes are made and the production backs off on them rather than following through. so whatever. i'm more interested to see what they do than anything else.

#the witcher #witcher season 3 #witcher spoilers #i guess? #adaptation #i will still defend the overall narrative thrust of season 2 i think it was inspired and interesting #but i do also think fandom at large took somewhat different things away from book!yenralt than i did #(but listening to the audiobooks now i still think my take is very valid) #i love book!yenralt so much narratively but it is also very bad in terms of functional relationships right up until the end #in my head they get their happily ever after but it's telling that they have to be outside of their own time and space for it to work #also i like netflix!geralt #i just also want to murder people who are like #henry cavil cares about the source material so much #because like... a lot of these things are on the record as being his choices #and i don't think they are necessarily bad in terms of the show telling it's own story (which i like a LOT in an adaptation) #but his decisions are a giant snowball of inaccuracy #in a way that is not deliberate and intentional like i think many of the things the writers are doing is #and the writing staff is left to have to keep making that story work #idk #this fandom is tough sometimes

[jack-is-lost]

The 1994 movie adaption of Interview With The Vampire was good in its own way. I liked the actor/actress choices — Tom Cruise played Lestat so damn well — I enjoyed the time era’s, the set props, and alluring undertones. However, the subtle relationship displayed on screen compared to the book was disappointing. It was there in very minimal phrasings but otherwise “off-screen” and left to interpretation. So, when given the option between the two, why would I choose a version where there is hardly an ounce of queer representation within it? When I can simply tune in to the series that is willing to openly showcase their relationship — heteronormality be damned? 

#amc interview with the vampire #Interview with the Vampire #so many are upset about the actors choices and era placement for the show - how things are being altered vs the book #this is how adaptions work and I am not upset by their choices of wanting to change things up to fit a bit of their own touch to it #they want to offer more representation into their retelling of the book and I am happily going to devour each episode

[timeisacephalopod]

I am so tired of all new media being sequels and remakes and threequels and remakes and reboots and remakes and prequels and remakes and the lack of any creativity in nearly any creative field right now is absurd. I know Hollywood is allergic to change because that might not make a gagillion dollars for them but if you're that obsessed with money and also a vacuous black hole when it comes to creativity you should have been an econ major and gotten a job writing Business Insider articles and left creativity to people who know what they're doing.

#winters ramblings #like ANOTHER mean girls adaptation? ANOTHER fucking avatar adaptation that DOESNT GET WHY THE OG WAS GOOD? #which coincidentally is ALSO true of mean girls adaptations #like the new hunger games prequel too? yes i heard it was actually good but was it NEEDED? and why Snow for the main character? #yeah i know im going to watch is unlike the other listed media but what an ODD choice? to make SNOW the character we follow? #anyway im so tired of all these extremely blandass creativity sucking projects like for fuck SAKES make something INTERESTING #even if it sucks MAKE SOMETHING INTERESTING AND NOT RELATED TO ANOTHER FRANCHISE #does Harry Potter fucking NEED a god damn show?? havent the fantastic beast movies PROVEN theyve sucked all they can??!? #HOW MANY MORE REMAKES OF THINGS THAT ARENT EVEN OLD ARE WE GOING TO GET?? #BEFORE SOMEONE WHO ACTUALLY UNDERSTANDS CREATIVITY DOES SOMETHING CREATIVE??!?!

[rocaillefox]

the anime romantic killer does genuinely seem like just a tone shift away from becoming a horror show

#ramblings #only a few episodes in but if this happened i think i would bite somebody #maybe it is the lgbt in me but being forced into potentially romantic situations #AND HAVING PEOPLE MIND CONTROLLED INTO THOSE SITUATIONS? #seems Genuinely horrifying. i would not feel comfortable getting into a relationship with anybody in this situation #not bc of anything on my end but bc mind control . completely erases all consent #and like. forget about Informed consent eithrr if they dont know about the wizard #and a wizard thats intentionally taking away things that you find joy in ??? #instead of encouraging you to meet other people through those interests????????? #a wizard whos forcing you to wear more 'girly' clothes despite discomfort??? #like. actually wearing clothes that have cats on them is 100% fine! you can make that into a style! #and forcing you to wear makeup?????????????????? #sorry this would be literal hell on so many levels for me. im watching to see how horrible a situation it wiuld be for me #and also; shock that there are people who might adapt well to this #edit: NOT TO MENTION THE WEIRD MORALIZING ABOUT FOOD? #like yeah eating only chocolate isnt healthy but its her choice if she wants to do that? #but again: forcing someone to give something up instead of idk. Offering Other Options In Addition ??? #and also the stealing away her cat... #AND LIKE. she doesnt need to become dependent on a person. and taking away her comforts until she does is blackmail #like if a guy was unable to play sports until he got a girlfriend that would be obviously fucked up right #why is it suddenly seen as more acceptable and not abusive to take away everything relating to a girl's interests until she finds a boyfrien #ntm the literal destruction of property to organize the whole scenario wtf.