Slight change of plans. Turns out, the planned “So You Want to Adapt a Story” is far more involved than I expected. That will come next week. Enjoy the round up of adaptational news in the meantime.
What could have been: Hayao Miyazaki wanted to make a Pippi Longstocking movie in 1971.
Concept art for the work has come out. The only thing stopping the adaptation was Astrid Lindgren, Pippi’s creator, saying no. Studio Ghibli just didn’t have the world renown in 1971 that it has today.
2014, the Year of the Bomb?
Of the fourteen potential major failures coming in 2014, twelve are adaptations and remakes. Of note, Edge of Tomorrow is based on the Japanese light novel, All You Need Is Kill. If Divergent and The Maze Runner both do poorly, this could signal the beginning of the end of Young Adult novels being adapted. Guardians of the Galaxy is a wild card. Marvel is taking a huge risk, but, as Steve put it, what has Marvel got to lose?
Sin City sequel and TV series on the way.
The Weinstein Company is getting Robert Rodrigues and Frank Miller to create Sin City: A Dame To Kill For is expected out August 29 next year, with a TV series to start afterwards. Meanwhile, the company is also working on a ten part miniseries based on the theatrical adaptation of the Stephen King novel, The Mist.
Two versions of 50 Shades of Grey adaptation to be released.
The first will be rated R. The second will go for the dreaded NC-17 rating. The problem with NC-17 movies is that there are few theatres willing to screen them. 50 Shades might be an exception, but there could be issues when someone who was expecting the R version sees the more explicit NC-17. The producer also said that she doesn’t want the film to be seen as “mommy porn”, which will be a neat trick considering that the original book is exactly that. Filming has started, with Vancouver, BC, standing in for Vancouver, Washington.
Daughter of Smoke and Bone to be adapted.
The first of a trilogy by Laini Taylor, the YA novel Daughter of Smoke and Bone is being adapted by Universal. The novel originally came out in 2011; the adaptation has no release date yet.
Cats may be next Broadway musical adapted to film.
Andrew Lloyd Webber confirmed that Universal is working on the adaptation. Cats itself is an adaptation of Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats by T.S. Eliot. Main challenge is convincing the audience that people dressed as cats and signing is worth seeing, but the stage version also had that issue.
Veronica Mars due out March 14, 2014.
After a very successful Kickstarter campaign that saw the movie funded in under twelve hours, Veronica Mars will hit the theatres next March. Most of the core cast has returned for the movie.
Also out March 14, 2014, Need for Speed.
Electronic Arts teamed up with Dreamworks for the adaptation. The video game series focuses on street racing, and includes police pursuit as part of the challenge. Each game in the series has a different focus, giving a bit of room for the movie to work with.
Warner Bros/DC may have a low-budget series of movies.
Three lesser known titles, Suicide Squad, Team 7, and Deathstroke may get lower budget movies, in the range of $20-40 million. The lower budget may reduce audience expectations and allow for a decent return. DC just needs to avoid looking desperate compared to Marvel’s approach.
MTV to adapt Shannara.
MTV’s network decay continues, but this time, it’s not a reality series. The former music network will be adapting Terry Brooks’ Shannara series, hoping to jump on the fantasy bandwagon led by A Game of Thrones. The advantage with Shannara is that twenty-five books have been written, so there’s no chance of the TV series catching up and overtaking. Brooks himself is involved in the project.
Heathers to run Off Broadway.
The 1989 movie, Heathers, has been adapted as a musical slated to run Off Broadway beginning March 17, 2014. The original was a dark comedy starring Winona Ryder and Christian Slater, where the two took revenge on a clique of mean girls all named Heather.
NBC to air Rosemary’s Baby miniseries.
NBC continues to ride the adaptation train with the announcement of the four-hour Rosemary’s Baby miniseries. The miniseries will go back to the original book of the same name by Ira Levin.
The Sound of Music Live! a sign of things to come?
Still on NBC here. The live musical broadcast garnered ratings for the struggling network, leading to the confirmation that there will be another musical for next November. Which one has yet to be decided. The Sound of Music Live! may have brought in an audience in part from novelty and in part for the potential train-wreck it could have been.
Sony takes a page from Marvel Studios.
Sony announced that they will be producing two Spider-Man spin-offs, Venom and The Sinister Six. Both movies will focus on Spidey’s rogues gallery. No dates for either production start or release were given.
Animated Anne Frank in the works.
The Diary of Anne Frank is being turned into an animated feature, with the blessing of the Anne Frank Fonds Basel, the foundation created by Frank’s father. Ari Folman, director of Waltz with Bashir will direct and will have full access to the foundation’s archives.
The Naked Gun to be rebooted.
Paramount is looking to reboot The Naked Gun, with Ed Helms to fill Leslie Nielsen’s role of Sergeant Frank Drebin, Detective-Lieutenant, Police Squad. David Zucker, one of the original creators, is on board.
Disney to create series based on animated villains.
Descendants will look at the lives of the teenaged offspring of Disney villains. The live-action work will premier in 2015.
Next week, “So You Want to Adapt a Story”.
Reaching back a bit, I reviewed The Muppets, the reboot/sequel to The Muppet Movie. However, The Muppet Movie itself was an adaptation, of sorts.
In 1976, The Muppet Show debuted as a variety show sketch comedy program. Each week, a different guest star would appear and get caught up in the antics and running gags of the Muppets. While the range of guest stars were more theatrical and British in the first season, as the series went on, more and more stars appeared. Mark Hamill reprised the role of Luke Skywalker for one episode while also playing himself shortly after filming The Empire Strikes Back. There was no fourth wall, and the show was seen, in-universe, as bad vaudeville. The Muppet Show was family entertainment, not the “family, but really only suitable for the under-five set” but “something for everyone in the family, from brightly colour puppets to double entendres to high art”. The series ended in 1981, with Roger Moore as the last guest star.
During the run, Muppetmania caught hold. Naturally, when there’s a mania, people want to exploit it. The need was there, so Henson Associates and ITC Films released The Muppet Movie in 1979. The movie told, approximately*, how the Muppets first came together, from Kermit’s early life in a swamp to running Muppet Theatre. The writers, Jack Burns and Jerry Juhl, were also the writes for The Muppet Show, and the core cast of performers came from the same spot.
The movie delivered. Favourite characters appeared, Miss Piggy was head over heels in love with Kermit who wasn’t as thrilled about her, Fozzie told bad jokes, Gonzo was weird, and Animal was Animal. Instead of a special guest star, there were cameos. Of note, The Muppet Movie was the last film Edgar Bergen appeared in; he passed away shortly after his scene was shot. Bergen was one of Jim Henson’s inspirations. The fourth wall didn’t exist. When the Electric Mayhem catch up to Kermit and friends, they explained that they used the script to find them. As for the running gags, there were several, from “Lost? Try Hare Krishna,” to “‘That’s just a myth! Myth!’ ‘Yeth’?”
The years since The Muppet Movie was made has added some new twists on the gags in the film. Gonzo’s desire to become a movie star by going to Bombay isn’t that odd now that Bollywood has become better known to North American audiences. Still, it’s not the easy way. The movie, though, really hasn’t aged. The Muppets picked up on a few ideas in The Muppet Movie and continued with them, including Gonzo’s old plumbing business.
As an adaptation, The Muppet Movie works. The form of The Muppet Show, a vaudeville theatre show, wouldn’t work for a movie, but showing how the Muppets got together, approximately, while keeping true to the nature of the characters, the show, and the overall tone more than made up the difference. The core writers and performers understood what the audiences would be expecting, and delivered without being predictable.
Next week, riffing off the It’s A Wonderful Life sequel.
* “Well, it’s sort of approximately how it happened.” – Kermit.
First, A Lupin the Third live action movie has been announced! The movie will be a prequel, showing how Lupin met his crew.
Next, it’s weird where you can find an adaptation. Back while getting info for the comments about the It’s a Wonderful Life sequel, I discovered that the movie is an adaptation of a short story, “The Greatest Gift” by Philip van Doren Stern. Unlike the sheer mess of rights that It’s a Wonderful Life became, van Doren Stern properly renewed his copyright in 1971 on his story.
Moving on, here’s what I hope to do for December. There will definitely be a review, though of what, I do not know yet. I’m half-tempted to review Miracle on 34th Street because of the number of times the films has been remade; movie versions in 1955, 1959, 1973, 1994, a Broadway musical in 1963, a stage play in 2006, and a half-hour puppet version at Macy’s in New York City. For the year’s end, a look back on 2013 followed a week later by a look ahead to 2014 and beyond. Given the sheer amount of news in October and November, twice even, I won’t be short of material. That leaves one week, which I may leave as a surprise.
I’m also open to suggestions. The catch is, I need to have access to the original and the new work. I am keeping my eyes open for certain titles, either due to personal interest or because of influence. However, as mentioned above, there will be times when I run across a remake or an adaptation without realizing it. Along with It’s a Wonderful Life, I found out that Bedazzled, with Brendan Fraser and Elizabeth Hurley, is a remake of the 1967 film of the same name, with Dudley Moore and Peter Cook. I will make a note of when I encounter the new work before the original; it could, as I mentioned previously, make a difference in how the adaptation is perceived.
Next week, back to the reviews!
Some time back, I reviewed Spider-Man, the Sam Raimi helmed adaptations of the comics. Since then, the movie series has been rebooted, turning the new movie, The Amazing Spider-Man into an adaptation and a reboot at the same time.
The history of Spider-Man was covered in the previous review, but a brief recap of Amazing Fantasy #15 wouldn’t hurt. Nebbish, nerdy Peter Parker, a high school student, was bitten by a radioactive spider during a field trip. The venom interacted with Peter’s blood, giving him the proportional strength and agility of a spider and a preternatural sense for pending danger. As he learns how to handle his powers, he uses his knowledge and skills to create web-shooters; wrist-mounted devices that shoot out artificial webs. Peter then patrols the streets of New York as the Amazing Spider-Man.
For the movie, The Amazing Spider-Man, the writers returned to the classic stories instead of using Marvel’s Ultimate universe. The difference, beyond the source of Spider-Man’s powers*, is the love interest. The Raimi film used Mary Jane Watson, who, prior to One More Day, was Peter’s wife in the main line comic. However, early Spider-Man stories had Peter paired with Gwen Stacy, a fellow geek. The new movie explores their relationship, especially in light of the job Gwen’s father has, a police captain looking for the new spider-themed vigilante terrorizing New York. And, as in the comics, Spider-Man’s foe is someone that Peter has gotten close to; this time, the classic villain, The Lizard who is Gwen and Peter’s mentor, Dr. Curt Connors.
As mentioned previously in Lost in Translation, superhero comics tend to intertwine, making it hard to adapt everything the character has been involved in. Thus, the concept of various related-but-separate universes, such as the DC Animated Dini-verse and the Marvel Cinematic Universe of The Avengers. While Marvel Studios was busy with The Avengers Initiative, it had to work with Sony, owner of Columbia Pictures, to get the Daily Bugle into a shot in The Avengers**. Right now, Sony has the rights to Spider-Man and related characters, so cameos by other characters other than Ghost Rider is unlikely.***
The Amazing Spider-Man/ holds up on its own as a movie, without needing prior knowledge. All the characters are introduced, Spidey’s origin is shown again. This time around, the writers remembered that Spider-Man doesn’t just fight; he talks at his opponents. The comic version of Spider-Man always maintained snappy patter, in part to psych himself up and in part to keep his opponents off-balance. The rebooted version also had the patter, the insults, the taunts. The nature of the threat kept with the theme of runaway science that appeared in the comic; the Lizard looked to change the residents of the city into his subjects.
The movie does represent the core of Spider-Man well; the responsibility, the dangers of misusing science and radiation, and the heart of the character. Allowing the movie to create a new cinematic Spider-verse, separate from the prior Raimi films and from the Avengers-verse, allowed the filmmakers to explore what placing the duties of a superhero does to a teen.
Next week, the October adaptational news round out.
* Genetically altered spider versus radioactive spider. Both reflect the fears of the era the comics were created in.
** Ultimately, the shot wasn’t used.
*** Ironically, Spider-Man made guest appearances in every new Marvel title to establish that the book belonged to the overall universe and to bring attention to the title.
Finally! The last of the Avengers Adaptation series!
Previously:
Iron Man
Incredible Hulk
Thor
Captain America
Also, of note, Adaptations and the Superheroic Setting, which discusses the creation of a separate universe for different media. The Avengers and the movies leading up to it are a good example of creating a separate setting that shares common elements with the original work but still allows for creative interpretations. Otherwise, the nitpicking on minor details will get annoying and detracting.
In 1963, Marvel decided to pull together a team to challenge DC Comics’ Justice League of America. DC’s JLA comprised of the company’s heavy hitters – Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, the Flash, Green Arrow, Green Lantern, Aquaman, the Martian Manhunter, and the Atom. Marvel’s first attempt to counter the JLA resulted in The Fantastic Four. While The Fantastic Four succeeded, the team wasn’t what the publisher wanted. Stan Lee pulled together Marvel’s top tier characters – Iron Man, Thor, the Incredible Hulk, Ant-Man/Giant-Man*, and the Wasp – to create a competitor. The characters came from Marvel’s top books; Iron Man’s Tales of Suspense, Thor’s Journey into Mystery, The Incredible Hulk, and Tales to Astonish, featuring Ant-Man and the Wasp.
The first issue of The Avengers brought the team together. Loki, wanting to exact revenge on Thor, lured the Hulk into attacking a railway car. When the call for help went out, Loki diverted it to Thor, inadvertently sending it to Iron Man, Ant-Man, and the Wasp as well. All four heroes converged and, setting the tone for not only the full Avengers run but also spin-offs, misunderstood each other to the point of in-fighting. Thor worked out the illusions and that his brother was behind them, allowing the heroes to team up and assemble as the Avengers.
The Hulk left in the second issue, leading to a fight against the Sub-Mariner. The fight, though, broke a chunk ice free from an ice floe, leading to the return of Captain America, who took the Hulk’s place on the team in issue 4. Hawkeye, who had appeared as an Iron Man villain in Tales of Suspense #57 joined the Avengers in issue 16. The Black Widow, another of Iron Man’s rogue gallery**, joined the team in issue 29.
In 2000, Marvel launched a new imprint, Ultimate Marvel. The original goal was to update backgrounds and clear out continuity snarls*** that caused potential new fans to be locked out from the regular universe’s titles. In the Ultimate line, the Avengers became The Ultimates, a team brought together by the head of S.H.I.E.L.D., one General Nick Fury****. The team comprised of Captain America, Giant-Man, the Wasp, Bruce Banner, and Iron Man; Banner would go on to inject himself with the super-soldier serum to become the Hulk, who the rest of the team stopped with the help of Thor. The second Ultimates series introduced Loki, who arranged for Thor to be put away as an escaped mental patient.
This leads to the movie, Marvel’s The Avengers+. Marvel Studios had an ambitious plan to release a number of movies leading up to one about Marvel’s mightiest team, the Avengers. The first movie in the Avengers Initiative was Iron Man, one that had fans wondering until the announcement of Robert Downey, Jr. as Tony Stark. Iron Man performed beyond expectations, allowing the rest of the series to continue. Each movie in the Initiative acted as the origin story for the title character, allowing The Avengers to get to the heart of its story without having to explain who all the characters were. SHIELD first appeared in Iron Man, although after the end credits, and reappeared in Iron Man 2. Hawkeye, Agent Clint Barton, appeared in Thor. During this, Disney bought Marvel, sending panic among fans. The first movie released with Disney as distributor was The Avengers.
The movie mixes mainline Marvel and Ultimate Marvel continuity. Changes were made to both line’s story on how the group formed and the composition of the team, but Loki remained the element that brought the team together. The heroes are brought to squabbling amongst each other, distrusting, as Loki tweaks each hero’s sore spot. The bickering becomes an all-out brawl on board the SHIELD Helicarrier, allowing Loki’s team of agents on board while the fighting disrupts and almost destroys the vessel. With the death++ of a SHIELD agent, the heroes pull together as a team to defeat Loki and his minions.
The Avengers isn’t a pure adaptation. However, especially in light of Lost in Translation #54, the creators bring in a number of elements from both the main Marvel continuity and the Ultimate line, blending the elements to let the movie stand as its own continuity. The movie also blends together the different themes from previous movies, from techno-thriller to Shakespearean drama to pulp heroism, turning The Avengers into a work of its own. With the exception of Edward Norton, casts from the previous movies reprised their roles; Norton was replaced with Mark Ruffalo as Banner. Humour came naturally from characters and situations instead of being forced. The Avengers felt like both a serious comic book and a step back from the dark grey of the Batman movies without going too far the other direction as seen in Flash Gordon or Street Fighter: The Movie.
Next week, a superhero round up.
* Hank Pym changed his hero code name at the start of The Avengers #2 to Giant-Man. He’d later take several other names. — Scott
** Natasha first appeared in Tales of Suspense #52, five issues before Hawkeye’s first appearance. Fittingly, she first appeared in Marvel’s cinematic universe in Iron Man 2 — Scott again
*** Some snarls include the Summers family tree, which involves time travel, and Spider-Man’s Clone Saga — Yep, it’s Scott
**** General Fury was redesigned early in production to look like Samuel L. Jackson, who gave his permission to use his likeness. Made him the perfect actor to cast as Nick Fury in the movie. — Trivia Scott
+ As opposed to the remake of the TV series that starred Patrick McNee and Diana Rigg. — Still Scott
++ Maybe. We only have Nick Fury’s word on it. — Doubtful Scott
Adventure novels have gone through their own evolution. Novels by Alistair MacLean (The Guns of Navarone among many others) and Ian Fleming (of 007 fame) gave way to the creation of the techno-thriller. While Tom Clancy is seen as the start point for the techno-thriller genre, both Robert Ludlum and Craig Thomas had novels out a decade before. Thomas could be seen as taking Fleming’s setting and bringing it into alignment with the reality of the Cold War*. Starting with Rat Trap in 1976, Thomas showed a grittier, more realistic look at espionage, showing missions at several levels, including the agents on the ground and the MI6 heads revising plans as better intelligence arrived.
In 1977, Thomas released his second novel, Firefox. In the story, the Soviet Union had developed a new fighter jet, the MiG-31**, that incorporated stealth technology, could reach Mach 5, and had a weapons system controlled by the pilot’s thoughts. At the time of publication, the B-2 stealth bomber was in development and the fastest aircraft were the SR-71 Blackbird, reaching Mach 3.2, and the Soviet MiG-25 “Foxbat”, reaching Mach 3. Thought control was in the realm of science fiction at the time, but is now available to the general public. In the novel, an advance like the Firefox would upset the balance between NATO and the Warsaw Pact.
To counter the Soviet breakthrough, Kenneth Aubry, one of Thomas’s recurring characters, devises a brash plan. He recruits American pilot and Vietnam war veteran Mitchell Gant to sneak into the Soviet Union and steal one of the MiG-31 prototypes. Aubry’s choice of Gant boiled down to the American fitting the pilot’s uniform and helmet. Gant, however, has Post-Traumatic Stress from his experiences in Vietnam; Aubry is well aware and trusts that the stress won’t affect Gant’s flying abilities.
To get Gant into the Soviet Union, Aubry uses up several contacts and dissidents. The main goal is to get the Firefox. After arriving in Moscow, Gant meets the dissidents, gets another false identity, and is taken to Bilyarsk, where the MiG-31 is being tested. Once there, Gant sneaks in, creates confusion, and steals the Firefox. Once in the air, he’s invisible to radar and satellite. He lets himself be seen by an Aeroflot crew before changing to his real course. Meanwhile, the Soviet Air Marshal begins to realize the sort of chess game he’s in and gets reconnaissance craft, both air and sea, to cover the northern routes while telling the crews to seach for the stolen Firefox’s heat signature. The second Firefox prototype is sent to destroy Gant’s jet.
Adptations in the 80s were mainly made to exploit the name and make a quick buck. Writers didn’t have the pull that JK Rowling, Stephanie Meyer, and Suzanne Collins do today. However, when the producer, director, and owner of the studio enjoyed the book and wants to bring it to the silver screen, the chance of a good adaptation rises. Clint Eastwood had read the book and thought it would make for a good movie. His studio, Malpaso, shot the film for $21 million, most of which were on the special effects. The movie follows the book as close as it can, though at times feeling a little shallow from the transition – the book delved into the focus characters’ thoughts and brought forth imagery of the locations. Eastwood, who also starred as Mitchell Gant, keeps close to the events in the book, only adding little details. One detail, Gant’s flashback, made it into the novel Firefox Down, which picked up from the end of Firefox.
There are some interesting elements in the story and movie. Wolf Kahler played the head of the KGB, Yuri Andropov. During filming, Andropov replaced Leonid Breznev, and the world saw what he looked like for the first time, which was nothing like Wolf Kahler. The fictional MiG-31 took design elements from the SR-71 and the XB-70. The outer skin the B-2 stealth bomber wound up having elements in common with the Firefox. Thought control has since been relegated to toys, but the voice commands used to trigger the thought impulses needed are making their way to commercial uses, such as Apple’s Siri.
The likelihood of Firefox being remade today is low. Both the novel and the movie are artifacts of the Cold War that ended almost twenty-five years ago. The remake would have to be done as a period piece, but that could drive away the younger audience. That said, Firefox shows what can be done when the studio makes an effort to adapt a work properly. With Clint Eastwood as star, director, producer, and head of Malpaso, meddling by the executive suite was removed from the efforts, leading to a good adaptation.
Next week, the ultimate Avengers Adaptation review.
* The Cold War plays a huge element in this review. While an extensive knowledge isn’t needed, if things get confusing, the BBC and the History Learning Site have summaries that can help.
** There was a real MiG-31, codenamed “Foxhound”, in production at the time of publication. Its specifications are nowhere near as groundbreaking as its fictional counterpart’s. The real MiG-31 entered service while Firefox was being filmed.
Superman has been around for a long time. Last month marked the 75th anniversary of the release of Action Comics number 1, Superman’s first appearance. Jerry Siegal and Joe Shuster created the characters for a thirteen page story in the comic, originally an anthology. The story showed the now-classic origin story of a baby sent from a dying planet to be adopted and raised in the American Mid-West to become a champion of the oppressed. An entire genre – superhero comics – built up after publishers noted the success of Superman. Generations have grown up with the adventures of the Man of Steel; Superman has appeared on radio, in serials, in movies, on television (live action and animated), video games, novelizations, and even a Broadway musical. Superman is an iconic character, one of the most recognizable.
In short, people know who Superman is.
This level of familiarity, though, can make it hard to adapt the character. As with other works, like the Incredible Hulk and the Addams Family, what the general public knows about a character doesn’t necessarily reflect the original or any development that has occurred, with the knowledge coming from a popular adaptation. Superman, as iconic as he is, has had iconic adaptations done; the main one in the collective subconscious being Superman: The Movie with Christopher Reeve. The 1978 movie introduced distinctive theme music that is now forever associated with the name “Superman”. All incarnations of Superman since then, including Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman and Smallville have had nods back to the Christopher Reeve movie. To be fair, Superman: The Movie was well done, captured the feel of the Silver Age Superman, and Reeve did show how a pair of glasses could protect Superman’s secret identity*.
Man of Steel opened last month after a turbulent five year development that saw numerous writers directors approached. Eventually, Zack Snyder was signed on to reboot the movie series instead of continuing from the 2006 Superman Returns. Man of Steel takes the audience back to the last days of Krypton, as the planet died through an ecological disaster, and follows, through flashbacks, Clark’s arrival on Earth and how he adapted to his powers, Clark’s search for who he is, and his choice to protect his new home when the old war finds him. The movie is one part an orphan’s story, one part a refugee’s story, and one part an immigrant’s story.
Given the nature of the story, with an alien refugee hiding from terrestrial authorities, having Lex Luthor as a villain would defeat the purpose of the general theme. First, there is a gross power unbalance between Superman and Luthor; Luthor has far more power available to him just through wealth that he could defeat the Man of Steel before the latter knows something is up, while, in a fight, Superman would have to hold back to avoid looking like a dangerous invader. The choice of General Zod, though, sets up Superman as the saviour of Earth and forces Clark to decide whether he is a Kryptonian or a Human. Having Zod also allows the film to show the destructive potential a battle between Kryptonians and, hopefully, sets up a “World of Cardboard” speech in the next movie or in a potential Justice League film.
As an adaptation, the movie mostly succeeds. The problem, as noted above, is that the general public is more aware of an adaptation than the current comic. As a result, the tone feels slightly off, darker than what the audience may be used to in previous incarnations. At the same time, Man of Steel is a Superman movie, with Henry Cavill’s portrayal of Clark on the mark. It’s just that the story isn’t what people are used to out of the Superman franchise.
Next week, Alien from LA.
* Watch Reeve’s body language as Clark Kent. There’s one scene where he’s about to reveal himself to Lois, taking off the glasses, with a noticeable change in his posture. When he changes his mind and puts the glasses back on, he deflates, slouches, and his voice loses confidence.
Welcome to Lost in Translation‘s quick series about the ins and outs of adapting games to television and film.* As seen since the first post, if something is popular, someone else will want to adapt it to a different medium. Today, 2013, the most likely medium to adapt from elsewhere is the Hollywood film.
Part I – Video Games
Part II – Boardgames
Part III – Tabletop Role-Playing Games
Part IV – Adapting Games to Games
Adapting Games to Games
So far, I’ve looked at adapting games as movies and television. There is still one more way for a game to be adapted – as another game. Already, a questions appears; “Why? What’s the point?” A popular game, though, is ripe to be exploited.
Starting with boardgames, what usually happens is the game gets adapted as a video game. The main advantage is that the player can get a computer opponent when there is no one else available to play with. Another advantage is having an impartial judge, the computer or console, make sure that the game is played fair. With the integration of the Internet into day to day lives, updates to the game, in the form of new content, is easy to get. Trivia games, such as Trivial Pursuit, can add new questions and fix wrong answers with a patch instead of waiting for the next expansion pack to be published. A successful adaptation of a boardgame has to keep the gameplay the same in the video game; otherwise, why play the video game when the boardgame is within reach. Most boardgames have simple mechanics, relatively speaking. The rules have to be easily interpreted by the players to keep the game flowing and keep the number of arguments to a minimum. The computer opponent needs to be challenging but not impossible to beat. The experience has to be similar to the original game, though added details like animation are a plus.
Video games, usually ones that have become household names, do get adapted as board games. Sometimes, it’s a brand applied to another existing game, typically Monopoly**. Other times, there’s an effort to bring the feel of the video game to the board; the Frogger adaptation involves trying to cross a highway and the Pac-Man board game was a multi-player version of the video game. World of Warcraft has spawned boardgames, a trading card game, and a miniatures game. HeroClix, a miniatures game, has sets for Assassin’s Creed, BioShock, Gears of War, Halo, and Street Fighter. Again, the experience the players have must be similar to the original video game. Pac-Man‘s board is set out like the video game’s, with the players’ tokens looking like Pac-Man himself. There will be cases where it will be difficult to bring the video game experience to the table; first-person shooters will lose that perspective. The HeroClix examples, however, add a new dimension; all HeroClix sets are compatible. It is possible to find out if a team up of Master Chief from Halo and Chun Li from Street Fighter can win against Batman and Robin.
Video games have also been adapted as tabletop rpgs. Not many, the market for a tabletop RPG is already a niche, and the cost of licensing a title may be more than the game can bring in. That said, the three adaptations that come to mind are Dragon Age: Origins (adapted by Green Ronin), Street Fighter II (adapted by White Wolf; currently out of print], and Everquest (adapted by Sword & Sorcery Studio, an imprint of White Wolf; print status unknown). Adapting a video game to a tabletop RPG means that the coding used to play the game, especially determining success with tasks, needs to be made available to the players in a way that is understandable by a human, not a machine. As with the case of the Street Fighter II and Everquest games, a tabletop game company may use its house rules and try to fit the video game’s setting around those. White Wolf used its Storytelling system with Street Fighter; the fit wasn’t ideal; the Everquest tabletop RPG used the third edition Dungeons & Dragons Open Gaming License as a base, recreating the classes from the video game to fit. Green Ronin, however, created a new system for the Dragon Age RPG, one that reflects what happens during gameplay. The key for a successful adaptation is to have the tabletop RPG feel like the video game while still being approachable by both people new to the tabletop hobby and people new to the video game’s setting. Characters should be capable of doing what their counterparts in the video game do; Street Fighter didn’t manage to do this while Everquest presented the same type of character that a new player just starting the video game would get.
As for tabletop RPGs, the adaptation of those spans the history of video games and will be dealt with in Part V
* And theatre, though I’d be surprised if someone made that leap.
** When the Monopoly movie comes out, will there be a Monopoly Monopoly?
Space opera has long been a staple in science fiction. Sprawling epics, from Edgar Rice Burroughs’ John Carter of Mars through Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers to Star Trek and Star Wars and the original Battlestar Galactica, where good and evil are easily determined and the stakes are high. Even if the heroes run into obstacles too much to overcome, they triumph in the end.
The past two decades have seen deconstruction of many forms of entertainment, taking the original works and applying a grim, gritty, realistic or semi-realistic filter and showing the results. The remade Battlestar Galactica is an excellent example of deconstruction. The original Galactica, despite the last survivors of the Colonies being on a ragtag fleet being hunted to extinction, left the viewer with optimism that humanity would survive. The remade Galactica, there was the question of who would finish off the fleet first, the Cylons or the humans.
With desconstruction comes reconstruction, the rebuilding of the tropes associated with the genre. In this case, Bioware’s Mass Effect series of video games. In 2007, Mass Effect introduced video gamers to a galaxy where humanity joins a large number of species already capable of faster than light travel. Planets and locations range from the high tech and political centre Citadel Station to frontier colonies like Eden Prime and hell holes like Omega. Into this, eldritch abominations return from beyond the galaxy, intent on destroying all life as part of a cycle of destruction.
Players took on the role of Commander Shepard, a special forces member of the human Systems Alliance Navy, as he or she* investigated an attack on the human colony of Eden Prime. As the investigation progressed, Shepard picks up an eclectic band of supporting characters, including a rogue Citadel Security officer, a homeless pilgrim, and a naive archaeologist, and learned about the threat to the galaxy being spearheaded by a rogue Citadel Council special operative.
The follow up games, Mass Effect 2 and Mass Effect 3 continue the investigation and fight against the abominations, even while Council doesn’t believe that there is a danger. Throughout the series, despite the threat, despite the inevitability of the abominations returning and succeeding, the hope exists that Shepard will prevail and unite the galaxy against the threat.
In 2012, Funimation**, in conjuction with T.O. Entertainment*** and Production I.G.**** released the animated feature Mass Effect: Paragon Lost. Part of the goal of the feature was to introduce a new playable character for Mass Effect 3 in case Shepard died during the gameplay of Mass Effect 2 while still succeeding with the mission. Another goal was to introduce the game to new players.
Paragon Lost follows Lieutenant James Vega, a marine in the Systems Alliance Navy, as he and his squad race in to protect Felh Prime from an attack by krogan mercenaries. Vega and his teammates show off the different classes available in the game without calling them out by name. Instead, the movie shows what each class does, and the abilities shown are possible in-game, even by Shepard with the right choice of class. The movie starts shortly after the beginning of Mass Effect 2 after the apparently loss of Commander Shepard, and takes place before the start of the real plot of the game. Through the course of the movie, Vega discovers the abominations and what the race known as the Collectors are doing and works to prevent a tragedy.
As an adaptation of a video game, Paragon Lost needs to be able to tell a good story within the framework of both the plot and the gameplay of the Mass Effect series. As seen with Battleship, getting how a game works into the visuals can be problematic. Working in the Paragon Lost‘s favour is having a common ground with the video game – both are visual. The special moves available to Shepard and his or her team are already shown on screen. Paragon Lost shows the viewer each class and what it can do easily enough, from the flashy to the subtle. The movie also shows the setting, giving a taste of the Mass Effect galaxy despite staying primarily on Fehl Prime.
The other major factor in the Mass Effect games is the effect of player choice. A decision made in the first game will return to haunt the player in the second and third. Movies, with the exception of Clue, tend to have just one ending. Interactive DVDs do exist, but are marketed more as games than movies. Paragon Lost, though, still manages to introduce the idea, giving Vega a critical decision and showing the viewer the ramifications of his choice, in a way that drives home the seriousness not only of the immediate results but the long term war to survive.
Next week, the legacy of early computer animation.
[Note: This is not the column I hinted at last week. That review is still coming.]
Nineteen forty-four was not a kind year to British citizens. World War II was still going on, and people living within airstrike distance of Germany had to deal with lengthy air raid drills. To help pass the time spent underground and take minds off the worry about what was happening on the surface, Anthony Pratt created a board game based on a murder mystery. After the war, he presented the game to Waddington’s, a British game publisher. Once the wartime shortages were dealt with, the game Cluedo*, known as Clue in North America on its release by Parker Brothers, was released.
The game millions have played since then involves trying to determine who killed Mr. Boddy with what and where by examining evidence at his mansion by going room to room. The murderer, location, and weapon are determined by dealing one of each type of card and setting them aside unseen. Players then move through the mansion, making suggestions in each room. Once a player is sure of who the murderer is, an accusation can be made. Murder weapons include a revolver, a candlestick, a lead pipe, a length of rope, a knife, or a wrench.
In 1985, Paramount released the movie Clue, based on the board game. The movie took the game play, then expanded it to provide motives for each of the characters. Each character was given the name of a token from the board game as well, explicitly called out as pseudonyms. With the movie set in 1954, Communism was a possible motive for several of the characters. Once the murder occurs, both the characters and the audience set off to figure out who killed Mr. Boddy. The clues are there, but the audience needs to pay attention and not get distracted by the double entendres, single entendres and puns. The cast worked well together, with comedic actors Martin Mull (Col. Mustard), Eileen Brennan (Mrs. Peacock), Madeleine Kahn (Mrs. White), Christopher Lloyd (Prof. Plum), and Michael McKean (Mr. Green), and other greats Lesley Ann Warren (Miss Scarlet) and Tim Curry (Wadsworth, the butler**). The movie was released with a gimmick – three endings were filmed, each to be sent to different theatres in the same city. The release didn’t help in the box office, with the movie underperforming and not making up the initial budget.
The movie did go to lengths to adapt the Clue‘s board as the setting. The rooms were laid out just like the board game, with the secret passages still available. The murder weapons, for the most part, resembled their counterparts in the game. The exception was the revolver, which was played by a modern era weapon instead of the pepperbox design in the game. As mentioned, all the suspects took on the names of the token in the game. One of the endings included the traditional line used when suggesting and accusing in game***.
As an adaptation, it works. The mansion has the right layout. The tokens are all there and now given personalities and motives for killing Mr. Boddy. Wadsworth keeps the “game play” moving, suggesting the characters split into pairs to investigate the mansion. Each of the murder weapons are used. Unfortunately, the gimmick may have led people to avoid the movie. Audiences tend to prefer a definite ending instead of a random one.
The movie is worth watching, especially since it did portray the game well. The writing is tight, with a cinematic nod to Edward Bulwer-Lytton****. Tim Curry is on top of his game, and the rest of the cast keeps up with him. Pay attention to the scenes and the lines. Just remember, like in two of the endings, that Communism is just a Red herring.
Next week, adaptation as a way to expand a setting.
* A play on words of the Latin “ludo”, meaning “I play”.
** He buttles.
*** To avoid spoilers, the form is “[Mr.|Miss|Mrs.] X, in the [room], with the [weapon].”
**** It was, indeed, a dark and stormy night.
