Too controversial for Tumblr

[soc_puppet]

Today, in "Things I am absolutely not going to post to Tumblr because I will be eaten alive":

storywonker posted a new curse:

may your favourite fantasy book series be adapted into a hit TV show

What I Said in a reblog:

In 99% of cases, I’ll take it. Even if I have to retreat into a tiny corner of fandom that only acknowledges the original books when the TV show ends up being a terrible adaptation that completely undermines the original themes, it still means the author is that much closer to financial independence and able to keep writing as much as they want.

Still, there are always exceptions…

What I did not say in a reblog:

Too late, the movie version of Howl's Moving Castle already exists.

(I like Studio Ghibli/Miyazaki! They do good work! And I can respect that a lot of people really love the movie! I just don't know that it's possible for Howl's Moving Castle to be adapted into anything that's less than three hours long and still satisfy me, let alone any number of other changes that were made.)

Comments

[bluedreaming]

Too true! To be honest I like the movie but I absolutely don’t think it has anything more than a passing resemblance to the book.

[mistressofmuses]

I love both the book and the movie... but the movie is good as its own thing, NOT as an adaptation of Howl's Moving Castle! It's SO drastically different. I am able to separate the two from each other, which paradoxically makes me happy that it IS so different.

But it's one of my favorite books, and it makes me sad how many people ONLY know the story from the movie.

(I'm partway through posting a fic that's a Howl's Moving Castle fusion, and is based far more heavily on the book than the movie, and I think at least one commenter was surprised by how different those two are from each other.)

[redsixwing]

Ahahaha very fair.

I reblogged the original post out of spite, because every remake thing I've seen in the last decade has just been increasingly bad (I am, as has been noted, allergic to JJ Abrams and imitators.)

But yeah. Separation between book and various TV/movie incarnations isn't a bad thing.

[type_wild]

I adore the Ghibli version, but it was also my first meeting with the story. I never could compare it to the novel (which I read years later and from which I remember absolutely nothing), but on it stands remarkably well on its own.

[eastofthemoon]

I fully agree. I love the movie, but I have mix feelings about it. I feel like you need to read the book in order to understand parts of the movie. The fact they left out Sophie's ability to bring things to life annoys me greatly. (Also, hot take, but as much as I respect Miyazki, not sure I feel about him taking someone's else story for an adaptation and then deciding to throw his own themes into it that weren't there aka the anti-war stuff and such.)

Howl's Movie Castle would have to be done in at least a mini series to be done right.