The Shannara Chronicles S02

[Nolder]

So apparently this show didn't get cancelled. It's no longer with MTV though, they moved to Spike.

Episode 1 aired the other day and without too many spoilers I'll just say they retain the same cast as last season more or less but this time they seem to be covering the Sword of Shannara story.

How they are going to do that exactly with the elfstones in play isn't really clear to me but eh whatever.

[LedZepMan]

I was so excited for this to be made for screen, and then terribly disappointed with the outcome.

[Nolder]

I was so excited for this to be made for screen, and then terribly disappointed with the outcome.

Really?

 

I thought it was pretty good when taking all factors into consideration.

 

Did you watch the whole thing or just one episode?

[Nolder]

The season was ok.

I kind of thought it was ending but we got a to be continued and a sort of cliffhanger (not unsatisfying).

So I guess there will either be a season 3 or an unfinished story.

[Gentled Ben]

When I read the book, I did not see the ending coming despite ample foreshadowing, so I was stunned and saddened and LOVED it! I thought the ending was the best part of that book, and so I was quite disappointed that she explained it all to him before it happened. Other than that, it was fine. They are always going to screw the story up when they translate a book to the screen, but this was at least well-acted. Man, she was beautiful, too.

 

I'll have to dig into season two at some point. I hated the book, as I felt it was a cheap ripoff of tLotR, but I liked Elfstones and Wishsong. I haven't read any of the other Shannara books, but I enjoyed the first two (I assume there are more by now) Magic Kingdom for Sale novels. He's a decent author, his early Tolkien plagiarism notwithstanding.

 

EDIT: I'm talking primarily about The Elfstones of Shannara, season one, here. I haven't seen any of the season two episodes yet.

Edited January 31, 2018 by Gentled Ben

[Illian Tear]

From what I can tell so far they have flipped the books.

Season 1: Elfstones of Shannara

Season 2 from what I can tell so far (only 3 episodes so far): Sword of Truth

[Nolder]

On 1/30/2018 at 7:06 PM, Gentled Ben said:

I'll have to dig into season two at some point. I hated the book, as I felt it was a cheap ripoff of tLotR, but I liked Elfstones and Wishsong. I haven't read any of the other Shannara books, but I enjoyed the first two (I assume there are more by now) Magic Kingdom for Sale novels. He's a decent author, his early Tolkien plagiarism notwithstanding.

Three Things.

 

1) Plagiarism is fine if you do it well enough imo. (not really but you know what I mean)

 

2) There are...3? 4? more books in the Magic Kingdom for Sale series. All of them were pretty good.

 

3) If you understand the Shannara world and how it works and came into being and all that then I would recommend skipping a lot of the books and reading the Voyage of the Jerle Shannara trilogy. It was excellent. 

[Gentled Ben]

I'll dig back into the Magic Kingdom books then, and I'll check out the Jerle Shannara trilogy at some point, too. Thanks!

[Nolder]

Sure np

[Songstress]

I've read all of the Shannara books so far and really liked them - it might be a bit of nostalgia, it was one of the first fantasy series I remember reading after college, and I did a big binge of them a couple of years ago.  I haven't read the Landover/Magic Kingdom series yet, it's on my wish list on Amazon so I don't forget to pick them up eventually.  I have a huuuuuuge amount of stuff that I've already got that I haven't read, though, so... it'll be a bit.

 

I just finished the 2nd season of the show a couple of days ago.  It was well made, which isn't surprising when I realized halfway through that the showrunners are the same guys who made Smallville, which I loved.  I'd say it's pretty loosely based on the books at this point, they definitely took a lot of story liberties to make it an interesting show.  And i think the show as created works well, if you take it as a separate thing.  Kind of like Game of Thrones, except I'd say it may be even more loosely connected to the source material than GoT.

 

I wouldn't put it among my favorite shows,  but I'm interested to see if they manage to find a home for another season and would definitely watch it for grins if and when they do. 

[jbarlow1]

I liked the first season well enough, and while I intend to marathon season 2 and see if I like it better than week-to-week, I stopped watching for the time being. The Shannara books were some of the first real novels that I read, and they were so dear to me that they show just felt wrong, even considering the whole "take artistic liberties for the show" thing. Still, I'll give it a run through and hope!

[Nolder]

15 hours ago, jbarlow1 said:

I liked the first season well enough, and while I intend to marathon season 2 and see if I like it better than week-to-week, I stopped watching for the time being. The Shannara books were some of the first real novels that I read, and they were so dear to me that they show just felt wrong, even considering the whole "take artistic liberties for the show" thing. Still, I'll give it a run through and hope!

Definitely better to marathon than wait week to week.

[Songstress]

Agreed.

 

The last 2 or 3 episodes would have made me yell at the screen if I hadn't already steeled myself to stop comparing it to the books.  GoT has trained me well for this discipline.

[jbarlow1]

5 hours ago, Songstress said:

Agreed.

 

The last 2 or 3 episodes would have made me yell at the screen if I hadn't already steeled myself to stop comparing it to the books.  GoT has trained me well for this discipline.

 

I think the way I said it on Twitter was the best way I can sum it up:

 

"Just found out that The Shannara Chronicles was announced as cancelled. It's a little disappointing to me as a huge Shannara fan for 20+ years, but the series was a little disappointing to me as a huge Shannara fan, too."

[Songstress]

Yeahhh, i can see that.

[Gentled Ben]

9 hours ago, Songstress said:

Agreed.

 

The last 2 or 3 episodes would have made me yell at the screen if I hadn't already steeled myself to stop comparing it to the books.  GoT has trained me well for this discipline.

 

Right? After season 2 of GoT, I feel like I can handle anything

[mactwist2]

So I actually watched the full first season of this even though I thought it was terrible pretty much the whole time.  I was just praying it'd get better I guess.  A couple of the monsters looked pretty good actually but in general the costumes were poor.  That's not the worst part though.  The worst part was clearly the acting.  The main guy can't act a lick and most of the girls were the same.  Then you got Manu Bennett, who I actually liked in Spartacus, overacting something fierce and not seeming believable.  I tried my best but had to skip season 2.