TV from novels, what do you think?

[Guest Yveva]

A thought just wafted through my mind... Do you get excited about TV series' based on novels? Does "knowing how it ends" spoil your enjoyment?

 

Case in point, over christmas break I watched the first season of Dexter, and LOVED it. I came home to read what I thought was the first Dexter novel and was totally in to it, only to discover that it was actually the second Dexter novel. I loved the second novel, but now I'm just not as pumped to read the first one, I know there are differences, but the major plot twist that it took a while to find out, and the dramatic irony is a little bit lost, it's not as tense.

 

How do you guys feel about TV adaptations of novels into series? Should the series be supertrue to the novels? Should they be like a fanfic, using the same characters and world, but with different plot points?

[Guest Emperor]

I like when they take the TV show to a different place. What I mean is that they use elements from the books but the TV show develops into something new. The way they have described the making of the Dresden Files, based on Jim Butcher's books, is that the first pilot will be the first book and after that they will take elements from the books to great a new universe for Harry Dresden. I am sure some of the other book's plots will show up, but I think we will see new stuff as well.

 

As to other books made into TV shows, yes I get excited about it. If you loved the books, you get excited about actually seeing it.

 

However, even though I love the Potter books, I almost fell asleep when watching 1 and 2 on the big screen.

[Guest Yveva]

Why were you bored during the first two? Were the first two books also boring to you?

 

 

I hadn't read the books (I boycott whatever "everyone else" is reading) and I was really drawn in by the first two movies because everything was new to me. But then the last two didn't make much of an impression, I think because too much was cut and too many plotlines were condensed.

[Guest Emperor]

The first two were fresh in my mind and I knew what was going to happen.

 

Sure the last movie I knew that some person was going to die, I just forgot most of the rest of the plot which made it much more enjoyable.

[The Outsider]

I can't really think of any books I've read that have been turned into TV series. Movies I can think of though.. The Lord of the Rings is one that I bought the One Volume edition of right before the first movie came out, and actually read through The Hobbit, TLotR, The Silmarilion, and The Lost Tales before the first movie came out, and I think it really enhanced my viewing pleasure of the movie, even though I knew pretty much what was going to happen. I did the same recently with The Chronicles of Narnia, reading the one volume set before the first movie came out last Christmas, and that also did not hurt my enjoyment of the movie.

 

Harry Potter though I have done a bit differently. I have not read any of the Harry Potter books, planning to see all the movies first. It was going great for the first three movies. The third being my favorite of the series so far. But from what I can tell, the fourth book was the one where the books went from being all about a certain size, to being at least twice as long, maybe more. So suddenly they were trying to fit twice as much story into two hours of film, and I felt like it showed. I don't if it lost me some, but I think what I really felt was that the characterization of the three leads was really lost. It left me wondering if I wouldn't have enjoyed it more if I had read the book and knew what was going on in advance...

 

I have to say also, that normally having read a book will not influence me to not see a movie. In fact, it often makes me want to see the movie if I have enjoyed the book. On the other hand, if I have seen the movie first, I often find myself reluctant to read the book, knowing how it will end and all. I'm still not sure if I ever reat Pet Semetary after seeing the film, but I think I did. It's just been a long time. Other times though, I've read the book after seeing the movie and enjoyed the book so much more.