I was watching the premiere of a fantasy series based on one of my favorite books today. I’ll do my readers a favor and not bother naming it, because what I saw was a two hour train wreck. I honestly do not understand how the producers of this show managed to obtain the author’s approval of their screenplay.
The show took many liberties with the text. This is understandable to an extent, as the medium and audience are very different, but every deviation from the text was executed very poorly. Now that I think about it, what little TV fiction I’ve watched recently has also exhibited the same general characteristics as this show:
The world is portrayed in absolutes: there is Good and there is Evil. The job of Evil is to take over the world. No motive for this is given, and it’s never because the Evil person wants to make the world a better place. The job of Good is to stop Evil, and thus Save The World.
It’s always personal: This originally begins as a personal vendetta after Evil lashes out at the protagonist, but this is quickly subsumed into a sense of duty to Save The World by killing the minions of evil, usually in elaborate, drawn-out battle scenes. Nevertheless, as Good Triumphs Over Evil, a protagonist will invariably make some remark about having given meaning to those who have fallen or having achieved his revenge.
All motivations are exogenous, most caused by Evil: if someone on the side of Good is a traitor, it is because he was bribed or coerced by Evil. If a character is attacked by wild animals, it was somehow Evil’s fault. If it rains and a character gets wet, it must be the Wetness of An Evil Storm.
Morality Determines Causality: Just as most motivations are Evil, most of the plot consists of Evil’s machinations. Nothing can happen independently; it must all be the result of the actions of the protagonists or antagonists. There is literally no setting; it has become an extension of the characters.
No patience for unknowns: This is a bit more specific to the show I was watching. There was an aspect of the main character’s identity that the book kept the reader guessing at for at least 100 pages. I was shocked when the show merely blurted it out, as if it were known all along. And everyone picked it up and acted as if it were perfectly normal once it was revealed!
Violence solves everything: This book had several instances where the characters talked their way out of problems and used their wits. Part of the idea was to avoid unnecessary violence, which is always a smart thing to do. On TV, if one character so much as breathed too near another, out came the swords.
What Philosophy?: Finally, the motivation of Good is to Save the World simply because the Good Guys are Just Plain Nice. They don’t have those pesky attributes of real morality, like a set of personal values or decisions that require them to really think about these values. This makes the characters come off as completely inauthentic. It’s as if an average person were to suddenly become a hero, yet retained the morality of an average person rather than anything that could be construed as heroic. The deeds are heroic, but why are the characters performing them? Think Superman.
That’s my rant for today.