The Colour of Magic

[Heradel]

Part one aired last night, so for our Sky-one-satellite-paying segment of the forum population (and for the scurvy-dog segment), thoughts?

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[eytanz]

I'd give it a 7 out of 10. It was fun, but not too exciting. I found my attention drifting about 75% through; I was watching it but thinking about other stuff.

What I really liked was the imagining of the discworld - the set designs, characters, and general appearance of everything was fantastic (well, some of the CGI looked a bit cheap but nothing too bad). I really liked how the characters were portrayed in the most part as well.

What fell flat was the overall storyline. Partially this is the fault of the source material. The Color of Magic is episodic and was written before Pratchett really figured out how to pace his material. But the tv adapatation, in my opinion, highlighted the pacing problems rather than smoothed them down. Partially it was the decision to fit two books into a 2-part, 4-hour miniseries; so while yesterday was "part 1", it was actually the entire novel. I don't mind so much the large chunks of plot being cut off, but the story ended up so truncated that the narrator had to come in often and tell us what was going on. And - though maybe this is because I know the book - I occasionally felt there was way too much exposition, and some of it repeated needlessly. Often the narrator would say something and then a character would repeat it later. This was partially borrowed from the book which does the same thing, but in the book it is often a way for Pratchett to stick in more jokes, and partially a sign of his inexperience at the time that he later shed.

Also, the humor didn't work quite as well as it could have. It was often funny, but Pratchett's humor tends to be composed of occasional very obvious, signposted jokes with more subtle jokes in between them, balancing things out. Again, he didn't quite get the balance right in his early books, but the adaptation went the way of just ignoring more subtle stuff in favor of very obvious humor.

I think partially the issue was that the show was aimed more at children than at adults; I have a feeling that if I was 12 years old, I would have really loved it. But as a 32-year old Pratchett fan, I found it enjoyable but not something I would buy a DVD of to ever watch again.

[stePH]

Also, the humor didn't work quite as well as it could have. It was often funny, but Pratchett's humor tends to be composed of occasional very obvious, signposted jokes with more subtle jokes in between them, balancing things out.

I find the problem with adapting Pratchett's humor to the screen is that, much like Wodehouse, most of the humor is in the narrative rather than in the dialog.  I laugh out loud reading Wodehouse and Pratchett, but the Fry and Laurie Jeeves and Wooster series and the Hogfather movie both leave me lukewarm at best.  Neither was remotely as funny as it should have been given its pedigree.
 

[Listener]

Hmm, something else to... um... obtain.

I very much enjoyed the animated Soul Music, and largish chunks of the live-action Hogfather.  But TCOM, I think, was a weaker book to choose for adaptation (and that's saying it without having seen it yet).  I personally want to see some of the Watch books done.

[cuddlebug]

I have finally watched it on DVD with a friend recently (I was never able to see it on TV, I think it was only aired on SKY here in the UK) and we had a little discussion about it, since my friend just finished reading the book a few weeks ago. We both loved the film for its quirky characters and the fun special effects but like many other posters we felt it totally lacked what one would normally expect from a film or book for that matter: a plot. Given that The Colour of Magic was Pratchett's first novel, we found it extremely hard to imagine how he could actually get it published at all. Any editor or proof reader nowadays would tell the author to rewrite a book that is so clumsy, that has no noticeable conclusion and introduces character arches, settings and plot lines without ever drawing them to an end. Obviously, The Light Fantastic was an attempt at resolving exactly those issues, but if I understand correctly, Pratchett only decided to write it after The Colour of Magic turned out to be such a success. So that leaves the question, how did he get a book that is so obviously faulty, which would be refused immediately today, how did he get it published?

[Listener]

I obtained and saw TCoM. I like how they got around Twoflower's not speaking Morporkian, and I think the casting was good -- especially Sean Astin -- though I think they got the actors' ages backward. If I remember right, Rincewind was in his 30s and Twoflower was in his 50s. Those were my guesses. The casting of Vetinari was awesome too, except that at that time Vetinari wasn't the Patrician and I don't think he became the Patrician until Guards Guards. I'm saying that despite what Pratchett has stated on Usenet (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Havelock_Vetinari) because, in Night Watch, Vetinari didn't seem to be an overweight man, whereas earlier Patricians (pre-GG) were.

Anyway, the movie was enjoyable as a fan, but if you're not a fan, I don't think you'll like it. Soul Music is much more accessible.

[Talia]

I'm not sure I get your complaint, exactly. It seemed to have a plot to me.

[Loz]

I would have said that, with the exception of Mort, the first five or six novels aren't what you would use to introduce anyone to the Pratchett canon, I tended to use either Mort or Guards, Guards and then, when hooked, let people go back and rediscover the earlier stuff for themselves.

From memory, Hogfather was adapted in such a way as to understand some jokes would have to be cut out for reasons of time or because they wouldn't work on screen and replaced with other things instead, David Jason's bit of business with the roll-up being a prime example. The Colour of Magic instead seemed to be trying too hard to stick to the books so there was a lot of mugging and dead space.

[Listener]

I would have said that, with the exception of Mort, the first five or six novels aren't what you would use to introduce anyone to the Pratchett canon, I tended to use either Mort or Guards, Guards and then, when hooked, let people go back and rediscover the earlier stuff for themselves.

For my money, the best books to start with are Men At Arms, Soul Music, or Moving Pictures.