Book readers and non-readers alike were unimpressed by the film Seventh Son, based on Joseph Delaney’s The Last Apprentice series. This one is going down in Adaptation history as one of our least favorite, and a gigantic missed opportunity for what could have been a great movie series.
Our team geared up for the new live-action Cinderella by reading and watching an insanely large amount of versions of the classic tale, from the 7 BC Egyptian Rhodopis to the 2011 A Cinderella Story: Once Upon a Song. We get into themes of beauty and it’s worth, social status and neglect as well as why there are just SO many birds.
Make sure you let us know in the comments if there are any other versions we should pick up!
If you couldn’t tell by the length of the episode, Dorin and Kendyl have a lot to say about Kingsman: The Secret Service and the original comics by Mark Millar and Dave Gibbons. They discuss the improved themes, the interesting characters and, of course, the annoying sexism.
The Adaptation staff have spent their February with these lovely characters. How about you?
I’ve heard a lot of people say that there isn’t a lot of information in The World of Ice & Fire that you can’t get from the books, but despite the fact that there is a lot that we already knew, the book was worth buying for the extra information you do get, the excellent art work and the ability to have all the bits and pieces of this complex world all in one place. You could definitely just use it as a reference guide, but I sat down and read it cover to cover, not putting it down for days.
-Ryan
The Librarians started out as a series of TV movies, 10 years ago on TNT, about a “professional student” Flynn (played by Noah Wyle), who is hired as a librarian. The library is full of magical artifacts much too dangerous to be out in the world, and the librarian (there is only one) is the only person who can seek out and secure them. Since then they have made novelizations, comic books, and most recently a TV series that changes the game.
In the new series, the librarian (still Noah Wyle) finds that other librarian candidates who were not hired, are being hunted. He and his Guardian, Eve (played by Rebecca Romijn) go round up a three of the last candidates, played by Christian Kane, Lindy Booth, and John Kim. In the process the library is infiltrated and lost which sets the series off where Flynn decides to change the rules and have more librarians to fight the small magical disruptions, while he himself finds a way to recover the library. He leaves the new librarians in Eve’s capable hands and with the Library Annex and its caretaker, Jenkins (played by John Laroquette) only to appear when real danger is near. The whole franchise is a wonderful roller coaster ride.
-Dorin
I’ve recently been rewatching Roswell, which is the epitome of 90s teen supernatural romantic dramas. The story focuses on a group of teens in Roswell, New Mexico a touristy town that plays on the 1947 UFO “crash” by having alien themed restaurants and a UFO museum. The series kicks off with a shooting in the local Crashdown Cafe that almost kills Liz Parker, until she is saved by secret teenage alien Max Evans. Yes, it’s cheesy as hell and tons of fun to watch. In fact, we’ve even created a drinking game.
1) Drink every time someone moodily (read: creepily) looks at someone else through a window.
2) Drink every time the weather symbolizes someone’s emotions.
3) Drink every time an alien and a human have to talk about how they can’t be together because they are just. too. different.
So you over-21s, drink up! And you under 21s? Just get some friends together and have a blast watching, laughing and eventually getting way too emotionally involved with these characters. By season 2, you’ll be crying when they cry.
-Kendyl
That’s it for us this month, but be sure to leave your own recommendations in the comments!
Our hosts are back, discussing the second book in the Divergent trilogy, Insurgent. There is a lot to go over in this book: visiting the different factions, Tris’s PTSD, the motivations of the untrustworthy and how this book stacks up against the last. Listen and tell us what you think about all these things and more!
Check out our episodes on Divergent the novel and the film.
Jess and Kendyl discuss Little Women by Louisa May Alcott, remembering how they felt reading it in younger years and how their opinions have changed.
This week our hosts have read The Last Apprentice: Revenge of the Witch by Joseph Delaney (or The Wardstone Chronicles: The Spook’s Apprentice for the UK, still by Joseph Delaney). They are pretty amused by the main character’s inability to do as he’s told and considerably less amused by the Spook’s generalizations about women. But over all, they are ready to continue on with this series and to see how the filmmakers will interpret it in the upcoming Seventh Son.
The Adaptation staff have started the new year off right with these recommendations for January! What have you been into this month?
I have been reading through Void, which is a compilation of three novels published in the 90s. The first one is called Hex, and I’ve just finished that one. The basic premise is about a dystopia future where certain people – called Hexes – are being rounded up and exterminated because they have special abilities to control technology. It’s almost a psychic connection with the World Wide Web. Anyway, one of these is a particularly gifted Hex named Raven, and she and her brother are on a search for their younger sister, who was separated from them years ago and who may or may not have just come on the government’s radar as being a Hex herself.
-Jess
I have to recommend Agent Carter! I didn’t really get into Agents of S.H.E.I.L.D. sadly, but I knew I would love this. It’s fab, so good. She’s a fabulous powerful woman who uses the sexist norm of the 40’s against all the men. I love it. And, and, AND! Holy crap Chad Michael Murray! I did not recognize him for so long, they styled him so well, and he is suited to this part so well. So many good people in this show and I was hooked by first episode.
-Dorin
I’m reading Octavia Buterly’s Fledgling, it’s a novel about Shori genetically altered part human (African American) vampire. An attack on her human/vampire compound leaves her badly injured, without her memory and the only survivor. I read a portion of this I college and now I started from the beginning again, but this book lives in grey areas so I’m having mixed feels.
-Nicole
A short story from the A Song of Ice and Fire universe, this story is part of an anthology called Dangerous Woman edited by George R. R. Martin. When King Viserys dies, he leaves a daughter, Princess Rhaenyra, from his first marriage and a son, Price Aegon from his second. The queen wishes her son to take the throne, but as his first born Princess Rhaenyra feels it is her birth right, resulting in a civil war between the Targaryens that results in the supposed extinction of the dragons. The story has great background information for Targaryen fans and is pretty fast-paced for Martin’s normal writing style.
-Ryan
Being a rather busy bee, I’ve been watching a lot of shows that I don’t have to focus all my attention on. Unfortunately, although I don’t have to watch every second of Cutthroat Kitchen, I always end up wanting to anyway. Hosted by Alton Brown, four chefs are eliminated in three rounds, each with its own theme, like they all have to make chili or muffins or sausage. They each start with $25,000 and every round several things are auctioned off to them that will either make it easier for the winner or harder for their opponents. For example, they can take away the privilege of using a muffin pan or be the only one allowed to use a sausage stuffer. It’s pretty entertaining to watch the chefs screw each other over and really interesting to see how they get around the obstacles.
-Kendyl
That’s it for us this month, but be sure to leave your own recommendations in the comments!
In which Kendyl gives a brief history of Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm.
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Podcasts on fairytales:
#9 Snow White and the Stranger Danger
#37 Hansel and Gretel, So Hot Right Now
#70 What Frozen Things Do In Summer
#71 Two Sides to Every Twisted Tale
#83 OUAT’s Adventures in Wonderland
As fairytale connoisseurs, the team has been looking forward to the film Into the Woods for a long while. Most are extremely pleased, but someone has some issues with the plot.
In which new vlogger Dorin details our list of worst adapted fairy tales and bemoans their inadequacies.
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Related Podcasts:
#9: Snow White and the Stranger Danger
After rolling their eyes through the 1982 Annie, the hosts are pleasantly surprised with the 2014 version. The plot changes, the updated music, and better character development led to an incredibly fun film experience.
*NOTE* We tried a few things with the audio this time, trying to make it a bit louder for you commuters out there. Let us know if this is better, worse or the same!
Adaptation Podcast 