January 27, 2021 • 46 mins
Adaptations are rarely 100% accurate to their source material, but where is the line between adaptation and a completely new story with the same old name? Jonathan and Ariel discuss when a story isn't the story it says it is.Then we adapt two very unlikely stories of our own.
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Podcast is a production of I Heart Radio. Hey everybody,
welcome to the Large Nerdron Collider Podcast, the podcast that's
all about the geeky things happening in the world around
us and how excited we are about them. I'm Ariel Castion,
(01:49):
and with me, as always is my super awesome, super
original co host Jonathan Strickland. Hey, Ariel, I got I
got an original idea. I'm gonna ask you a question.
You're a bad guy in a Scooby Doo cartoon. What
sort of abandoned structure or location is your home base
(02:11):
of operations? Uh? Functional yet uh not inhabited? Called Stone Creamery. Okay,
that's that's a good answer. I like it. Yeah, you're
just like the marble slab. It's still cold. It's a
nice twist on the it's still warm trope, I like
(02:33):
it excellent. Alright, so we know, oh me, uh, an
abandoned Renaissance festival site. I like that. We're yeah, we're
both like it's abandoned. Well, it has to be. It
has to be because that's like, that's the trope, right,
that's always the old abandoned amusement park or the old
abandoned train station. So so my reasoning is because I
(02:55):
just want to be able to make ice cream to
fuel my villainy. Is your reason to be behind it?
Because I love Renaissance festivals if it weren't for all
those dang people. Uh, that is not true, sir. The
best part of the Renaissance festival is the people because
otherwise you can't entertain them. And true, and you and
(03:17):
I have spent more than enough time on a more
or less abandoned Renaissance festival site for rehearsals and stuff
where it's just the cast, and it does get creepy.
But that's uh, that's enough of all that. Now we
know where are our villainous Scooby Do characters would reside?
Let us move on to what we have to talk
(03:38):
about today. Yeah, and the first thing we want to
talk about, and almost the most important thing to me
is One Division, because One Division came out last week
and Jonathan and I both watched it, So the first
two episodes, we should say, the first two episodes, so
Jonathan in a as not as spoilery spoilery as you
(03:59):
can and way, what did you think of the show?
I absolutely adored it. I wholeheartedly loved it. Um. I
loved it both for the the obvious love and affection
the writers and everybody have for classic sitcoms, American sitcoms,
(04:21):
and I loved it for all the weird and slightly
sinister creepy stuff that gets woven in. Again, no spoilers,
but there the first two episodes, I think it's safe
to say fall way harder on the sitcom love and
corny humor than the creepy stuff. The creepy stuff just
kind of is there occasionally, but that just makes the
(04:44):
creepy stuff stand out more. And that's what it made
me really really enjoy it. What about you? What did
you think? Um? I also absolutely loved it. I actually
spent the entire weekend saying, why are there not more
episodes of this for me to watch? Maybe? I just
want to go back and watch the first You again
because it was you know, we know that something is
up in the show. You know that from the trailers. Uh.
(05:06):
And and like you said, there was some sinister stuff
that happens throughout uh. But it was just overall very
uplifting and fun. And it was just fun, which is
a fun show. And I feel like so many shows
in the past five ten years have just tried to
be gritty and dark and and graphic that I just
(05:29):
really appreciated almost the wholesomeness of of this mystery comedy.
And I just have to say, like Elizabeth Olsen has
floored me with how well she embodies that classic sitcom
leading lady uh kind of kind of spirit. She nailed
(05:55):
it in such a great way, like that interesting balance
between being uh, you know, sort of the straight man
but also genuinely funny in her own right. And the
supporting cast of that show is amazing. I agree. I agree.
Unlike Fuller House or something where they're trying to bank
(06:15):
on old kitch, this show just really takes old nostalgia
and makes it feel natural. Yeah, it doesn't make it
feel forced, you know. Paul Bettany also did an amazing
job you know, brivling some Dick van Dyke in there.
They Yes, there's their actual direct references to things like
the Dick Van Dyke Show and a little bit of
(06:37):
Lucy ole Ball in that first episode. And I don't
know for a fact, but at least the way the
first two episodes play out, I suspect we're going to
see almost a chain of different sitcom styles. We know
there's one other one because it was in the trailer
right there was one that looks very much Partridge Family
Brady Bunch ish, But I expect we'll see maybe a
(07:00):
couple of others, hopefully before the season ends, because I
am absolutely digging it. And and it's also fun in
that they have customized openings for each episode to write,
like the opening sequence for episode two is different from
the opening sequence for episode one and reflects the kind
of sitcom that that episode embodies, which is really cool.
(07:24):
It also makes me really curious how they're going to
go forward because we know in the movies Vision has died.
Yes that's not spoiler, he's really most sincerely dead and
now he's back, and I I worry Jonathan that it's
not going to stay so fun and wholesome. No, this
is going to end in a very sad way. But
(07:46):
you see, they could they can spin it. They can
they can keep vision around. They can do this. Uh
well yeah, I mean it would be great if you
could keep him around because he he is such a
genuinely fun character. Listen, if they can make three movies
out of the Hobbit, we'll talk about that later. Well,
that was my clever way to segue, right right, right,
(08:10):
So speaking of the Hobbit Tolkien Lord of the Rings
all that, there is a Lord of the Rings show
happening eventually, really more of a Middle Earth show. It's
going to coming out for Amazon. We knew about this.
Turns out it's going to be the most expensive TV
show in all of history, with a five million dollar budget,
(08:32):
which is in It also has a five season commitment,
so I'm not sure whether that budget is per season
or for all five or for all five And it's
already been renewed for season two without a single episode
of season one having come out, but that is still
a huge budget. You know, they're filming in New Zealand,
and they, like everybody else, kind of got uh sidelined
(08:56):
by the pandemic. Of course New Zealand's and much better
shape than most of the world. So yeah, yeah, And
apparently we've been waiting for this for three years, and
I must have put that out of my mind because
I forgot about it until now. I'm pretty sure we
covered this when Ellen c was still going back in
probably and then I forgot about it. Yeah. Well, and
(09:18):
and this show is going to be set during the
Second Age of Middle Earth. And if you don't know
how the history of Middle Earth works, everything you see
in the Hobbit, everything you see in Lord of the Rings,
all that takes place at the end of the Third
Age of Middle Earth. And so this is three thousand
years before that. Um, it's when Saron is the big
(09:40):
bad for the first time around. You remember the beginning
of Lord of the Rings has Um, Yeah, is Sealder
chopping off Saron's fingers with Narsal the sword, the shards
of Narsal, and that is essentially the Dan new Ma,
the end scene of of of the Second Age of
(10:04):
Middle Earth. So this is going to take place during that,
and we suspect that a lot of it is going
to take place on New Menoor, the island where the
sort of elevated members of humans live. That's Arragorn is
descended from them. So yeah, yeah, you know, I'm I'm
excited about this. I when the Hobbit movies came out one,
(10:28):
I was like, why are there three of them? This
is a short story, not a short story, but a
shorter story. Uh, and and to like, there's so much
world that Tolkien built that I want to explore it.
So this has given me the opportunity. I'm I'm cautiously
optimistic about this one. If it fails, it will not
(10:49):
be because it was cheap. Yes, yes, I am also
cautiously optimistic about the Doogie Howser reboot, which is not
a sentence I ever thought i'd be saying. Yeah. So
this was one that had escaped my attention until recently,
where we learn more about the the the new version
(11:13):
of Doogie Howser, which will not be Doogie Howser, It's
it's Doogie kume Aloha m D. So uh. One, Now
we're following a person of Hawaiian descent and to that
person happens to be female. So we've got a young
woman doogie and I think this is awesome. I actually
(11:34):
really kind of dig this idea and I'm very interested
to see where it goes. Um. And I also hope
that they play the theme song on a ukulele, and
I hope it's the yeah do do do do? I
just hope that she types up all her thoughts on
(11:54):
a really really really really old computer or I think
it will have to be like a smartphone. Um, it's
Peyton Elizabeth Lee? Who is who is playing the title role?
You know? I went back and watched the first couple
of episodes of Dukie Howser again recently. They are deal
with some more adult issues than I thought they would.
(12:16):
I was like, they aren't doing this in this episode?
Are they? What are they doing? I can't I watched
this as a child. Um, I mean it was, But
that was the whole point, right, was that here here's
a person who is incredibly intelligent but lacks worldly experience,
and and how how the difference between intelligence and wisdom
(12:38):
needs to be understood so that you don't just assume
someone who's really intelligent is wise, or someone who is
wise is you know, book smart intelligent. It's it's the
combination of those two things that is his journey. So yeah,
it will be I'm curious to see how this one
plays out. So our next story, and actually the story
(12:58):
that is going to be um inspiring our mashup later,
is about the television show Batwoman, Yes, which has a
new Batwoman. Yeah. Yeah. Ruby Rose left h at the
end of the last season after the last season, and uh,
instead of recasting her, they're just giving us a whole
(13:20):
new character. The new Batwoman will be a character called
Ryan Wilder Leslie. Yes. And this is the reason why
Ruby Rose left. At least in part was that she
suffered an injury during her shoots of the previous season
of bat Woman and had to have surgery in order
(13:43):
to correct the injury, and that was part of it.
But another part was just that she was kind of
re examining her goals during the whole lockdown period and
I felt like they weren't really an alignment with Batwoman.
So now we've got a new Batwoman. Uh, we've already
seen trailers of her, and of course the show's coming
out very soon, so you'll get to see her in action. Um.
(14:07):
I love the look of her. I think that it
looks great. You know the fact that she's adjusted the
cowl and everything. Um, and hopefully this will be the
change that bat Woman needs to really get its you know,
get up and running, because a lot of people have
said that the Batwoman series so far has not quite
(14:28):
met expectations. I honestly, I will say I haven't watched
it because the wig looked so bad in the trailers
for the first season that I yeah, so I'm hoping
that's better too. But you know, I'm I'm excited for
about I like Batman. I'm excited for more bat Person media,
so I will give the second season to try. Something
(14:51):
I'm not Yeah. Something I'm not sure if I'm going
to give a try though, is the Snyder cut of
Justice League. I was already on the fence, but now
we know it's going to be four hours long and
and new. I don't I don't know if I can
sit through that. Yeah, I um, I gotta be honest
(15:16):
with your Ariel. When I finally watched Justice League, not once,
not once in that running time, did I think, Gosh,
I wish this would go longer? No? No, No, I
mean I will say like it was a fairly ho
um storyline. I really just enjoyed Justice League for the
character uh exploration. Yeah, but you know, Snyder has a
(15:41):
darker vision, and so I don't even know if I'm
going to like the character exploration. Yeah. No, I have
a feeling like the the more lighthearted, quippy stuff that
we saw was very likely the contributions of Josh Weeden.
It just felt much more like Josh Weeden's style. Um
and yeah, that, yeah, that to me tells me that
(16:02):
I probably will not I'll probably watch it, if I'm
being honest, but I'm not looking forward to it. I
think that it's almost feel like you're of the same
I almost feel like I have to watch it for
purposes of being able to talk about it here. Uh
the And also it does have one thing that makes
(16:22):
me kind of want to watch it, which is, in
theory we're gonna get Martian Manhunter, who I do very
much like. I'm being curious to see how how that
is handled because it's such an outlandish character. Well, we'll
have to see if that realization of the character ends up,
you know, meeting your very high standards, Aerial. In the meantime,
(16:45):
let's take a quick break, and when we come back,
we're gonna talk about when adaptations are no longer really
adaptations and when that's good and when that's bad. But first,
let's take this quick break. Teething can be a real
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hope dot org today and we're back. So a lot
of the things that we talked about in the news
segment are adaptations or reboots or or the like from
properties we really like. And sometimes they are really great,
(18:56):
like when we get the Lord of the Rings movies,
and sometimes they're not so great, like when we get
The Hobbit movies. They usually have a wide range of
of criticism about them, in part to the fact that
a lot of times when properties are adjusted for movie
or television, they veer from the source material to make
(19:18):
it a better viewing experience. So arguably they try to
make it a better viewing experience, it does not always
work out. As the aforementioned The Hobbit proves yes. So uh,
I mean where do you Let's start at the basic
level of of movies that are adaptations that just kind
(19:39):
of veer away from their source material in places that
don't follow the storyline exactly. We see this a lot
in you know, superhero movies, for example. What are what
are your thoughts of that just between staying true to
the thing that you love because that's what you're going
to watch and and giving a new story. And I
mean like this this to me, it largely depends upon
(20:03):
your experience with the material. And by that I mean
if you are someone who has never seen or read,
or or otherwise encountered the original version of that thing,
then your impression of the adaptation is likely to be
very different from someone who is like a big fan
(20:25):
of the source material. Um. And you know, fans of
source material are notoriously picky, myself included, and that I
think is one of the major determining factors. There are
other ones as well. You mentioned superhero movies. I think
superhero movies in particular have a lot of license only
because for especially the classic superhero characters, there have been
(20:51):
so many different incarnations of those characters told in so
many different styles from so many different writers and artists
that you can pick and choose, and it's everything's up
for grabs, right Like there is a can't be Batman
if you wanted to go with the campy Batman route.
There's the dark and gritty Batman if you want to
go that route. There's the Tim Burton route, where it's
(21:12):
kind of both. Like it's you know, there's a lot
of a lot of flexibility there in other ways, like
other works, there's not as much flexibility. And so one
of the the examples I put in our our notes
that I think excels as a movie and was terrible
as a book is Jaws. Uh. Jaws is my favorite
(21:36):
film of all time. It is I think a perfect movie.
The book is almost unreadable, you see. I feel that
way about Hitty Chitty Bang Bang, where the only thing
the movie in the book having common is a flying car. Yeah. Well,
if you got rid of Hushaby Mountain, I would be
(21:57):
all over that because that Usha by Mountain is the
song that kills that movie for me. Kind of similar
to Cheer Up Charlie and Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.
Another example of a movie that's very different from the
source material. Um, slow songs kill movies, is what I'm saying.
You know, I would wait you to say in cases
(22:19):
like Jaws or Chitty Chitta Bang Bang, or even Willie
Wonka in the Chocolate Factory, depending on which iteration you're
talking about. What I said, Willy Wonka, not Charlie. Fair enough,
Willie Wonka, which is the gene wilder one. Uh. I
think that it is beneficial, especially in Willie Wonka and
the Chocolate Factory, to um kind of reinvigorate an old
(22:40):
story that had some old concepts and ideas that were problematic. Yeah. No,
that's that's a fair point. Is that there's stuff in
that book where, you know, viewed through the lens of today,
you think, wow, that that is, that is harmful thinking,
that is reinforcing some pretty negative stereotypes. Yeah. Oh, I
think I think you're right on there. Yeah. And yet
(23:03):
when Tim Burton readd it to Charlie in the Chocolate Factory,
I didn't it focused more on Willy Wonka unless on Charlie,
which was odd because of the title change. And I
didn't like that a that adaptation as much. And maybe
it's just because it's a story I came to as
a child and related to at a childlike level, and
(23:26):
didn't relate to on the candy mogul level. Well, and
to be fair, also for Willy Wonka, that's like, that's
a movie I encountered well before I ever read Charlie
in the Chocolate Factory. So again that's another example of
I encountered that story in the form of its adaptation first.
It's kind of like if you hear a cover song
without realizing it's a cover song, you might then listen
(23:49):
to the original and think, oh, this isn't this isn't
what I expected, because you know the cover has done
something different to it, and you might not even like
the original as much as you like the cover. That
that happens a lot. It tends to be whatever version
of person encounters first, they they imprint upon that more.
I see that also with adaptations of foreign films, like
(24:11):
if you have seen The Ring before you saw Ringo,
then you may like the Ring more. But people who
saw Ringo first will say, oh, no, the Ring is that. No,
they didn't get anything right. Ringo is the best. Well,
did you watch or read The Shining first, Because that's
another one that's really popular, uh, but veered from its
(24:32):
source material and actually made it made Stephen King upset
as it did. He Yeah, we're talking to course about
the kubric adaptation of The Shining, not the not the
Faithful and yet nigh unwatchable mini series that was made
much later. Um. I read The Shining first, and I
I feel like those are It's almost like it's two
(24:53):
different stories that share some common DNA, and I think
both are brilliant. I understand King's objections, and I agree
that if you're telling the story of the book, Kubrick
made some decisions that don't work. The big one being
that that Jack Torrens, the character played by Nicholson, that, um,
(25:17):
that he comes off way too crazy, way too quickly.
And in the book it's something that you see is
built upon his alcoholism and his history of anger management
issues that then escalates. Well, there's not a whole of
escalation in The Shining. It kind of he kind of
comes off as unhinged from the beginning. And so it's
(25:39):
a different story. But I think it's a good story.
It's just different. Yeah. Yeah, Now, I would say that
all of these things that we've talked about so far
are maybe not Bang Bang are close enough to the
original story that they should be called the original story,
just a different adaptation. There are there are things out
(26:01):
there that try to say that they're a loved story
that really aren't. World war Z the Watch and I'm
going to say Pete Dragon, even though Disney owned the
story Petche Dragon to begin with and had complete right
to change it, their new Petche Dragon is not Peach
Dragon to me right. The the the remake Pete Dragon
(26:23):
completely ignores almost everything about the original except for having
an orphan and a dragon or is he even an orphan?
In the remake he is an orphan, yes, yes, But
you know World War Z has to do with zombies. Yeah,
for my anders, that's about Yeah, that's about it. So
have you read the book, Yes, so you know that
(26:45):
the book's brilliant. The book is more of an observation
about how humans cope in the wake of a massive disaster.
And honestly, if you read World War Z and you
look at how the United States has handled the pandemic,
you're like, wow, this is the World War Z is
so accurate and how how these things play out? Um,
(27:07):
because it's more of a commentary on things like how
bureaucracy can get in the way and mess things up
and make a bad situation even worse. Um, and the
movie is a zombie action movie. Yeah, well, and and
a big thing like the story is told from the
recollection recollections of a bunch of different people, right, and
(27:28):
it's after the zombie the zombie menace has passed its
peak and now we're on the other side of it.
So it's people thinking back to when it was going
into its peak, but from the perspective of the story teller,
the worst has already happened. Yeah. And then you've got
the Watch, which you talked about in a previous episode Trying,
(27:54):
which is based off of Guards Cards by Terry Pratchett. Right, yeah,
it's it's based off the night Watch series of books,
mainly Guards Guards. It's got the the main storyline is
mostly pulled from Guards Guards with the onset of a
dragon around on more pork and um yeah, it's um
it's so different from the source material. It shares tiny
(28:18):
little bits of of identity with the source material, but
it makes so many drastic changes that you lose the
spirit and you start to wonder, like, why would you
why would you make these choices? Because every choice you
make that gets further away from the source material is
(28:38):
alienating the built in audience. But if you are making
it for people who are not that built in audience,
why would you bother adapting something in the first place.
Maybe because they they had an idea that they thought
would be similar enough, but they wanted to get a
chunk of audience automatically, so they said, we're going to
(29:02):
throw in a couple of things so we can call
it the Watch, so that Terry Pratchett fans will want
to watch it, even though we really want to tell
our own story. But then, I mean, you know, or
you should know going into it, that you're going to
alienate those fans, and thus any reaction you get from
them is going to be negative, and that that is
(29:22):
going to become a very powerful story all on its own,
is that the fans of the series are rejecting the
adaptation you've made. Um. I think if I watched The
Watch without ever having read any Terry Pratchett, I would
have thought it was very unusual and strange and a
little compelling, just because it was unusual, but not particularly
(29:46):
well told or interesting like like it's unusual. It's kind
of like a David don't get on me David Lynch fans.
I think David Lynch has worked brilliant, but it's like
a David Lynch thing in the sense that you're watching
stuff and you're like, this is I'm just trying to
get my head wrapped around what's happening now. The fact
that I've read Pratchett tells me a little bit more
(30:06):
about what's going on, But the changes that have been
made are so drastic that, uh, my knowledge of Pratchett
is only somewhat helpful in sussing out what's happening. And
you know, they leave out entire characters who are really
important in the books, who don't even appear in the
in the show. Um. Yeah, it's one of those that
(30:27):
I find particularly perplexing because I can't figure out what
your end goal was if you are making choices that
are bound to alienate the fan base. Yeah. So we've
talked about some stories that are close enough that they
should be titled after their source material, and we've talked
about some that are so far away that they really shouldn't.
What about Disney, because Disney writes that line for me
(30:50):
of and I know we need to wrap this up
so maybe we can get into this deeper later. But uh,
Disney rides that line of just that. They change the
original story just enough that I'm like, is it that
original story anymore? I got you? Yeah, Like like all
the fairy tales, I mean, obviously they take all the
(31:10):
hard edges off the fairy tales, right if you read
Grimm's fairy Tales, I mean it's called the Brothers Grim
right there, the Brothers Grim. But they can be pretty
grim fairy tales. Uh, you know, people get their feet
chopped off at ice, pecked out and stuff. You don't
see that in the Disney stories. I I mean Disney,
(31:33):
for much of its history, is known for sanitizing a
lot of stories in an effort to create a particular
kind of feel, right, Like you can see a lot
of those classic Disney movies and detect like, yeah, this
is all trying to create that sort of sense of
(31:53):
wonder and magic and the bad guys are easily identifiable
and they are bad, and the good guys are really
really good, and you know, the good guys will win
in the end and nothing terrible will happen. To anybody
that's permanent except the bad guy who will probably die.
Um that's about it. Uh. I'm okay with it because
(32:14):
I know going into it what I'm going to get, Like,
I know, the disease not going to break the mold
on that. Um, you're not gonna have some morally ambiguous
characters in there for the most part. No one's gonna
get their eyes pecked out. Um. If I want that,
I can go back and read the original fairy tales.
So I just accept it as a totally different take
(32:37):
on the basic plot points of a story. Um. And
some cases it gets way the heck away from the
basic plot points there. You're like, Okay, yeah, you've got
some dwarves in here, but this is not snow White.
Yeah yeah, Well, Um, now we're gonna adapt somethings of
(33:00):
our own. Uh. And I don't know if either of
our adaptations will live up to their namesakes, but we're
going to give it a go. But first we're gonna
take this quick break. Support for this podcast in the
(33:21):
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Do you suffer from zoom fatigue with so many meetings
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otter dot Ai. All right, guys, we're back. And as
(35:07):
you know or maybe you don't, we like to mash
up two different properties into one and find out what happens.
And this week I chose the properties because I had
a joke in my head and I decided that I
did to write a whole piece around. By the way,
this is how my brain works. I had to write
a whole piece around the joke. So we are combining
(35:31):
the world of of Gotham City, not Gotham the series,
but Gotham City from d C Comics, the home of
characters like Batman, Joker, Arkham Asylum and all that kind
of stuff. With the Veggie Tales, a beloved cartoon series
featuring talking vegetables and fruits that tell Bible stories and
(35:54):
songs and saying awesome, awesome songs. Um, So since you
have this brilliant Joe, oh it's terrible, you're gonna hate
it and you throw you threw me under the vegetable
cart for this one, I'm gonna I'm gonna go first. Yes,
So this is bat Tails Positive Fables for a Caped
Crusader Chapter one. Yes, it's an anthology, all right. Batman
(36:18):
was feeling blue. You see, the denizens of Gotham City,
we're feeling that their hero was far too violent and dark.
Leaving Caped Crusader's approval ratings at a native with women
and children, Batman's pr person insisted that he clean up
his image. He had to start doing p s a
s about brushing your teeth and eating your vegetables. They
even took away his weapons, so instead of batterings, he
(36:41):
would throw bananas. It was torture, but it was working. However,
Poison Ivy got wind of this, and she decided that
she would not have this. In Gotham's darkest days, people
would sorrow, eat fast food left and right, and her
pants plants were allowed to thrive. But now now that
(37:03):
Batman and Gotham were cleaning up their act and their diet.
Her plants were being murderously killed, Yes, murderously killed. She
broke into Wayne manchon well the bat Cave Wayne Mansion Uh,
one of those two, and animated all of the plant
matter in Batman's fridge to attack him. There was a
lot that men have had gifted tons of produce baskets,
(37:25):
more than he could eat from all of his good
will work and in the agriculture business. Slowly, but surely,
because they don't really have legs, the animated vegetables and
fruits began to creep up on Batman, seeking to bludgeon
him to death with their soft, almost ripe bodies. Batman
turned and saw the proroitics just in time. He was
(37:47):
just about to make guacamole out of them when he
remembered that he was on a broadcast to a bunch
of children, teaching them about playing outside. So, but grudgingly,
he decided he tried to make peace with these animated
vegetables UH instead of making a massacre, and he addressed
the sentient flora. He thought, surely, if these things are
good for you, then they must be good at heart too.
(38:09):
He explained that he was just trying to make the
world a better place and not kill them. And the
veggies and fruits, actually, being rather selfless, liked this so
much showed that they asked to join Batman on his quest.
He may not have weapons, but he did have good
nutrition for the body and the mind, and that is
just as dangerous. And soon Batman took forth with his
(38:31):
new arsenal. He had the grapes of Wrath, which would
incapacitate villains with their smell, because as you know, they
never take a bath, a killer tomato named Bob, who
would shut down any bad joke, along with French peas
who would incapacitate you with bad jokes and laughter. He
also had a cucumber who, being mostly water, had a
psychic connection with the water buffaloes at the Gotham Zoo,
and together they vowed to fight crime the right way
(38:54):
by speaking kindness and goodness and reason into the villains,
and surprisingly, the villains were so thrown by this that
it worked for a time. That was a really good week. Well,
I can tell you that my version goes as dark
as yours went bright. Oh no, yeah, I get ready,
(39:16):
I'm going to ruin it. In my version of Gotham city,
there is no batman. Bruce Wayne, rather than setting out
to avenge his slain parents, goes into a deep despair,
eventually emerging but being a shell of who he was
meant to be, i'dly spending his time and living off
(39:37):
his inheritance and irritating his butler, Archibald. However, also in
Gotham there lives Barbara Gordon, daughter to Jim Gordon, the
police commissioner. Despite her father's best efforts to protect his
daughter from the grim realities of Gotham, young Barbara realizes
at an early age how the world works. She shares
her father's convictions and has a strong moral calm puss,
(40:00):
but is also frequently distressed at how corrupt much of
Gotham's system is, with criminals frequently bouncing out of the
justice system due to bribery and intimidation. She sees the
need for a hero. Ever since she was young, Barbara
was interested in gymnastics, but as she considers the possibility
of the life of a vigilante, she begins to seek
(40:22):
out other training. She convinces her father she needs to
learn martial arts and how to handle weapons, pragmatically pointing
out that since he is a police officer, and he
has a revolver. It would be irresponsible of him not
to have her learn how to be responsible with such things.
After much training and consideration, Barbara is sitting in her
(40:43):
room contemplating what persona she should take on as the
vigilante Gotham needs. She has to protect her father, after all,
and criminals are a superstitious, cowardly lot. As she thinks,
she overhears her own name being sung on the television.
It's a children's program that's on, just something she had
on in the background. Moreover, it's all about biblical stories,
(41:05):
something she hadn't paid much attention to, but now seemed
to really hone in on that moral compass, and the
song has convinced her. Barbara would become the man a
t yes, a flipping, somersaulting, kicking and punching manatee of justice.
She makes a big, lumpy suit and sets out to
confront the low life of Gotham. While on patrol, she
(41:28):
happens to over here some common street criminals chatting about
a new force into town. It's Mr Nezzer, a veritable
crime boss who is shaking up the criminal underworld in Gotham,
taking territory and assets from other families for Perhaps even
more feared than Mr Nezzar is his assistant Mr Lunt,
a native of Gotham. Mr Lunnon is known for his
(41:48):
sadistic streak, with a reputation of slicing open victims and
stuffing them with decorative gourds. Similarly, the serial killer of
Victor Zazz, known for peeling his victims, has joined forces
with the criminals. Barbara begins to research Nezzer and Lunt,
doing some detective work as she learns more about their
plans and influence. Along the way, she encounters a young
(42:10):
man dressed as a pirate. His name is Larry. Larry,
smitten with Barbara the Manatee, proves that he can actually
handle himself pretty darnwell in the scuffle as the two
are discovered by some criminals on the streets of Gotham.
Larry mostly seems to be effective by accident, but Barbara
proves she is more than capable of handling herself, and
(42:30):
so Barbara man the t and buccaneer Larry form a
dynamic duo capable of putting crime in its place. Their
first true victories when they defeat one of the three
Scallion brothers. The other two are already making plans and
how to bust their baby brother out of our comb
to be continued, question Mark. That is the gritty reboot
(42:53):
of Larry Boy. Yeah. Yeah, So for those who have
no idea why I made that joke, it was us
for aerial Uh, you need to If you are unfamiliar
with veggie tails, you need to look up the video
Barbara Manity, and that is why I wrote that joke.
I do love manatees and I do love veggie tales,
(43:13):
so totally worth bringing my beloved vegetables into the grimness
of reality. I bet I lost at least ninety percent
of our audience who are like, why is she a manity?
But the other ten percent absolutely adore you, Jonathan. That's
probably true. So if you adore Jonathan and his Barbara
(43:36):
Manity joke, or have ideas about adaptations yourself and and
what you think doesn't doesn't qualify, or you know news
that you want to talk to us about, you can
reach out to us. How can they do that, Jonathan? Well,
the best way now is through our email. That would
be l n C at I Heart Media dot com.
We have a website that is large ner dron collider
(43:59):
dot com where we post episodes and show notes. You
can leave comments there as well. We've also got our
sights on We've got Twitter that's Ellen c Underscore Podcasts,
and we are on Facebook and Instagram that's Large ner
Drunk Collider, So you can reach out in any of
those ways. If we really like what you have to say,
you could be referenced on a on a future episode.
(44:22):
And um also remember if you enjoyed this show, to
like on whatever platform you're listening to us on and
recommend it to a friend. Word of mouth really helps.
We're starting to see growth every week, which is fantastic.
We love to see it because we really want this
to become a conversation, not just us talking to you,
(44:43):
but talking with you, and we want to hear from you.
Yeah uh, and so we hope we hear from you.
But until next time, I'm Ariel Casting and I am
the Night. M hm hm m m m. The Large
(45:17):
New Drunk Collider is a production of I Heart Radio
and was created by Aerial cast In. Jonathan Strickland is
the executive producer. This show is produced, edited and published
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(01:27):
Podcast is a production of I Heart Radio. Hey everybody,
welcome to the Large Nerdron Collider Podcast, the podcast that's
all about the geeky things happening in the world around
us and how excited we are about them. I'm Ariel Castion,
(01:49):
and with me, as always is my super awesome, super
original co host Jonathan Strickland. Hey, Ariel, I got I
got an original idea. I'm gonna ask you a question.
You're a bad guy in a Scooby Doo cartoon. What
sort of abandoned structure or location is your home base
(02:11):
of operations? Uh? Functional yet uh not inhabited? Called Stone Creamery. Okay,
that's that's a good answer. I like it. Yeah, you're
just like the marble slab. It's still cold. It's a
nice twist on the it's still warm trope, I like
(02:33):
it excellent. Alright, so we know, oh me, uh, an
abandoned Renaissance festival site. I like that. We're yeah, we're
both like it's abandoned. Well, it has to be. It
has to be because that's like, that's the trope, right,
that's always the old abandoned amusement park or the old
abandoned train station. So so my reasoning is because I
(02:55):
just want to be able to make ice cream to
fuel my villainy. Is your reason to be behind it?
Because I love Renaissance festivals if it weren't for all
those dang people. Uh, that is not true, sir. The
best part of the Renaissance festival is the people because
otherwise you can't entertain them. And true, and you and
(03:17):
I have spent more than enough time on a more
or less abandoned Renaissance festival site for rehearsals and stuff
where it's just the cast, and it does get creepy.
But that's uh, that's enough of all that. Now we
know where are our villainous Scooby Do characters would reside?
Let us move on to what we have to talk
(03:38):
about today. Yeah, and the first thing we want to
talk about, and almost the most important thing to me
is One Division, because One Division came out last week
and Jonathan and I both watched it, So the first
two episodes, we should say, the first two episodes, so
Jonathan in a as not as spoilery spoilery as you
(03:59):
can and way, what did you think of the show?
I absolutely adored it. I wholeheartedly loved it. Um. I
loved it both for the the obvious love and affection
the writers and everybody have for classic sitcoms, American sitcoms,
(04:21):
and I loved it for all the weird and slightly
sinister creepy stuff that gets woven in. Again, no spoilers,
but there the first two episodes, I think it's safe
to say fall way harder on the sitcom love and
corny humor than the creepy stuff. The creepy stuff just
kind of is there occasionally, but that just makes the
(04:44):
creepy stuff stand out more. And that's what it made
me really really enjoy it. What about you? What did
you think? Um? I also absolutely loved it. I actually
spent the entire weekend saying, why are there not more
episodes of this for me to watch? Maybe? I just
want to go back and watch the first You again
because it was you know, we know that something is
up in the show. You know that from the trailers. Uh.
(05:06):
And and like you said, there was some sinister stuff
that happens throughout uh. But it was just overall very
uplifting and fun. And it was just fun, which is
a fun show. And I feel like so many shows
in the past five ten years have just tried to
be gritty and dark and and graphic that I just
(05:29):
really appreciated almost the wholesomeness of of this mystery comedy.
And I just have to say, like Elizabeth Olsen has
floored me with how well she embodies that classic sitcom
leading lady uh kind of kind of spirit. She nailed
(05:55):
it in such a great way, like that interesting balance
between being uh, you know, sort of the straight man
but also genuinely funny in her own right. And the
supporting cast of that show is amazing. I agree. I agree.
Unlike Fuller House or something where they're trying to bank
(06:15):
on old kitch, this show just really takes old nostalgia
and makes it feel natural. Yeah, it doesn't make it
feel forced, you know. Paul Bettany also did an amazing
job you know, brivling some Dick van Dyke in there.
They Yes, there's their actual direct references to things like
the Dick Van Dyke Show and a little bit of
(06:37):
Lucy ole Ball in that first episode. And I don't
know for a fact, but at least the way the
first two episodes play out, I suspect we're going to
see almost a chain of different sitcom styles. We know
there's one other one because it was in the trailer
right there was one that looks very much Partridge Family
Brady Bunch ish, But I expect we'll see maybe a
(07:00):
couple of others, hopefully before the season ends, because I
am absolutely digging it. And and it's also fun in
that they have customized openings for each episode to write,
like the opening sequence for episode two is different from
the opening sequence for episode one and reflects the kind
of sitcom that that episode embodies, which is really cool.
(07:24):
It also makes me really curious how they're going to
go forward because we know in the movies Vision has died.
Yes that's not spoiler, he's really most sincerely dead and
now he's back, and I I worry Jonathan that it's
not going to stay so fun and wholesome. No, this
is going to end in a very sad way. But
(07:46):
you see, they could they can spin it. They can
they can keep vision around. They can do this. Uh
well yeah, I mean it would be great if you
could keep him around because he he is such a
genuinely fun character. Listen, if they can make three movies
out of the Hobbit, we'll talk about that later. Well,
that was my clever way to segue, right right, right,
(08:10):
So speaking of the Hobbit Tolkien Lord of the Rings
all that, there is a Lord of the Rings show
happening eventually, really more of a Middle Earth show. It's
going to coming out for Amazon. We knew about this.
Turns out it's going to be the most expensive TV
show in all of history, with a five million dollar budget,
(08:32):
which is in It also has a five season commitment,
so I'm not sure whether that budget is per season
or for all five or for all five And it's
already been renewed for season two without a single episode
of season one having come out, but that is still
a huge budget. You know, they're filming in New Zealand,
and they, like everybody else, kind of got uh sidelined
(08:56):
by the pandemic. Of course New Zealand's and much better
shape than most of the world. So yeah, yeah, And
apparently we've been waiting for this for three years, and
I must have put that out of my mind because
I forgot about it until now. I'm pretty sure we
covered this when Ellen c was still going back in
probably and then I forgot about it. Yeah. Well, and
(09:18):
and this show is going to be set during the
Second Age of Middle Earth. And if you don't know
how the history of Middle Earth works, everything you see
in the Hobbit, everything you see in Lord of the Rings,
all that takes place at the end of the Third
Age of Middle Earth. And so this is three thousand
years before that. Um, it's when Saron is the big
(09:40):
bad for the first time around. You remember the beginning
of Lord of the Rings has Um, Yeah, is Sealder
chopping off Saron's fingers with Narsal the sword, the shards
of Narsal, and that is essentially the Dan new Ma,
the end scene of of of the Second Age of
(10:04):
Middle Earth. So this is going to take place during that,
and we suspect that a lot of it is going
to take place on New Menoor, the island where the
sort of elevated members of humans live. That's Arragorn is
descended from them. So yeah, yeah, you know, I'm I'm
excited about this. I when the Hobbit movies came out one,
(10:28):
I was like, why are there three of them? This
is a short story, not a short story, but a
shorter story. Uh, and and to like, there's so much
world that Tolkien built that I want to explore it.
So this has given me the opportunity. I'm I'm cautiously
optimistic about this one. If it fails, it will not
(10:49):
be because it was cheap. Yes, yes, I am also
cautiously optimistic about the Doogie Howser reboot, which is not
a sentence I ever thought i'd be saying. Yeah. So
this was one that had escaped my attention until recently,
where we learn more about the the the new version
(11:13):
of Doogie Howser, which will not be Doogie Howser, It's
it's Doogie kume Aloha m D. So uh. One, Now
we're following a person of Hawaiian descent and to that
person happens to be female. So we've got a young
woman doogie and I think this is awesome. I actually
(11:34):
really kind of dig this idea and I'm very interested
to see where it goes. Um. And I also hope
that they play the theme song on a ukulele, and
I hope it's the yeah do do do do? I
just hope that she types up all her thoughts on
(11:54):
a really really really really old computer or I think
it will have to be like a smartphone. Um, it's
Peyton Elizabeth Lee? Who is who is playing the title role?
You know? I went back and watched the first couple
of episodes of Dukie Howser again recently. They are deal
with some more adult issues than I thought they would.
(12:16):
I was like, they aren't doing this in this episode?
Are they? What are they doing? I can't I watched
this as a child. Um, I mean it was, But
that was the whole point, right, was that here here's
a person who is incredibly intelligent but lacks worldly experience,
and and how how the difference between intelligence and wisdom
(12:38):
needs to be understood so that you don't just assume
someone who's really intelligent is wise, or someone who is
wise is you know, book smart intelligent. It's it's the
combination of those two things that is his journey. So yeah,
it will be I'm curious to see how this one
plays out. So our next story, and actually the story
(12:58):
that is going to be um inspiring our mashup later,
is about the television show Batwoman, Yes, which has a
new Batwoman. Yeah. Yeah. Ruby Rose left h at the
end of the last season after the last season, and uh,
instead of recasting her, they're just giving us a whole
(13:20):
new character. The new Batwoman will be a character called
Ryan Wilder Leslie. Yes. And this is the reason why
Ruby Rose left. At least in part was that she
suffered an injury during her shoots of the previous season
of bat Woman and had to have surgery in order
(13:43):
to correct the injury, and that was part of it.
But another part was just that she was kind of
re examining her goals during the whole lockdown period and
I felt like they weren't really an alignment with Batwoman.
So now we've got a new Batwoman. Uh, we've already
seen trailers of her, and of course the show's coming
out very soon, so you'll get to see her in action. Um.
(14:07):
I love the look of her. I think that it
looks great. You know the fact that she's adjusted the
cowl and everything. Um, and hopefully this will be the
change that bat Woman needs to really get its you know,
get up and running, because a lot of people have
said that the Batwoman series so far has not quite
(14:28):
met expectations. I honestly, I will say I haven't watched
it because the wig looked so bad in the trailers
for the first season that I yeah, so I'm hoping
that's better too. But you know, I'm I'm excited for
about I like Batman. I'm excited for more bat Person media,
so I will give the second season to try. Something
(14:51):
I'm not Yeah. Something I'm not sure if I'm going
to give a try though, is the Snyder cut of
Justice League. I was already on the fence, but now
we know it's going to be four hours long and
and new. I don't I don't know if I can
sit through that. Yeah, I um, I gotta be honest
(15:16):
with your Ariel. When I finally watched Justice League, not once,
not once in that running time, did I think, Gosh,
I wish this would go longer? No? No, No, I
mean I will say like it was a fairly ho
um storyline. I really just enjoyed Justice League for the
character uh exploration. Yeah, but you know, Snyder has a
(15:41):
darker vision, and so I don't even know if I'm
going to like the character exploration. Yeah. No, I have
a feeling like the the more lighthearted, quippy stuff that
we saw was very likely the contributions of Josh Weeden.
It just felt much more like Josh Weeden's style. Um
and yeah, that, yeah, that to me tells me that
(16:02):
I probably will not I'll probably watch it, if I'm
being honest, but I'm not looking forward to it. I
think that it's almost feel like you're of the same
I almost feel like I have to watch it for
purposes of being able to talk about it here. Uh
the And also it does have one thing that makes
(16:22):
me kind of want to watch it, which is, in
theory we're gonna get Martian Manhunter, who I do very
much like. I'm being curious to see how how that
is handled because it's such an outlandish character. Well, we'll
have to see if that realization of the character ends up,
you know, meeting your very high standards, Aerial. In the meantime,
(16:45):
let's take a quick break, and when we come back,
we're gonna talk about when adaptations are no longer really
adaptations and when that's good and when that's bad. But first,
let's take this quick break. Teething can be a real
nightmare for your little ones. So are you looking for
(17:07):
the best relief to soothe teething pain. Highlands Naturals Baby
oral pain relief can help us the pain. It's gentle,
natural active ingredients like camemil and arnica. They'll soothe your
baby's mouth and gums. No chemicals, no funny business. Highlands
is a kinder way to care for teething. Get yours
at Highlands dot com, slash kind that's h y l
(17:28):
A and ds dot com. Slash kind claims based on
traditional homeopathro practice, not accept the medical evidence, not ft evaluated.
Want to boost your immunity and protect your community. Get
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(17:49):
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(18:33):
hope dot org today and we're back. So a lot
of the things that we talked about in the news
segment are adaptations or reboots or or the like from
properties we really like. And sometimes they are really great,
(18:56):
like when we get the Lord of the Rings movies,
and sometimes they're not so great, like when we get
The Hobbit movies. They usually have a wide range of
of criticism about them, in part to the fact that
a lot of times when properties are adjusted for movie
or television, they veer from the source material to make
(19:18):
it a better viewing experience. So arguably they try to
make it a better viewing experience, it does not always
work out. As the aforementioned The Hobbit proves yes. So uh,
I mean where do you Let's start at the basic
level of of movies that are adaptations that just kind
(19:39):
of veer away from their source material in places that
don't follow the storyline exactly. We see this a lot
in you know, superhero movies, for example. What are what
are your thoughts of that just between staying true to
the thing that you love because that's what you're going
to watch and and giving a new story. And I
mean like this this to me, it largely depends upon
(20:03):
your experience with the material. And by that I mean
if you are someone who has never seen or read,
or or otherwise encountered the original version of that thing,
then your impression of the adaptation is likely to be
very different from someone who is like a big fan
(20:25):
of the source material. Um. And you know, fans of
source material are notoriously picky, myself included, and that I
think is one of the major determining factors. There are
other ones as well. You mentioned superhero movies. I think
superhero movies in particular have a lot of license only
because for especially the classic superhero characters, there have been
(20:51):
so many different incarnations of those characters told in so
many different styles from so many different writers and artists
that you can pick and choose, and it's everything's up
for grabs, right Like there is a can't be Batman
if you wanted to go with the campy Batman route.
There's the dark and gritty Batman if you want to
go that route. There's the Tim Burton route, where it's
(21:12):
kind of both. Like it's you know, there's a lot
of a lot of flexibility there in other ways, like
other works, there's not as much flexibility. And so one
of the the examples I put in our our notes
that I think excels as a movie and was terrible
as a book is Jaws. Uh. Jaws is my favorite
(21:36):
film of all time. It is I think a perfect movie.
The book is almost unreadable, you see. I feel that
way about Hitty Chitty Bang Bang, where the only thing
the movie in the book having common is a flying car. Yeah. Well,
if you got rid of Hushaby Mountain, I would be
(21:57):
all over that because that Usha by Mountain is the
song that kills that movie for me. Kind of similar
to Cheer Up Charlie and Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.
Another example of a movie that's very different from the
source material. Um, slow songs kill movies, is what I'm saying.
You know, I would wait you to say in cases
(22:19):
like Jaws or Chitty Chitta Bang Bang, or even Willie
Wonka in the Chocolate Factory, depending on which iteration you're
talking about. What I said, Willy Wonka, not Charlie. Fair enough,
Willie Wonka, which is the gene wilder one. Uh. I
think that it is beneficial, especially in Willie Wonka and
the Chocolate Factory, to um kind of reinvigorate an old
(22:40):
story that had some old concepts and ideas that were problematic. Yeah. No,
that's that's a fair point. Is that there's stuff in
that book where, you know, viewed through the lens of today,
you think, wow, that that is, that is harmful thinking,
that is reinforcing some pretty negative stereotypes. Yeah. Oh, I
think I think you're right on there. Yeah. And yet
(23:03):
when Tim Burton readd it to Charlie in the Chocolate Factory,
I didn't it focused more on Willy Wonka unless on Charlie,
which was odd because of the title change. And I
didn't like that a that adaptation as much. And maybe
it's just because it's a story I came to as
a child and related to at a childlike level, and
(23:26):
didn't relate to on the candy mogul level. Well, and
to be fair, also for Willy Wonka, that's like, that's
a movie I encountered well before I ever read Charlie
in the Chocolate Factory. So again that's another example of
I encountered that story in the form of its adaptation first.
It's kind of like if you hear a cover song
without realizing it's a cover song, you might then listen
(23:49):
to the original and think, oh, this isn't this isn't
what I expected, because you know the cover has done
something different to it, and you might not even like
the original as much as you like the cover. That
that happens a lot. It tends to be whatever version
of person encounters first, they they imprint upon that more.
I see that also with adaptations of foreign films, like
(24:11):
if you have seen The Ring before you saw Ringo,
then you may like the Ring more. But people who
saw Ringo first will say, oh, no, the Ring is that. No,
they didn't get anything right. Ringo is the best. Well,
did you watch or read The Shining first, Because that's
another one that's really popular, uh, but veered from its
(24:32):
source material and actually made it made Stephen King upset
as it did. He Yeah, we're talking to course about
the kubric adaptation of The Shining, not the not the
Faithful and yet nigh unwatchable mini series that was made
much later. Um. I read The Shining first, and I
I feel like those are It's almost like it's two
(24:53):
different stories that share some common DNA, and I think
both are brilliant. I understand King's objections, and I agree
that if you're telling the story of the book, Kubrick
made some decisions that don't work. The big one being
that that Jack Torrens, the character played by Nicholson, that, um,
(25:17):
that he comes off way too crazy, way too quickly.
And in the book it's something that you see is
built upon his alcoholism and his history of anger management
issues that then escalates. Well, there's not a whole of
escalation in The Shining. It kind of he kind of
comes off as unhinged from the beginning. And so it's
(25:39):
a different story. But I think it's a good story.
It's just different. Yeah. Yeah, Now, I would say that
all of these things that we've talked about so far
are maybe not Bang Bang are close enough to the
original story that they should be called the original story,
just a different adaptation. There are there are things out
(26:01):
there that try to say that they're a loved story
that really aren't. World war Z the Watch and I'm
going to say Pete Dragon, even though Disney owned the
story Petche Dragon to begin with and had complete right
to change it, their new Petche Dragon is not Peach
Dragon to me right. The the the remake Pete Dragon
(26:23):
completely ignores almost everything about the original except for having
an orphan and a dragon or is he even an orphan?
In the remake he is an orphan, yes, yes, But
you know World War Z has to do with zombies. Yeah,
for my anders, that's about Yeah, that's about it. So
have you read the book, Yes, so you know that
(26:45):
the book's brilliant. The book is more of an observation
about how humans cope in the wake of a massive disaster.
And honestly, if you read World War Z and you
look at how the United States has handled the pandemic,
you're like, wow, this is the World War Z is
so accurate and how how these things play out? Um,
(27:07):
because it's more of a commentary on things like how
bureaucracy can get in the way and mess things up
and make a bad situation even worse. Um, and the
movie is a zombie action movie. Yeah, well, and and
a big thing like the story is told from the
recollection recollections of a bunch of different people, right, and
(27:28):
it's after the zombie the zombie menace has passed its
peak and now we're on the other side of it.
So it's people thinking back to when it was going
into its peak, but from the perspective of the story teller,
the worst has already happened. Yeah. And then you've got
the Watch, which you talked about in a previous episode Trying,
(27:54):
which is based off of Guards Cards by Terry Pratchett. Right, yeah,
it's it's based off the night Watch series of books,
mainly Guards Guards. It's got the the main storyline is
mostly pulled from Guards Guards with the onset of a
dragon around on more pork and um yeah, it's um
it's so different from the source material. It shares tiny
(28:18):
little bits of of identity with the source material, but
it makes so many drastic changes that you lose the
spirit and you start to wonder, like, why would you
why would you make these choices? Because every choice you
make that gets further away from the source material is
(28:38):
alienating the built in audience. But if you are making
it for people who are not that built in audience,
why would you bother adapting something in the first place.
Maybe because they they had an idea that they thought
would be similar enough, but they wanted to get a
chunk of audience automatically, so they said, we're going to
(29:02):
throw in a couple of things so we can call
it the Watch, so that Terry Pratchett fans will want
to watch it, even though we really want to tell
our own story. But then, I mean, you know, or
you should know going into it, that you're going to
alienate those fans, and thus any reaction you get from
them is going to be negative, and that that is
(29:22):
going to become a very powerful story all on its own,
is that the fans of the series are rejecting the
adaptation you've made. Um. I think if I watched The
Watch without ever having read any Terry Pratchett, I would
have thought it was very unusual and strange and a
little compelling, just because it was unusual, but not particularly
(29:46):
well told or interesting like like it's unusual. It's kind
of like a David don't get on me David Lynch fans.
I think David Lynch has worked brilliant, but it's like
a David Lynch thing in the sense that you're watching
stuff and you're like, this is I'm just trying to
get my head wrapped around what's happening now. The fact
that I've read Pratchett tells me a little bit more
(30:06):
about what's going on, But the changes that have been
made are so drastic that, uh, my knowledge of Pratchett
is only somewhat helpful in sussing out what's happening. And
you know, they leave out entire characters who are really
important in the books, who don't even appear in the
in the show. Um. Yeah, it's one of those that
(30:27):
I find particularly perplexing because I can't figure out what
your end goal was if you are making choices that
are bound to alienate the fan base. Yeah. So we've
talked about some stories that are close enough that they
should be titled after their source material, and we've talked
about some that are so far away that they really shouldn't.
What about Disney, because Disney writes that line for me
(30:50):
of and I know we need to wrap this up
so maybe we can get into this deeper later. But uh,
Disney rides that line of just that. They change the
original story just enough that I'm like, is it that
original story anymore? I got you? Yeah, Like like all
the fairy tales, I mean, obviously they take all the
(31:10):
hard edges off the fairy tales, right if you read
Grimm's fairy Tales, I mean it's called the Brothers Grim
right there, the Brothers Grim. But they can be pretty
grim fairy tales. Uh, you know, people get their feet
chopped off at ice, pecked out and stuff. You don't
see that in the Disney stories. I I mean Disney,
(31:33):
for much of its history, is known for sanitizing a
lot of stories in an effort to create a particular
kind of feel, right, Like you can see a lot
of those classic Disney movies and detect like, yeah, this
is all trying to create that sort of sense of
(31:53):
wonder and magic and the bad guys are easily identifiable
and they are bad, and the good guys are really
really good, and you know, the good guys will win
in the end and nothing terrible will happen. To anybody
that's permanent except the bad guy who will probably die.
Um that's about it. Uh. I'm okay with it because
(32:14):
I know going into it what I'm going to get, Like,
I know, the disease not going to break the mold
on that. Um, you're not gonna have some morally ambiguous
characters in there for the most part. No one's gonna
get their eyes pecked out. Um. If I want that,
I can go back and read the original fairy tales.
So I just accept it as a totally different take
(32:37):
on the basic plot points of a story. Um. And
some cases it gets way the heck away from the
basic plot points there. You're like, Okay, yeah, you've got
some dwarves in here, but this is not snow White.
Yeah yeah, Well, Um, now we're gonna adapt somethings of
(33:00):
our own. Uh. And I don't know if either of
our adaptations will live up to their namesakes, but we're
going to give it a go. But first we're gonna
take this quick break. Support for this podcast in the
(33:21):
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Do you suffer from zoom fatigue with so many meetings
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otter dot Ai. All right, guys, we're back. And as
(35:07):
you know or maybe you don't, we like to mash
up two different properties into one and find out what happens.
And this week I chose the properties because I had
a joke in my head and I decided that I
did to write a whole piece around. By the way,
this is how my brain works. I had to write
a whole piece around the joke. So we are combining
(35:31):
the world of of Gotham City, not Gotham the series,
but Gotham City from d C Comics, the home of
characters like Batman, Joker, Arkham Asylum and all that kind
of stuff. With the Veggie Tales, a beloved cartoon series
featuring talking vegetables and fruits that tell Bible stories and
(35:54):
songs and saying awesome, awesome songs. Um, So since you
have this brilliant Joe, oh it's terrible, you're gonna hate
it and you throw you threw me under the vegetable
cart for this one, I'm gonna I'm gonna go first. Yes,
So this is bat Tails Positive Fables for a Caped
Crusader Chapter one. Yes, it's an anthology, all right. Batman
(36:18):
was feeling blue. You see, the denizens of Gotham City,
we're feeling that their hero was far too violent and dark.
Leaving Caped Crusader's approval ratings at a native with women
and children, Batman's pr person insisted that he clean up
his image. He had to start doing p s a
s about brushing your teeth and eating your vegetables. They
even took away his weapons, so instead of batterings, he
(36:41):
would throw bananas. It was torture, but it was working. However,
Poison Ivy got wind of this, and she decided that
she would not have this. In Gotham's darkest days, people
would sorrow, eat fast food left and right, and her
pants plants were allowed to thrive. But now now that
(37:03):
Batman and Gotham were cleaning up their act and their diet.
Her plants were being murderously killed, Yes, murderously killed. She
broke into Wayne manchon well the bat Cave Wayne Mansion Uh,
one of those two, and animated all of the plant
matter in Batman's fridge to attack him. There was a
lot that men have had gifted tons of produce baskets,
(37:25):
more than he could eat from all of his good
will work and in the agriculture business. Slowly, but surely,
because they don't really have legs, the animated vegetables and
fruits began to creep up on Batman, seeking to bludgeon
him to death with their soft, almost ripe bodies. Batman
turned and saw the proroitics just in time. He was
(37:47):
just about to make guacamole out of them when he
remembered that he was on a broadcast to a bunch
of children, teaching them about playing outside. So, but grudgingly,
he decided he tried to make peace with these animated
vegetables UH instead of making a massacre, and he addressed
the sentient flora. He thought, surely, if these things are
good for you, then they must be good at heart too.
(38:09):
He explained that he was just trying to make the
world a better place and not kill them. And the
veggies and fruits, actually, being rather selfless, liked this so
much showed that they asked to join Batman on his quest.
He may not have weapons, but he did have good
nutrition for the body and the mind, and that is
just as dangerous. And soon Batman took forth with his
(38:31):
new arsenal. He had the grapes of Wrath, which would
incapacitate villains with their smell, because as you know, they
never take a bath, a killer tomato named Bob, who
would shut down any bad joke, along with French peas
who would incapacitate you with bad jokes and laughter. He
also had a cucumber who, being mostly water, had a
psychic connection with the water buffaloes at the Gotham Zoo,
and together they vowed to fight crime the right way
(38:54):
by speaking kindness and goodness and reason into the villains,
and surprisingly, the villains were so thrown by this that
it worked for a time. That was a really good week. Well,
I can tell you that my version goes as dark
as yours went bright. Oh no, yeah, I get ready,
(39:16):
I'm going to ruin it. In my version of Gotham city,
there is no batman. Bruce Wayne, rather than setting out
to avenge his slain parents, goes into a deep despair,
eventually emerging but being a shell of who he was
meant to be, i'dly spending his time and living off
(39:37):
his inheritance and irritating his butler, Archibald. However, also in
Gotham there lives Barbara Gordon, daughter to Jim Gordon, the
police commissioner. Despite her father's best efforts to protect his
daughter from the grim realities of Gotham, young Barbara realizes
at an early age how the world works. She shares
her father's convictions and has a strong moral calm puss,
(40:00):
but is also frequently distressed at how corrupt much of
Gotham's system is, with criminals frequently bouncing out of the
justice system due to bribery and intimidation. She sees the
need for a hero. Ever since she was young, Barbara
was interested in gymnastics, but as she considers the possibility
of the life of a vigilante, she begins to seek
(40:22):
out other training. She convinces her father she needs to
learn martial arts and how to handle weapons, pragmatically pointing
out that since he is a police officer, and he
has a revolver. It would be irresponsible of him not
to have her learn how to be responsible with such things.
After much training and consideration, Barbara is sitting in her
(40:43):
room contemplating what persona she should take on as the
vigilante Gotham needs. She has to protect her father, after all,
and criminals are a superstitious, cowardly lot. As she thinks,
she overhears her own name being sung on the television.
It's a children's program that's on, just something she had
on in the background. Moreover, it's all about biblical stories,
(41:05):
something she hadn't paid much attention to, but now seemed
to really hone in on that moral compass, and the
song has convinced her. Barbara would become the man a
t yes, a flipping, somersaulting, kicking and punching manatee of justice.
She makes a big, lumpy suit and sets out to
confront the low life of Gotham. While on patrol, she
(41:28):
happens to over here some common street criminals chatting about
a new force into town. It's Mr Nezzer, a veritable
crime boss who is shaking up the criminal underworld in Gotham,
taking territory and assets from other families for Perhaps even
more feared than Mr Nezzar is his assistant Mr Lunt,
a native of Gotham. Mr Lunnon is known for his
(41:48):
sadistic streak, with a reputation of slicing open victims and
stuffing them with decorative gourds. Similarly, the serial killer of
Victor Zazz, known for peeling his victims, has joined forces
with the criminals. Barbara begins to research Nezzer and Lunt,
doing some detective work as she learns more about their
plans and influence. Along the way, she encounters a young
(42:10):
man dressed as a pirate. His name is Larry. Larry,
smitten with Barbara the Manatee, proves that he can actually
handle himself pretty darnwell in the scuffle as the two
are discovered by some criminals on the streets of Gotham.
Larry mostly seems to be effective by accident, but Barbara
proves she is more than capable of handling herself, and
(42:30):
so Barbara man the t and buccaneer Larry form a
dynamic duo capable of putting crime in its place. Their
first true victories when they defeat one of the three
Scallion brothers. The other two are already making plans and
how to bust their baby brother out of our comb
to be continued, question Mark. That is the gritty reboot
(42:53):
of Larry Boy. Yeah. Yeah, So for those who have
no idea why I made that joke, it was us
for aerial Uh, you need to If you are unfamiliar
with veggie tails, you need to look up the video
Barbara Manity, and that is why I wrote that joke.
I do love manatees and I do love veggie tales,
(43:13):
so totally worth bringing my beloved vegetables into the grimness
of reality. I bet I lost at least ninety percent
of our audience who are like, why is she a manity?
But the other ten percent absolutely adore you, Jonathan. That's
probably true. So if you adore Jonathan and his Barbara
(43:36):
Manity joke, or have ideas about adaptations yourself and and
what you think doesn't doesn't qualify, or you know news
that you want to talk to us about, you can
reach out to us. How can they do that, Jonathan? Well,
the best way now is through our email. That would
be l n C at I Heart Media dot com.
We have a website that is large ner dron collider
(43:59):
dot com where we post episodes and show notes. You
can leave comments there as well. We've also got our
sights on We've got Twitter that's Ellen c Underscore Podcasts,
and we are on Facebook and Instagram that's Large ner
Drunk Collider, So you can reach out in any of
those ways. If we really like what you have to say,
you could be referenced on a on a future episode.
(44:22):
And um also remember if you enjoyed this show, to
like on whatever platform you're listening to us on and
recommend it to a friend. Word of mouth really helps.
We're starting to see growth every week, which is fantastic.
We love to see it because we really want this
to become a conversation, not just us talking to you,
(44:43):
but talking with you, and we want to hear from you.
Yeah uh, and so we hope we hear from you.
But until next time, I'm Ariel Casting and I am
the Night. M hm hm m m m. The Large
(45:17):
New Drunk Collider is a production of I Heart Radio
and was created by Aerial cast In. Jonathan Strickland is
the executive producer. This show is produced, edited and published
by Torri Harrison. For more podcast on my Heart Radio,
visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
you listen to your favorite shows. Teething can be a
(45:37):
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dot com. So kind that's h y l A n
d s dot com. Slash kind claims based on traditional
homeopath a practice, not accept the medical evidence not ft evaluated.
Here at Freddy's, we could tell you how our original
double is this steak burger made with lean ground beef,
cooked to order with deliciously crispy edges, and finished off
with our Freddie's famous seasoning. But we'd rather let our
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original double speak for itself. I couldn't have said it better.
Ourselves enjoy food made fresh the Freddy's Way, Tap now,
or learn more at Freddy's USA dot com. If you
work in i T, you'll want to check out change Makers,
a podcast profiling I T industry leaders. We dive deep
(46:44):
into i T profiles and learn what it takes to
drive large scale I T transformations for successful businesses. Visit
change Makers dot fresh works dot com
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