the Seasonal Cycle of Media

I'm not sure if this is just me - or if everyone is like this - but I've noticed something about myself: my media interests seem to be somewhat cyclical, based on the time of year.

To give a few examples...

• In May, I'm especially interested in spirituality books (such as Rob Bell's books, and of course the writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson), as well as manga, anime, and/or video games that take place in modern day Japan.
• In late July and August, I lean towards American and European media - BBC tv shows, Cormac McCarthy books, etc. Asian media still makes an appearance here and there (such as a large concentration on Psycho-Pass last year) but it's not as predominant in the late summer like this.
• Unsurprisingly (and as I spent the entirety of the month discussing), October features a lot of horror stuff - whether books, movies, or video games. In addition to this, though, October also features a come back to an emphasis on Asian media. 
• November and December are really the only times of year I'll partake of fantasy - again, whether books, movies, or video games. I also enjoy more colorful things around this time - for example, it's the only time I'm likely to play Nintendo games (Mario, Zelda), as opposed to PlayStation games. Correspondingly, it's also the time of year I'm most likely to read children's books.

Anyway. Time to go into a more concrete example.

Recently I’ve been thinking about 47 Ronin. You remember that horrendous 2013 movie starting Keanu Reeves? - yeah, you're right; it was pretty terrible.

One fateful November day two years ago, I happened upon a used copy of the novelization of the movie. I hadn't yet seen the movie - and so didn't know how bad it was - but of course the premise interested me. You'll notice above that October brings me back to Asian media, and November is when my interest in fantasy kicks in. Considering that 47 Ronin is a Japanese fantasy, the timing was perfect.

So then. I decided to give the book a shot. And it was incredible.

Weird, I know. 

Again, this is a novelization - meaning it came after the movie. And the movie was unforgivable. Yet somehow Joan D. Vinge managed to take atrocious source material and turn it into a beautiful epic about honor and the things we cherish. 

This was two years ago I read it. And, like clockwork, last November I started itching to read it again. So I did. 

Sure, this second reading may have been a little too soon - I remembered the story quite well from the year before - but it's still a magical book. 

And here we are, November one year later, and - surprise! - I'm itching to read it yet again. Granted, this time around, I've decided to skip it. I don't want to overdo the magic; I'll wait another year or two until my memories of the book fade a bit more. But let's call it what it is: next time I read it, it will probably be in a November.

Is this just me? Or do you do anything like this, friends? Does your interest in media follow any sort of seasonal cycle like this? 

What Horror Is Really About

When you’re trying to discuss the horror genre with someone, you may discover that is has a unique problem which it shares with only one other genre*:

Smarmy McGee: What’s your favorite horror movie?

Me: Hmm…probably Let Me In.**

Smarmy McGee: Psh. Whatever. That’s not even scary at all.

Well…yeah. Actually I agree. It’s not that scary. But you didn’t ask me about the scariest horror movie - you asked me what my favorite horror movie is.***

It’s the same with books, of course: I already explained that I don’t think books are scary, but that the scariest book I’ve read is I’m Thinking of Ending Things by Iain Reid. But Ending Things is a far cry from the best horror/thriller book.****

You don't see this problem with, say, sci-fi or fantasy or literary fiction. Can you imagine telling someone that your favorite sci-fi series is Asimov's Foundation series, and then that person replying that those books aren't "roboty" enough? Or that The Fellowship of the Ring isn't really that fantastical? It's ludicrous, right?

And yet we find people very often judging horrors/thrillers based on how scary they are. Yes, of course the idea is that these books/movies unsettle us, but does it really mean they're somehow inferior if they aren't that scary or disturbing? Is scare factor the only thing that sets these genres apart from others?

Not really, no. Though horror media usually tries to unsettle, frighten, or disturb us, it also shows us things: the darkness and the light that we all wrestle with; how people react in the face of the worst possible scenarios; how we overcome our fears, our past, our demons, ourselves.

This is what good horror is all about. Scares and thrills are, actually, merely the byproduct of this.

What do you think about this, friends? What do you think makes a good horror book (or movie)?

*Comedy, if you’re wondering.

**This is true. It’s probably my favorite horror movie. And yes, I like it just a hair more than the European original, Let the Right One In (though I sometimes feel alone in thinking that way).

***If you’re curious what the scariest horror movie is, it’s probably The Babadook.

****Which, obviously, is Dracula. Does that even need to be explained? 😉

Having High Expectations of Creators

First, my nigh-obligatory film anecdote:

When I first learned the Christopher Nolan was making Interstellar, I was jazzed. A combination of two of my favorite things—Christopher Nolan films and astronomy? My goodness, yespleaseandthankyou.

Not to bash him or his creations, but…actually, Interstellar was just okay.

In discussing it with my wife afterward, though, an interesting point came up:

Am I disappointed because the movie itself wasn’t so grand, or was it more disappointing because Christopher Nolan was the one who made it?

Further, if it is more the second one, is it really fair to judge a creation differently based on who made it?

This might be surprising, but the short answer, I believe, is: yes, it is fair.

Now here’s the long answer (which is the literature tie-in to the film anecdote):

One day while perusing Barnes and Noble, I stumbled upon a brand-new book called Looking for Alaska by John Green. (This was back in 2005, of course.) I bought it, read the entire book that afternoon (by the way, this is the first novel I read all in one day), and LOVED it. My goodness, it was incredible. In fact, it held the role of my “favorite modern book” for a few years.

The next year, Green’s next book, An Abundance of Katherines, came out. Of course I picked it up right away. Though it wasn’t quite as FANTASTICBEAUTIFULAMAZING as Alaska, it was still very, very good.

And then, a couple years later, Paper Towns came out – which, as you may have noticed by now, is my favorite modern novel. My very very very favorite. (Directly taking over the crown from Alaska.)

John Green was, quite simply, THE author.

Next up was Will Grayson, Will Grayson. And there’s really no easy way to say this – and I’m deeply sorry, John; I still love you – but…I couldn’t even finish Grayson.

I wonder: if someone else had written Grayson, would I have at least liked it a little more? Was I only disappointed because it was John Green?

Possibly, though it’s impossible to say for sure.

Here’s the rub, though:

I suppose it might not sound fair to say I dislike Grayson even more because it was John Green. And yet, the definite fact is that I only even bought it in the first place because it was by him. If I had never heard of John Green – or if, say, it was his first book – I think I would have read the back cover while standing in B&N, then set it back down. (That’s if I even picked it up in the first place, which I very well might not have, since it has both the least interesting title and the least interesting cover of all his books.)

That said, if I only read a book at all because it’s by a certain author, then I think it’s perfectly legitimate to judge that book against that author’s other work, and to hold it to a slightly different standard (than if it had been written by a different author). I mean, he got my money from that book because it's him - so doesn't it make sense to judge it differently based on the fact that it's him?

What do you think?

(Let me throw an extra little tidbit in here, so that I don’t seem like a complete jerk: John Green is still amongst the highest caliber of living authors. His follow-up to Grayson – The Fault in Our Stars – was back to being more typical, amazing John Green. And I’ve already pre-ordered his next book, Turtles All the Way Down, due out in October. So I certainly didn’t let Grayson leave me with a bad taste in my mouth.)

Books v. Movies

It’s curious to me that, anytime you’re talking to someone about a movie you saw which is based on a book, their reply is inevitably, “Yeah, but the book was better.”

I mean, of course it was. The book is always better.*

Whenever someone says this – “The book was better!” – I interpret this to mean, “I’d like to show off the fact that I read popular books.”

Good for you. I’m glad that you do.

Really though, why is it that the book is always better?

There are, I suspect, a few obvious answers to this question, and also a couple less obvious ones.

For starters, books are much longer than movies. If the director were to actually film every scene just as it is in the book, you’d be looking at an 8-ish hour movie (for approximately a 400-page book). And no one wants to see that. This means LOTS of stuff is going to get cut out. And that scene you think is super awesome in the book? – yep. It’s on the chopping block.

As well, the narrator’s voice goes completely mute when tackling a movie. If your book is in first-person POV, how is the film going to relay that? How can a director express an inner-monologue (without the use of a voice-over, which, let’s call it what it is, should never happen in a movie)? And all those cool philosophies and ideas that the character and/or narrator expresses all throughout? – this is just not how movies are made.

I can still remember the first time I saw the movie The Matrix in the theatre. The Matrix, of course, is not based on a book. As far as we know, it was always and only ever meant to be a sci-fi movie.

And let’s get real: the best scene in the whole movie? –definitely the lobby shooting spree. Amirite?

Can you imagine reading that scene, though?

“Neo cartwheeled to his left as he emptied a full clip into the guard right in front of him, then ran sideways along the wall…”

…psh. Please. How boring is this? Even coming up with that sentence felt lame.

I mean, sure, sometimes a book needs its action scenes because of the way the story progresses. That’s fine. But movies give us so much more to experience all at once. And, especially when we’re talking about heavy action or large set pieces, films are actually much better for these sorts of elements. Some stories all but require the visual element offered by electronic screens.

Really, what all of these things ultimately lead to is this:

The elements that make a book good are, very pointedly, NOT the same elements that make a movie good. They’re different mediums. They have different strengths and different focuses and different ways of relaying stories.

When a director decides to take a book and turn it into a movie, what he has to do is convert the story from one format into another. Some things will be lost in this conversion. Some things will be added. The fact is that, if it’s going to be a solid, effective movie, it has to be different than the book.

So when people complain that “they ruined the book [by turning it into a movie]!” I think they’re sort of missing the bigger picture.

Thoughts?

*This isn’t strictly true. Right off, I can think of at least five examples of movies/shows that are actually better than their books. (I’m sure there are others; these are just the first five that come to mind.):

1. The Hunger Games – This is because of exactly what I was just explaining: the plot relies too heavily on action for it to really work effectively as a book. The world and stories of The Hunger Games basically beg for a strong visual element.
2. The Da Vinci Code – This is largely Dan Brown’s fault. See Content and Form for an explanation why.
3. Thirteen Reasons Why – This is actually NOT at all Jay Asher’s fault. The book was great, and very well-written. The show just gives us so much more of everything that made the book great.
4. The Arrival – The short story (which is actually called Stories of Your Life) was good. The movie just covered more territory, and wrapped up everything in a slightly more cohesive package.
5. The Shawshank Redemption – I would never want to be the one to put down Stephen King. The novella (Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption) is good. The movie just rearranged a few things for the better and gave us a much more satisfying ending.