Written on Monday, March 17, 2014 by Unknown
"If you love something, then let it go." Said no one who ever belonged in a fandom ever.
They
also don't say things like "I accept every decision this
author/director/creator made without second guessing it or having any
kind of opinion about it."
Yep. Letting things go and accepting change are two things that die hard fans can be really bad at. And internet fandoms are just as ridiculous. They also love to use abbreviated terms. Take for example...
Ship/Shipping (other fun versions can be found here*):
This
is an abbreviation of the word "relationship" and basically means you
are rooting for a relationship to happen/continue. Ex. "I ship Stefan
and Elena." A sub category of shipping is "otp" or "one true pairing."
*for a much longer explanation go here (note to my advisor, this website claims it originated with fans of The X-Files)
Fans
are passionate. Very passionate. Borderline crazy passionate. (Okay, not all of them.) Some of
them are even like, "There's a line? Well we definitely have to step
over it then. Lines are for irl conversations only, and even then it
will still be crossed."
So the creators of The Lizzie Bennet Diaries
had an interesting dilemma. They wanted the show to be a modern
adaptation, but how modern were they allowed to make it? How far off
could they go from the original text that would a) please fans of the
novel and b) appeal to new fans (who may or may not have liked/read the
novel). As I have established, fans are freakin' passionate. They have
needs. They have feels. And messing too much with the original content
could make Janeites go berserk, but then not messing enough could make new fans roll their eyes.
The first line of Pride and Prejudice is iconic. Any English major can probably quote it to you, as could any Austen fan. LBD tried to incorporate it as best they could (honestly, I didn't exactly love what they did) because not doing so would have upset P&P fans.
The
show was also written by feminists, who don't consider the first line
to be a truth. So they changed things, the ending especially, so that it
fits into a modern feminist context. Austen was more constricted by her
time period and the ending of the novel is indicative of that, but not
really suitable to 21st century ideals. Lydia can't marry Wickham in
this era, because what he did to her in LBD's version is morally wrong and unforgivable (this, of course, is arguable—but not so much my point).
What
might happen if there was a major deviation from the original text?
Would an audience be lost? What if the deviation wasn't so "major"? To
what extent are they allowed to change? What is the audience comfortable
with?
I
know that there have been occasions where some Austen fans have been
like "Hell no, that is not supposed to happen" but then other times
where they say "I really like how you updated this particular scene."
Sometimes both of those statements exist in the same comments thread,
and other times it can be a vast majority pulling one way or the other.
There are major benefits and limitations to adapting. You have a built in audience which is a plus, but as I said you also need to appease them and new viewers too. It is certainly a predicament.
I seem to only have more questions than when I started, but that is why I am writing them out.
Time for more serious investigation...
-Danny
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Written on Monday, March 10, 2014 by Unknown
To book or not to book? That is the question.
So in a previous post I talked a bit about adaptations. And that was fine and everything, but now it's getting serious. Serious my friends.
Do I use the book when identifying kernels and satellites?
(Don't know what those are? Go back to part 1)
What I mean is, there are certain events in the book that would be considered kernels. But maybe they play out differently in the series (perhaps not on Lizzie's videos but on someone else's or on a social media account). Does that mean they are less important? More important? The same?
Should I even be considering the book, or should I look at the show on its own?
My past post was in full defense of the show standing on its own. And in terms of entertainment and storytelling and such, I still stand by that. But when analyzing it with narrative theory, the book can come back into play if I so choose.
Here's what I'm thinking. There is a spectrum concerning adaptations.
From faithful reenactments to interesting modernizations to lose-but-you-might-never-have-known-it interpretations:
Okay, so that last one is Emma but you get the idea.
The first one is so obviously Austen and the last one is the opposite of obvious. LBD falls somewhere in the middle. Some people may have never read P&P but they still love and watch the show. Some people, like me, have read the book and get all of the little jokes and references that they make. So does it turn to a question of viewership? Do kernels and satellites rely on the knowledge of the viewer? One of the problems associated with the Scene Function Model (a more specific version of kernels and satellites) is that the fans and novice viewers disagreed on the importance of certain scenes.
I mean, I can't watch LBD without being aware of the book. But I also know that the series can stand on its own. Then again, maybe I'm biased because I've read the book so many times. And maybe that doesn't matter, seeing as the show clearly has a following.
All right, I'm talking in circles now. But the issue still stands.
Can you believe that this was me being brief? I was way more detailed about this with my advisor, citing tons of examples and perceived conundrums.
I will address these questions again at a later date, along with a few more.
But for now, I'm calling it.
-Danny
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Written on Sunday, March 02, 2014 by Unknown
Seeing as this web show wouldn't be possible without the book it was based on, I thought I should spend at least one post on some facts about the novel.
Pride and Prejudice:
Type - Novel, satire, comedy, classic
Author - Jane Austen
Published - Jan 28, 1813
Publisher - T. Egerton, Whitehall
Volumes - Three, but now sold as one
Origin - United Kingdon
Setting - Early 19th-century England
Class system - Landed gentry
Protagonist - Elizabeth Bennet
Narrated - Third-person omniscient
Chronology - Published after Sense and Sensibility but before Mansfield Park. However, it was thought to be written before S&S.
Original Title - "First Impressions"
Popularity - Well received by critics when first published. Popularity grew with time. It has sold more than 20 million copies worldwide to this day. Probably mostly to high school students, English teachers, and bibliophiles. Did you read it when you were in school? I did. Once in high school and twice in college. And many more times just for fun. Yes, I'm that person.
Characters - Elizabeth (Lizzy/Eliza) Bennet [20], Fitzwilliam Darcy [28], Mr. Bennet, Mrs. Bennet, Jane Bennet [22], Mary Bennet [~18], Catherine (Kitty) Bennet [17], Lydia Bennet [15], Charles Bingley [23], Caroline Bingley [~20], George Wickham [mid/late 20s], William Collins [25], Lady Catherine de Bourgh, Anne de Bourgh [close to Darcy], Mr. Edward Gardiner, Mrs. Gardiner, Georgiana Darcy [16], Charlotte Lucas (and her family), Louisa Hurst (née Bingley), Mr. Hurst, Colonel Fitzwilliam [~30], etc.
[The brackets contain their approximate age at the beginning of the book. Beginning because it takes place in more than a years time so they likely celebrated some birthdays in between those stolen glances.]
Famous first line - “It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife.”
(Less important) Last line - “With the Gardiners, they were always on the most intimate terms. Darcy, as well as Elizabeth, really loved them; and they were both ever sensible of the warmest gratitude towards the persons who, by bringing her into Derbyshire, had been the means of uniting them.”
Themes and motifs - Marriage, manners, morality, class, education, love, courtship, self-knowledge, etc. Oh yea, and those two other ones. What were they called? I want to say pride and prejudice, but I'm just not sure...
List of adaptations - Too many to list on my own so here are some helpful links:
Majority of information from the novel itself (included in the bibliography) and some extra info from public resources such as wikipedia, sparknotes, and pemberley.com. Oh, and also some if it is just knowledge I retained from studying it in various classes.
-Danny
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Written on Thursday, January 23, 2014 by Unknown
It is hard to create an adaption. Any book that has ever been turned into a movie has run the risk of "not being as good as the book." Take these for example. See any that you would dub, "not as awesome as the novel I cherish so deeply"?
Yep. It happens. And yet adaptations are completely unavoidable. Why is that? Because they sell tickets. People want to see their favorite characters come to life on the big screen. Sometimes it works. Most of the time it doesn't, and then you just love to hate it which somehow manages to reinforce your original dedication to the book/series. You aren't a true Harry Potter fan if you haven't seen all eight movies and have strong opinions on things like the decision to remove S.P.E.W. or the lack of quidditch matches.
I mean come on Water for Elephants, I'm looking at you here. Why the hell did you choose Reese Witherspoon as the love interest when she could basically be Robert Pattinson's mom? She was not that old in the book. Not even close. I call bullshit.
I believe that when an adaptation is done right and done well, fans won't need to draw so many comparisons to the book. Instead, the media should stand on it's own and be judged thusly. No need to point out all the moments that were done wrong, but instead look at all the parts that were done right or maybe even done differently.
This is why I love The Lizzie Bennet Diaries. I don't need to jump back and forth from novel to web show and say "ugh, I hated that they did this" or "why did they take that out when it could so easily have been incorporated?" While I have read (and love) the novel and enjoy the sly references they make to Austen's other works, I don't think about it in terms of the book whenever I watch it. Instead I see the characters as they are and appreciate the show for what it is. Yes it has it's faults. Especially in the beginning there were quite a few problems. But, I'm not going to fight about the decision to make Kitty a literal cat. I actually thought that was an awesome and creative way to incorporate the character without needed to hire/introduce a new actress. All she does in the novel is follow Lydia around anyway, and so that's what she does in the show, just in cat form. It's modern, it's funny, it worked.
-Danny
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