[ SECRET POST #2622 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #2622 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 04 pages, 076 secrets from Secret Submission Post #375.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[dreemyweird]

I don't know, she might be? It's cool if she is. I didn't mean that I wish this film were never made or that nobody should enjoy it, I just think it missed the point of the books spectacularly AND did not introduce an equally interesting message of its own.

If she's okay with it or even likes it, it doesn't mean that she thinks it's good for the same reasons her books are good.

[sarillia]

Do the books have the same disability angle? The movie is really important to me on that front and I feel like I'll be told I'm reading too much into it and "SJW!!" if I go on about it, but it's one of my favorite movies because of that.

[dreemyweird]

Mm, I'm not sure. I never viewed the books from this perspective. In the sense that Hiccup and Toothless seem totally unfit for the kind of rough life other folks lead, yes. Hiccup fails at every "traditional" activity because he's just not wired this way, he's got other talents that are often not appreciated by those around him.

I think you can totally read them like this, but it's not explicitly about ~disabilities~.

It's great that this film's important for you because of its themes! Just not my cuppa, and I do tend to value the technical quality over the message.

[sarillia]

Just to be clear, I'm talking about how a large part of the plot of the movie can be read as Hiccup working on accommodations for Toothless's damaged tail. And I love the way Hiccup's foot is handled at the end. I relate so much to the moment when he wakes up and sees what happened and just the whole part where he's getting up off the bed and trying out his new foot for the first time. I never hear anyone talk about it but that expression on his face and the deep breath he takes before trying to stand and see what he can do is so powerful for me.

And now I babbled on about it anyway even though I said I wouldn't.

[dreemyweird]

Yeah, I got it. It's just that the "losing his foot" thing is not even a part of the book canon (Hiccup does get shot in the foot, but it's all very different, and he recovers later on), and Toothless's main problem is definitely not his tail. In fact, Toothless is ALL a problem. He's super small and he can't fly properly (he spends a huuge amount of time whining about it) and can't do shit. He doesn't have a specific disability.

ETA: I'm sorry if I sound inappropriately dry :/ I seriously cannot share your enthusiasm in any way. I don't like the thing. I'm glad that you do, but I'm definitely a book 'verse fan myself.

[sarillia]

Ah okay. It was just that what you were describing didn't sound like it had anything to do with what I was asking so it seemed like you didn't understand where I was coming from.

Also, I skipped over it before, but what's with the tildes around ~disability~? I usually see that used in a sarcastic way but the rest of your comments seem fairly respectful so I'm confused.

[dreemyweird]

No, I didn't mean it in a sarcastic way; it was just to stress the word. (Maybe I used it incorrectly, too. I do tend to develop personal quirks when it comes to punctuation.)

[sarillia]

I figured that was probably it. Just thought I'd ask.

[nyxelestia]

I was about to ask about that, actually - why not use italics? Because reading "~disability~" made it seem like you were being sarcastic and condescending, and it took me a few more comments to realize you weren't. :|

[dreemyweird]

I'm sorry about this! I didn't mean to sound like that :( It's just that sometimes I'm too lazy to type in italics, and the tildes would normally play roughly the same role - when we are talking non-sensitive concepts.

If I hurt somebody's feelings, that was entirely unintentional and is much regretted.

[nyxelestia]

Eh, like I and the anon said, the rest of your comments made it pretty obvious that you weren't trying to be condescending - it was just really confusing, because in my experience, using tildes around a word tends to carry a condescending or sarcastic connotation no matter what you are talking about.

When people can't use italics (i.e. on Facebook) and need to emphasize something, usually they use *asterisks* or /slashes/ around a word/phrase, and those don't really carry any kind of emotion or connotation with them.

[nan]

No, I absolutely agree, when Hiccup took the deep breath and stood up and tried his new foot for the first time and Toothless walks beside him and his tail swings into view and just, AH, oh my god, I cried. ;3;

[sarillia]

Yay, someone else gets it!

I haven't lost a foot but I have problems that have resulted in a lot of injuries and every time I would wake up for the first time the next day, I would have a similar moment like that. And even on days when I'm not dealing with an injury, some days are worse than others and I can never be quite sure that my legs will keep steady and carry my weight.

I've just never seen that moment captured on screen before.

[elialshadowpine]

Another person who burst into tears at that scene. I'm disabled (although not an amputee) and there are SO few GOOD portrayals of disability that... yeah, it was VERY important to me, and I can't wait for the second movie. (I should get around to watching the TV series too since it's supposed to be a bridge of sorts, according to my gf.)

[cakemage]

I know what you mean. Hiccup's expression in that moment pretty much sums up how I feel every time I get out of bed.

[(Anonymous)]

That part got to me too. I mean, it doesn't relate to anything in my life, but it was such a powerful moment, firstly for a kid's hero to have such drastic consequences to his bravery, and just...yeah, his face. It was really well done.

IMHO, the movie is miles better than the book. Maybe they get better down the way, but they were kinda unpleasant to me. I probably would've liked them more at age ten, I think, because Toothless reminds me a lot of Rudolph in the old "My Friend the Vampire" series.

But whether or not it's being compared with the book, the movie itself is such a good story that's well-told. It just succeeds in doing everything that a movie is supposed to do for an audience. I dunno, ever since H2G2 and reading Douglas Adams' view on adaptations, I've gotten more and more okay with adaptations being different from the source material, as long as they're good.

[dreemyweird]

(just to clarify: I like adaptations that are different from the source material. But I want them to have great themes&storylines&characterizations of their own. And I don't think HTTYD the film is a good work in this regard. - different strokes, though.)

[badass_tiger]

She is cool with it, and I respect her for that. The books and movies are super different though, and I tend to view them as separate entities.

[elialshadowpine]

I view a lot of book-to-movie adaptations this way. I've actually seen some adaptations I did not consider very good because they kept too much to the books, and it just did not work the same on film as it did in the book (IMO). They are two different mediums and thus can have different requirements. Sometimes I don't care for an adaptation because it's different from the book; sometimes I actually like the adaptation more (Gaiman's Stardust is this way for me; I disliked the book but LOVED the movie and consider it, for me, up there with The Princess Bride). Either way, an adaptation won't change how I feel about the original work.

[nyxelestia]

I honestly hate this whole attitude about how "impure" adaptations are, how bad deviating from the book is, etc., and the whole "books are always better" mentality.

Books and movies are two completely different forms of media, so trying to compare them is like trying to compare apples and oranges - you're not going to get anywhere because despite the similarities, they are ultimately just too different to be compared directly to each other.

I'm not saying there aren't bad adaptations - just that I don't think they are bad because they are adaptations or because they deviate from the book.

[dreemyweird]

I get what you are saying, and I agree with most of it (the purist attitude can be annoying, and admittedly I sometimes am guilty of displaying it), but I don't think that comparing adaptations to the original canons is altogether useless. Even if we do not consider the cases when to convey the spirit of the book IS the point of the adaptation (or is claimed to be one of the purposes, at least), there still remains the issue of the direction the adaptation has taken in reinterpeting the book source.

Say, if we have an amazing character in the book, but the adaptation took the character and destroyed every amazing aspect of their personality, I'll be pretty bitter about it - not because the character is different, but because the changes that were made were pointless and have spoiled the character in question.

As I see it, HTTYD is like this - it took an amazing book series and changed it into a lousy adaptation. That's why I don't like it.

(Sheldon Reynolds' Holmes series, for example, is one of my favourite Holmes adaptations. Its plots have zero to do with the canon source.)

[elialshadowpine]

Exactly. There are some adaptations I hate, but not because of trueness to the book, but because of how they are as movies. There are some that I have disliked because they changed the ending -- but that was just as much because I felt the ending did not work for the movie as much as it was that it differed from the book.

And in some cases, I prefer the movie ending. I much preferred the altered ending to Stardust, although I know a lot of Gaiman fans do not. I think even Gaiman himself said the changes were better for the story as a cinematic experience, which is cool. Some authors get very bent out of shape about changes, which... I can understand on one hand but on the other, that's part of the whole deal with optioning movie rights. Unless you're a big name author (and sometimes not even then), you have no creative control over what they do with the film... so if you aren't okay with that, don't option the rights. Simple as that.