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Post by newt5996 on Feb 19, 2016 3:44:15 GMT
Now that we have 8 adaptations with more on the way I pose the question how important is it for the audios to stay as close as they can to the novels? Damaged Goods, Theatre of War and All-Consuming Fire had changes but they' we're still great adaptations. Also I. Ask for predictions on what will change in Nightshade and Original Sin
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Post by omega on Feb 19, 2016 3:53:02 GMT
Should there be spoiler tags for anything about Nightshade and Original Sin? I know the books have been out for over twenty years now, but lots of people are no doubt coming to the stories through the audios. I feel we should treat any big plot points as spoilers, such as surprising character, the context in which they appear, the identities and natures of the antagonists etc.
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Post by CookieMaster on Feb 19, 2016 9:01:10 GMT
Sometimes i feel it is important for the adaptions to deviate from the novels, especially for the sake of the current continuity. In some ways, the deviation between the audio adaptions and the novels, is similar to the deviation between tv stories and target novelisations, they sometimes offer alternate interpretations of events but both are equally enjoyable.
Imagine if they wanted to adapt No Future with stories like Book of Kells and The Black Hole in Big Finish's library, it would almost definitely need an alternate ending for things to make sense. First Frontier is another one, considering the direction they took the Master in. Lungbarrow, that's a biggie, and would almost certainly need to be overhauled.
I haven't read Nightshade or Original Sin, so i look forward to seeing what changes might happen.
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Post by omega on Feb 19, 2016 9:17:10 GMT
Nightshade predictions: {Spoiler}The sex aspects will be toned down, that's a given. There's a scene where Ace walks in on two of the guest characters getting it on, and considers making a "I didn't recognise you with your clothes on" comment to the guy. She also gets intimate with Robin, but like her and Jan in Love and War this too will probably to toned down to a fully clothed snuggle.
The sub-plot with Robin's family will probably won't be in the audio. It doesn't lend anything vital to the plot and is just several more characters to cast.
Small scenes like Ace and the Doctor at a cafe for breakfast and Ace spending the day wandering about the town and going to see James Bond at the pictures also likely won't make it. They don't add anything to the narrative and while it paints a picture of life in a rural town in the 60's that kind of thing doesn't always make it into these adaptations.
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Post by mrfuggleboppins on Feb 19, 2016 20:23:17 GMT
If an adaptation does not deviate from the original to a certain degree, it does not deserve to exist.
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Post by seeley on Feb 19, 2016 21:01:58 GMT
I'm honestly quite curious as to how Nightshade will be adapted. It involves, by virtue of its monster, quite a few scenes with little or no speech. There's a particularly memorable scene involving someone trying to take a bath, that could never be done on audio, without being greatly diminished. Ditto {Spoiler}Hawthorne's demise. It's a very visual, memory-based story. Not the sort of thing that transfers easily to audio. The only way to even remotely maintain most of the scenes, as written, would require lots of Ghosts of N-Space-style (*shudder*) soliloquies. Nightshade predictions: {Spoiler}{Spoiler}The sex aspects will be toned down, that's a given. There's a scene where Ace walks in on two of the guest characters getting it on, and considers making a "I didn't recognise you with your clothes on" comment to the guy. She also gets intimate with Robin, but like her and Jan in Love and War this too will probably to toned down to a fully clothed snuggle.
There's very little in the way of sex. The scene you mention, where Ace finds two characters naked, wouldn't even register on audio. Aside from that, I think we only see them getting into bed.
As for Ace and Robin getting intimate, that's off-screen, even in the book (assuming it's there. I never picked up on it.)
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Post by Sir Wearer of Hats on Feb 19, 2016 22:23:34 GMT
If an adaptation does not deviate from the original to a certain degree, it does not deserve to exist. There's good deviations (losing the Bubbleshock subplot in Highest Science, or thr addition of Watson suggesting he and Benny had a fun evening together) that don't impact on the plot and then there's deviations that sort of upset the narrative (the rather pathetic and arbitrary fate of the villains in All Consuming Fire on audio versus "No, Watson is my friend" in the novel). Land then there's the deviations that risk taking away something from the novel that the audience likes (such as the Doctor's sniffy dismissal of Holmes' coping abilities in the novel versus his heaping praise upon him in the audio).
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Post by Deleted on Feb 20, 2016 2:15:40 GMT
If an adaptation does not deviate from the original to a certain degree, it does not deserve to exist. There's good deviations (losing the Bubbleshock subplot in Highest Science, or thr addition of Watson suggesting he and Benny had a fun evening together) that don't impact on the plot and then there's deviations that sort of upset the narrative (the rather pathetic and arbitrary fate of the villains in All Consuming Fire on audio versus "No, Watson is my friend" in the novel). Land then there's the deviations that risk taking away something from the novel that the audience likes (such as the Doctor's sniffy dismissal of Holmes' coping abilities in the novel versus his heaping praise upon him in the audio). Yeah, I have to admit that bit rubbed me the wrong way quite a bit with All-Consuming FireUnlike Love and War, it's an adaptation that really pales in comparison to the original and it's sadly probably one of the worst audios I've listened to pacing-wise. A new version of the story requires deviations sure, but they must, must, must be improvements over the original text. The Goldfinger film fixes Auric Goldfinger's ridiculous scheme from his original intention to steal Fort Knox's gold into irradiating it so the Americans won't be able to use any of it, Mark Gatiss's adaptation of The Hounds of the Baskervilles takes the original concept and transports it from its Gothic trappings into the twenty-first century, the Vincent Price adaptation of House of Wax removes the original's clunky comedic aspects, etc. These changes have to improve or otherwise refresh the narrative, otherwise you take a fantastic Doctor Who meets Sherlock Holmes vs. the Cthulu mythos story and crush the life out of it trying to squeeze it into four parts rather than say the requisite six or seven. It's an adaptation that chafes, gags and struggles against its runtime.
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Post by seeley on Feb 20, 2016 2:28:36 GMT
Was I the only person who was a bit disappointed with BF's Love and War? It wasn't bad, but it seemed to lose steam, about halfway through. I haven't read the original novel, but I got the impression that it was trying to be too faithful to its source. The apocalypse seemed oddly punchless, like it was out of focus.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 20, 2016 3:15:00 GMT
Was I the only person who was a bit disappointed with BF's Love and War? It wasn't bad, but it seemed to lose steam, about halfway through. I haven't read the original novel, but I got the impression that it was trying to be too faithful to its source. The apocalypse seemed oddly punchless, like it was out of focus. From memory, the original novel's structure is a lot more like The Wheel in Space than most traditional invasion stories with the Doctor trying to destroy the Hoothi before they can begin. The halfway point would have been where the Hoothi's infiltration of the Heavenite military came into focus with their subjugation and murder of the soldiers aboard the ships in orbit (a subplot ultimately cut from the audio) . Following in the footsteps of the Remembrance of the Daleks novelisation, one member of a prominent ship's command staff gets his head blown off by his engineer who picks off everyone else in charge to take command with others infected by the Hoothi. It's very graphic, but ultimately unnecessary because their fate is to be destroyed when the Doctor takes Ace and Benny to kill the members of the Church of Vacuum and offer an ultimatum. The Hoothi-controlled soldiers in orbit are forced to hit the self-destruct mechanism on their vessels and destroy themselves.
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Post by Ela on Feb 21, 2016 19:05:13 GMT
I enjoyed Love and War quite a bit. And I have both read the novel and heard the audio story.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 21, 2016 22:08:37 GMT
I enjoyed Love and War quite a bit. And I have both read the novel and heard the audio story. Yeah, me too. I loved the 'Love and War' Virgin NA novel and the Big Finish audio adaptation equally. I don't expect audio adaptations to be exactly the same as the novels, as only an unabridged version of a book could keep everything in it, and that alone would take up more than two CDs. Plus you'd have changes for errors and bringing things up to date, etc.. So some changes in an audio adaptation are inevitable. The BF novel adaptations that I have heard so far have all been very good though, and certainly enjoyable in their own right as audio stories. (N.B. I haven't heard All-Consuming Fire yet.)
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Post by Ela on Feb 22, 2016 3:49:10 GMT
I haven't heard All-Consuming Fire yet, either. Looking forward to it, though. I loved the book.
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Post by doctorkernow on Mar 16, 2016 22:47:05 GMT
Hello again... I am pleased some of the Virgin Doctor Who books have been released by Big Finish. Although some fans loathed them with a passion, for me they were an interesting diversion when no Who was on TV.
I have only heard Love and War which I loved as a book and I really enjoyed it. The book is usually better as Colin Baker always says your imagination means there is no budget. Also your idea of how a character sounds can be different to the actor chosen for the role.
Despite these limitations, most of the stories I liked have been adapted so when credits allow I will sample some more. Lungbarrow could be adapted as an Unbound perhaps. It is a giddying and eccentric murder mystery that reminds me of Mervyn Peake's Gormenghast. Just a thought...
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Post by charlesuirdhein on Mar 17, 2016 0:36:00 GMT
I expect the adaptations to lean closer to TV/BF continuity than the written version, simply because that's the prime continuity BF uses, and if it is a "straight" adaptation I'd like it to be flagged as such. Damaged Goods did well in this regard, rejigging some of the plot to account for the Time War and Torchwood. Well played. More of that.
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