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Awix (3310 KP) rated The War of the Worlds in TV

Dec 2, 2019

The War of the Worlds

2019 | Drama, Sci-Fi

7.2

(36 Ratings)

TV Show Rating

Grisly non-adaptation of the immortal H.G. Wells story retains the same basic premise and the very occasional moment, but essentially scoops out the innards of the actual novel and replaces them with indescribably turgid attempts to (I would guess) update the story and make it relevant to the modern world.

Part of a grim tradition where BBC attempts to adapt SF, fantasy and horror classics operate to different standards than when they are tackling Austen or Dickens. If the team who perpetrated War of the Worlds got their hands on Pride and Prejudice, it would end up being a lesbian romance between the Bennets' maid and one of the minor daughters, performed on ice, with a frame story concerning the Boer war. It's not just that it does the book badly, it genuinely doesn't seem interested in it at all. Someone gets a leaden, clumsy speech articulating the subtext of the novel (how to adapt a great book for the hard-of-thinking) but as to what this version of the story is supposed to be about or why we should care at all... It takes real skill and determination to screw up a classic piece of literature quite this badly.

Kudos

David McK (3705 KP) rated The Three Musketeers in Books

Jan 18, 2020

Let me start by saying that this is (was) one of the few novels I had abandoned, finding it very hard going and plodding.

And, truth be told, I still haven't actually read it.

You might be wondering, then, why I'm reviewing it?

Because, thanks to a well-known Amazon-owned subsidiary, I've now listened to it!

The subject of a fair-few movies over the years (most noticeably the 1970s Michael York duo The Three/Four Musketeers), I have to admit to being somewhat surprised at just how closely that Michael York fronted film actually sticks to the source material, with the first half of the novel (The Queens Diamonds) virtually transposed straight to the screen. And, as a result, I found this portion not really all that engaging, perhaps due to (over)familiarity.

However, things picked up once we got past the halfway point, and into more unfamiliar territory, before (roughly) the final third of the novel, which obviously served as the inspiration for The Four Musketeers (where d'Artagnan actually becomes one such).

Full of swashbuckling romance and acts of derring do, this - like many other classics - is one of those novels that you read simply so that you can say you've read it!