Comment by tom_vidal | Hacker News Reader

Comment by tom_vidal | Hacker News Reader

How in the world can you have a discussion about DVD packaging and special features without mentioning the Lord of the Rings trilogy extended edition box sets? Not only did the movies come in beautiful collector’s cases with two DVDs per movie, they were also completely packed with special features, the run time of which exceeded that of the movies themselves. Hours and hours of in-depth making-of documentaries. I used to watch the special features for all the movies in a row when I was home from college during the holidays. Probably because before the advent of streaming, this was the longest, highest-quality content I had access to.

But the special features themselves… man. Getting to see the craft of filmmaking and propmaking was one of the biggest inspirations for me in pursuing a career as a maker. That was the first time in my life anyone had pulled back the curtain to that extent on what it took to create something as complex and powerful as Peter Jackson’s LOTR. You could tell the profound love and dedication that went into every inch of that film. To anyone who was involved in creating those special features and deciding to include them in the extended edition box sets, thank you.

I absolutely consider the EE discs to be the canonical version

I consider the books to be canonical, honestly.

+ 1 Here.

I can hardly sit through The Two Towers, extended or otherwise, without cringing constantly at nonsensical plot changes.

No, Faramir was not a moody nihilistic relativist who changes his entire outlook without any character development.

No, there was no alliance, and getting from Lothlorien to Helm's Deep in the span of a few weeks, with a full army, is physically impossible even if the army were already assembled. (This was only in the movie after a last-minute cancelled attempt to turn Arwen into a warrior; seriously.)

No, Treebeard didn't spend 2/3s of the book stalling.

No, Frodo did not offer a wringwraith the ring, even for a second. And if he did, there's no way he would've survived afterwards.

And on, and on...

A movie adaptation of a book is a retelling of a story for a completely different type of audience, so it's an apples to oranges comparison always.

That is how Hollywood does movies. Other film traditions will more accurately adapt the source material. For example, many animes are a shot-for-shot recreation of manga.

>For example, many animes are a shot-for-shot recreation of manga.

This is something of a newer phenomenon in the grander history of anime as an artform. Osamu Tezuka, one of the founding fathers of the modern anime industry, notably created the filler-heavy formats of yesteryear that were the dominant form of popular televised anime well into the 21st century. There are notable early outliers like Yu Yu Hakusho and Death Note, but most of the popular anime had their runtimes padded all to hell in order to continually cash in on the unpredictable zeitgeist popularity of their source material. This trend of creating manga-accurate adaptations was largely spawned during the mid-80's OVA boom (wherein many one-shot OVAs were functionally made as high-production-value advertisements for their corresponding manga), but it largely didn't make the leap to TV anime until well after the turn of the century.

> This is something of a newer phenomenon in the grander history of anime as an artform

It's hard to argue about 'a newer phenomenon' which is now closer to Astro Boy than our current time.

> most of the popular anime had their runtimes padded all to hell in order to continually cash in on the unpredictable zeitgeist popularity of their source material

You can't 'faithfully recreate shot-for-shot' an ongoing title, you would be out of the material way earlier than out of the runtime.

This is not even diving on the differences between the manga and the manga eiga.

>It's hard to argue about 'a newer phenomenon' which is now closer to Astro Boy than our current time.

Last I checked, the 2010s are closer to now than to the 1960s. This didn't become the norm until the 2010s. I called out Death Note and Yu Yu Hakusho as notable exceptions and did note the initial start of it in smaller OVAs. I guess if you're going from the earliest OVA that did this then your comment does make sense. I was thinking more in terms of when the trend to do so became dominant.

>You can't 'faithfully recreate shot-for-shot' an ongoing title, you would be out of the material way earlier than out of the runtime.

Right. The modern trend is to wait until a series is done, or at least until it has enough plot/action in the manga to cover a full season before entering production. Chainsaw Man was over before the first season of the anime came out. Demon Slayer finished around the time the anime started. This is a new-ish trend among big popular TV anime. So as I said, it used to be that anime would be produced while the manga was still ongoing and popular, which lead to filler as a much more common phenomenon.

>This is not even diving on the differences between the manga and the manga eiga.

By all means, feel free to split hairs. I was just trying to give newcomers a more zoomed-out view of the history of anime, but if you'd like to delve into details, have at it.

> Last I checked, the 2010s are closer to now than to the 1960

That was a quip to "trend of creating manga-accurate adaptations was largely spawned during the mid-80's OVA boom"[0]

> until it has enough plot/action in the manga to cover a full season before entering production

Yes, though this is still not universal and still things go south with anime-original titles (WEP is 10/13, sadly)

> it used to be that anime would be produced while the manga was still ongoing and popular, which lead to filler as a much more common phenomenon.

> By all means, feel free to split hairs

Yes, I don't object this, though I was thinking more in how the media does not/translate. I even re-read Kaji/Akagi first story from Tsuredzure Children as this is the one best examples of a media adaptation.

[0] Gokushufudō would be an extreme modern 1:1, btw

PS:

ah, read the sibling comment

imma in the bar RN, if you want a hear an opinion on that sweet cash - drop a note

In some cases, the runtime being padded with filler was less about cashing in and more about trying to not catch up to the manga too quickly.

FMA (2003) is a fun example of this not happening, where they basically wound up creating a custom ending to the series because they got ahead of the manga.

>In some cases, the runtime being padded with filler was less about cashing in and more about trying to not catch up to the manga too quickly.

Right, so rather than stopping production on the anime until the manga had time to get ahead, most anime created filler to cash in on the popularity of the ongoing manga, rather than to try to make the most faithful adaptation. Nowadays it's more common for anime to halt production and release a follow-up season years later when the manga has gotten farther ahead.

shot-for-shot recreations are a waste of time. a robot or algorithm could copy. we watch adaptations to see a new perspective on an old tale. if you want a copy, just read the original.

There's a difference between adaptation; and retelling the story in a way that damages the integrity of the original. Many of the above changes don't make sense even within the movie's own material. Even if the books didn't exist, Faramir's filmic story arc (as just one example) would be a badly executed example of character development.

That's the real problem - nobody really cares about Arwen at the Ford vs Glorfindel; it doesn't change the story much at all.

And even changing characters somewhat but still having a development or purpose is arguably fine - it's the changes that aren't good in the context of the movie that are most baffling, especially considering the dedication shown in other areas of the films.

I also dislike the way Faramir was adapted but it makes sense. It puts a greater emphasis on the exceptionality of Aragorn by removing the complexity of the Faramir character and basically making him a second Boromir. Considering that the movie is necessarily a more condense experience than a book, it's a good choice.

The retelling of a story can never damage the integrity of the original, and it is very foolish of you to even suggest that it could. The original is always the original, and is unimpacted by anything that comes after...

This is as silly as suggesting that Tolkien's work somehow tarnishes or damages nordic/germanic mythology. utterly ridiculous.

I get what you're saying but art doesn't exist in a vacuum. Newer works can add context and alter our perceptions of older works. Especially when people's first exposure to a work is an adaptation. Someone who has never read the lord of the rings, but has seen the movies several times will never be able to read the book without picturing Elijah Wood.

Strong feelings for an adaptation or a sequel can taint or enhance how someone feels about the source material even if the original was experienced first. For example, it's understandable if someone who really loved star wars before the prequels and disney acquisition found that they can't help but experience a sense of loss and disappointment while revisiting those original films knowing about midi-chlorians and how the franchise ended up.

The original works are unchanged, but in many cases the way we view and experience them isn't.

> completely different type of audience

A general one. And if you think about that its sad that a story has to be rewritten in order to ensure maximal appeal to generate maximal profit. The story isn't rewritten for the screen, it's rewritten for the investors polluting the story with money.

But on the flip side the story reaches a large audience, perhaps larger than the books might have, though not in true form. Double edged sword really.

Ugh, don't get me started on the troll scene in The Hobbit...

Now that the last family member who gave a shit is dead LOTR is whored out. They want it to be the next Marvel universe.

I'm also swiftly bored by interminably long epic "battle sequences" - I usually find the choreography to be bland and uninspired, which I think partially stems from a childhood of golden harvest Hong Kong cinema.

For me, the fact they don't spend hours singing songs of lore makes it literally unwatchable.

In Peter Jackson's defense re Treebeard...

Treebeard did spend what seemed to Merry and Pippin an interminable amount of time deliberating, including a full three days in agonizingly plodding discussion with other ents, and it is emphasized that this is THE defining character trait of ents. The shape of the interaction between the hobbits and the ents was of the hobbits becoming extremely bored and impatient. It is more important in a film adaptation to capture the feel rather than slavishly copy the book blow by blow. There is only so much screen time to go around, and the character trait has to be conveyed somehow while still moving the plot along. If the movie faithfully compressed the entire ent episode into its runtime, including the 3 day entmoot, it would be both incredibly boring, and spiritually less accurate because it would feel rushed and cramped.

The article, the OP, and my comment weren’t talking about the books.

I considered Canonical to be canonical

If you haven’t already, get yourself to Wellington and take the tours at Weta. You might even recognize a few of the faces that still work there.

I want something that is small, May be Mini-CD size but with TeraByte of storage. That is able to fit that whole LOTR and all the Extra, in 4K Ultra High Quality in one disc.

It took a really really long time for Vinyl to make a come back. I hope we could one day innovate enough and bring physical media to the market again.

Most of the people I know who talk about LOTR movies are women who watched them once, but mainly rewatch the making of parts, because they don't care about the story as much as they care about seeing a group of dirty-looking men be friends with each other in ways that sort of look homoerotic but aren't explicitly.

Should be familiar if you know any anime fangirls.

I think this was the point where they started looking not at ticket sales, but overall lifetime earnings per family...sure, it's the ticket, then the DVD, then the BluRay, then the Extended BlueRay, then the Criterion Edition (with Sting)

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