Fans of the Walking Dead comic book will tell you that the TV series has some slight and not so slight changes to the characters and storylines. Series creator and producer Robert Kirkman says he’s enjoying getting to tweak things he originally did in the comics for the TV series and that he’s enjoying his chance to play George Lucas to his franchise.
“To a certain extent, I’ve told these stories before and I did them my own way in the comic book,” Kirkman told MTV News about his approach to the show. “I work on the TV show, I’m in the writers room, and it’s fun for me to look at it as a do-over. I can fiddle with things. I can play George Lucas, if you will, and I can think, ‘Well, what would happen if Shane had lived? How would that change things?'”
One big change is that in the TV version, Shane is still around. And he’s playing a pivotal role this season as well as having a very different character arc from the comics.
“Shane’s presence radically alters a lot of different things,” Kirkman warned of how the still-alive character will continue to change things. “Seeing how things are changed by his presence moving through the second season is a lot of fun for me. It ends up bringing in a lot of interesting twists and turns as you’ll see from watching the season.”
“George Lucas” is perhaps an unkind comparison. I prefer thinking of him like “Douglas Adams” who changed Hitchhiker significantly every time it was made in a new medium.
I don’t think that’s a good comparison. Kirkman is looking at his story and exploring some “what if” changes to his story. These are leading into come interesting and complex new dynamics different from the comics. This gives the story a fresh feel to those of us intimate with comics and I heartily approve.
What George Lucas is doing is endlessly tinkering with his story to update it with more modern effects. It’s not about storytelling, it’s about “correcting” his vision. I for one wish he’d leave it the hell alone already. I saw Star Wars when I was eight years old and it had a profound impact on my life, like many others. I only wished that he would give us something new instead of retreading the same ground.
My geek dream is to give a film, or series, treatment to Stackpole’s Rogue Squadron novels.
Actually I’m okay with this because the comic will most certainly differ from the movie or TV show. Different medium but you can still tell the core story with differences that work better in that medium. The problem is that a lot of people, me included, have a hard time going “The movie/tv show isn’t the same as the book/comic. The movie…” rinse and repeat.
I think it’s a great thing.
How many times in the past have we had to console ourselves with “well, we still have the book” or “we still have the comic” when the tv or movie adaptation turned out to be nothing close to the original story (remember the rage around “I, Robot”)? Or so awful that we didn’t want to associate it with the original story?
This time, this one shining time, the creator of the original good thing is given a chance to handle the adaptation himself, and he’s making the most of it by changing the universe he’s created without completely detroying the original or the links to it.
Yes, he’s taking some risks with original fans, but he’s the one person who knows when and where to push the boundaries he’d set up in the original story without having everyone call shenanigans on him.
So I say let him stretch himself and his story. I just wish he hadn’t used Lucas as an example, as Charles said… it does a disservice to his own creativity, whereas what George has done would be the equivalent of Picasso or Matisse taking down one of their masterpieces and modifying the painting, touching it up using crayons, Sharpies and glued on high resolution digital printouts that distract people with their shiny newness but add nothing to the quality, depth and inspiration of the original.
Ahem 🙂 and yes, I just recently saw the Matisse-Picasso documentary again, why do you ask?
Kirkman seems to have more respect for his creations and the fans that appreciate them, imo, so he shouldn’t sully himself by making that Lucas comparison. I just hope that season 3 isn’t affected by Darabont not being there.