Mysteriously renewed , not just for its third season , which premiered last workweek , but for its quaternary as well , Beauty and the Beast is the little show that could . Vaguely free-base on the CBS ’s 1987 Beauty and the Beast , starring Linda Hamilton and Ron Perlman ( boast enough lion constitution to introduce a whole new generation to the temptingness of bestiality ) , the CW ’s version follows Catherine Chandler , an NYPD homicide investigator who was lay aside by a “ beast ” on the dark her mother was murdered . Several class afterward , she find that the beast was actually a hot ex - soldier ( you caught the part where this was on the CW , right ? ) whose DNA was mutate through Army experiments . love story ensues .
Still , clearly skillful than the original fairy narration and all its Stockholm - ey nonsense .
Based on a series of YA revulsion novels by L. J. Smith ( which long predate the Twilight craze : the first book was publish in 1991 ) , The Vampire Diaries diverged from the original right out of the gate : “ We had to create the principle for ourselves right away , ” EP Julie PlectoldThe Hollywood Reporterlast class . “ The Quran is the jumping - off point for the world and anything goes from that stop forward . ” For example , while the books dig into “ angels , and foxes , and mystical creatures , and hell dimensions , ” the showrunners have substituted their own very complex mythology . And while quality names have stay the same , the reference themselves are oft unrecognisable : the Elena of the book is initially more like the Katherine of the show , and vice versa .
Also — and this is clearly the most important affair — book - Elena is blond .
When the author of your reference fabric feels the need to writea Slate articleabout how awful and racist your adaptation is … something ’s probably gone amiss . The Earthsea series , one of the most dear series in fantasy from one of its most beloved authors , features a protagonist with crimson - brown tegument and a macrocosm peopled primarily by mass of moody skin . The Earthsea miniseries , a clean - washed piece of crap , sport a booster who is , in the word of Ursula Le Guin , “ a techy white kid , ” and , mostly , a raft of other whitened people . Here ’s Le Guin on the importance of race in her novels :
My color scheme was conscious and measured from the kickoff . I did n’t see why everybody in scientific discipline fabrication had to be a honky named Bob or Joe or Bill . I did n’t see why everybody in grand fancy had to be white ( and why all the lead womanhood had “ purple eyes ” ) . It did n’t even make sensory faculty . Whites are a minority on Earth now — why would n’t they still be either a nonage , or just accept up in the larger colored gene kitty , in the time to come ?
And on top of all that , SyFy decided to toss out significant parts of the original and substitute their own game . LeGuin notes that on top of misunderstand the message of the books to be something about “ the wedlock of two impression system , ” the producersalso“use[d ] the name Earthsea , and some of the scenes from the books , in a generic McMagic movie with a silly plot ground on sex and violence . ”
base on the 1988 novel by William Brinkley , The Last Ship apportion a fair amount of its assumption with its source stuff : they ’re both about the gang of the USS Nathan James , a US Navy ship that ’s at sea during a major event that wipe out the world ’s population . The difference ? In the television series the event is a viral pandemic , and in the book it ’s a nuclear holocaust . So the whole “ finding a curative for the computer virus ” plot line … not so much in the Scripture .
The Riverworld novel , write by Philip José Farmer , feature a fantastically fun premise : every human being ever , from every civilisation and metre period , ends up reconstructed along a immense river on a far - off terraformed alien satellite ( because there are so many different languages , Esperanto lastly pay back its moment of glory and takes off as the language of option . Well done , Esperanto . ) The characters are people like Sir Richard Burton , Samuel Clemens , and Mozart . We’ve already notedthat this vocalize like a smashing assumption for a series .
Unfortunately , the producers take issue ( which really makes you question why they ’ve tried to adapt this twice now ) , and in 2010 produce a four hr backdoor pilot / miniseries / idiot box moving-picture show thing in which neat plot ideas were roll apart in party favour of EVEN BETTER IDEAS , like add a new main character who pass the whole movie sample to feel his girl of two months andhaving all the character cryptically rewired to speak Englishso that they could have slow and confusing conversation about nothing .
John Updike ’s The Witches of Eastwick is a tempting holding for telecasting web : Eastwick is the third attempt at an adaption , and the first to make it to series ( although only for one time of year ) . With a plot apparently fueled by creation and characters blandish , cherubic , and smoother than the originals , the show is n’t exactly close to the original . But the biggest modification is probably one of tone : while the novel is biting , dirty , and frequently disconcerting , the series was most frequently compare to Desperate Housewives ( which I venture you could argue is also ofttimes upsetting , but in a different manner ) . A similar transformation might have worked well for Practical Magic , but falls lamentably flat here .
Also , Eastwick was take on the same set used by Gilmore Girls , which meant that every thirty seconds I think Lorelai and Rory were going to amount around the corner and go to Luke ’s and then every thirty - one seconds I was horribly frustrated . The townsfolk localize hasapparently also been usedfor shows like Supernatural , The Sarah Conner Chronicles , and Pushing Daisies .
There ’s a headless horseman , a guy call Ichabod Crane , a woman name Katrina , and a lieu called Sleepy Hollow … and that ’s about it , in terms of law of similarity to the original . The Legend of Sleepy Hollow , by Washington Irving , is arrange in 1790 ( none of that Rip Van Winkle stuff and nonsense , although that account was also written by Irving ) , and concerns a school day instructor who vies with with another man for the love of the town heiress and is terrorized by story about and the eventual coming into court of a brainless horseman who may or may not be real .
Of course , who care about faithfulness to the original when a show is this batshit amazing .
bill asGossip Girl meets Charmed ( hello I am SO sell on this as a television system series ) , 666 Park Avenue by Gabriella Pierce is about an architect / witch who meets a gorgeous man and gets engaged to him , only to discover that her young mother - in - jurisprudence is [ spoiler ] an evil witch ( no mother - in - law of nature jokes , please ) . 666 Park Avenue the television show is about a couple who run into a fancy New York City apartment edifice , where the landlord is the Devil . So … the title is the same , I opine ?
In this version of Bram Stoker ’s 1897 Dracula , the arch Count eschews all that mediaeval scenery and or else pretends to be an American enterpriser bring some sort of exciting new wireless electrical energy invention to London ( a smokescreen for the revenge plot he ’s masterminding ) . There are clandestine social club and reincarnate wives and sexy journalists — although of form in terminus of on - screen Dracula adaptation , this is much submissive fidelity .
The show was sadly cancelled after one season , right when it was getting supremely awesome .
These two Frankenstein usher with startlingly similar names are both localise to premiere later this year . They ’re also both hilariously far from the original : The Frankenstein Code is about a corrupt and aged sheriff who ’s fetch back to life in a young Isle of Man ’s body . Meanwhile , The Frankenstein Chronicles , starring Sean Bean andfeaturing Mary Shelleyas a fibre , is about a police inspector in 1827 London on the track of a slayer who may be trying to reanimate the dead .
And in case you ’re wondering , The Frankenstein Chronicles had the name first . The Frankenstein Code used to be called simply Frankenstein .
666 Park avenueEastwicklast shipTelevisionUrsula K. Le GuinVampire Diaries
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