I hadn’t read the Discworld books for 15 years, when I decided to revisit at the end of last year. I’m six books in now, and when I was asked to reccommend some audiobooks for a friend, I started thinking about how I would “sell” these books.
I’ve been watching the new series halfheartedly, slightly annoyed at the changes, more annoyed at how self-serious the first episodes were.
What I like the most about the Discworld is how it’s silly and smart at the same time.
Once The Watch hits its stride, it starts really moving into such a narrative.
If you’re really invested in the particular details of the Discworld, you’re never going to like this series, but if you miss Pratchett’s voice, it’s slowly seeping in to the series as it progresses.
It feels like the first episodes hold back the Discworld goofiness, and with good reason. A lot of people read the books in spite of the fantasy setting, not because of it.
I know I wasn’t enthusiastic at first, I just went along begrudgingly because I’d finished all the Douglas Adams books and was jonesing for something as escapist yet smart. And as the series progresses, the series slowly moves toward the narrative world of the books.
In the first episode, cheery had been changed from a dwarf to a trans person, what seemed a rather jarring interjection of modern politics.
But as the series move along, cheery’s narrative, the dwarf who shaves her beard in the books, aligns with the backstory of the TV character, only difference being the height.
And when you think about it, cheery from the books wouldn’t translate on screen. Either she’d be a cgi figure, or the series would have to spend an early episode explaining a convoluted back story on why its interesting why a small person would not be wearing a beard.
It’s hard to explain, but all the visual signifiers of the books are devices pratchett used to tell us stories about our world. Cheery was always a story about a person on the lgbt+ spectrum, escaping to the big c. The particulars were only so much fodder for jokes and stories.
the world of the watch is far removed from the first books, still. Those are the ones I have re-read so far, but I also read the Lipwig books, started the re-read on those.
I’m watching the most recent ep, and the Unseen University is mentioned for the first time. The Disc hasn’t been mentioned yet.
Vetinari of the first eps was very different to the fleshed-out character driving the plot of the late-era moist von lipwig books. The dull character made the gender swap of the character more apparent too.
But vetinari is slowly getting there too. And going back into the books, I start noticing that the progressive changes made for the show seemed to match how pratchett built the world. It started out being just about dudes, but then he seemed to progressively try to mirror the changes of society in his day, often seeming rather ahead of the curve.
As far as technology goes, the world of the show seems to have followed the path of the later books, where Pratchett seemed to have grown tired of the medeivalness of everything and started inventing things, the telegram, movies, what have you.
It’s not quite the same quixoitic world, but a similar one.
So the changes made early on get the viewer used to the compromises that the adaptation needs.
And they don’t push the new viewer away with a visual landscape that only makes sense if you read the books.
Pratchett didn’t write dense descriptive prose for no reason, so it just makes sense that the series build a world much in the same way he did.
The world we know was built up around the story of rincewind. Most of the world we saw in other stories varied on the needs of each story. The witches lived in fairy tale lands, the wizards in a sort of hogwartsy existance, many others in a 19th century london with debris from the first books sort of scattered around.
But the voice is there. Not quite the same of couse, but it feels like the spirit of the source material is there.
The adaption towards a US tv audience doesn’t kill it. Its just a bit jarring to begin with, and then you realise, we’re getting new discworld stories.
Not bad, that.
So I wholeheartedly recommend giving it a few eps, it really gets cooking around episode 6 or so. I’m looking forward to the next ep now. I want the series to survive, I want more new stories from the (as yet unmentioned) disc.
And I suspect the series will get even more pratchetty with time.
I’ve been watching the new series halfheartedly, slightly annoyed at the changes, more annoyed at how self-serious the first episodes were.
What I like the most about the Discworld is how it’s silly and smart at the same time.
Once The Watch hits its stride, it starts really moving into such a narrative.
If you’re really invested in the particular details of the Discworld, you’re never going to like this series, but if you miss Pratchett’s voice, it’s slowly seeping in to the series as it progresses.
It feels like the first episodes hold back the Discworld goofiness, and with good reason. A lot of people read the books in spite of the fantasy setting, not because of it.
I know I wasn’t enthusiastic at first, I just went along begrudgingly because I’d finished all the Douglas Adams books and was jonesing for something as escapist yet smart. And as the series progresses, the series slowly moves toward the narrative world of the books.
In the first episode, cheery had been changed from a dwarf to a trans person, what seemed a rather jarring interjection of modern politics.
But as the series move along, cheery’s narrative, the dwarf who shaves her beard in the books, aligns with the backstory of the TV character, only difference being the height.
And when you think about it, cheery from the books wouldn’t translate on screen. Either she’d be a cgi figure, or the series would have to spend an early episode explaining a convoluted back story on why its interesting why a small person would not be wearing a beard.
It’s hard to explain, but all the visual signifiers of the books are devices pratchett used to tell us stories about our world. Cheery was always a story about a person on the lgbt+ spectrum, escaping to the big c. The particulars were only so much fodder for jokes and stories.
the world of the watch is far removed from the first books, still. Those are the ones I have re-read so far, but I also read the Lipwig books, started the re-read on those.
I’m watching the most recent ep, and the Unseen University is mentioned for the first time. The Disc hasn’t been mentioned yet.
Vetinari of the first eps was very different to the fleshed-out character driving the plot of the late-era moist von lipwig books. The dull character made the gender swap of the character more apparent too.
But vetinari is slowly getting there too. And going back into the books, I start noticing that the progressive changes made for the show seemed to match how pratchett built the world. It started out being just about dudes, but then he seemed to progressively try to mirror the changes of society in his day, often seeming rather ahead of the curve.
As far as technology goes, the world of the show seems to have followed the path of the later books, where Pratchett seemed to have grown tired of the medeivalness of everything and started inventing things, the telegram, movies, what have you.
It’s not quite the same quixoitic world, but a similar one.
So the changes made early on get the viewer used to the compromises that the adaptation needs.
And they don’t push the new viewer away with a visual landscape that only makes sense if you read the books.
Pratchett didn’t write dense descriptive prose for no reason, so it just makes sense that the series build a world much in the same way he did.
The world we know was built up around the story of rincewind. Most of the world we saw in other stories varied on the needs of each story. The witches lived in fairy tale lands, the wizards in a sort of hogwartsy existance, many others in a 19th century london with debris from the first books sort of scattered around.
But the voice is there. Not quite the same of couse, but it feels like the spirit of the source material is there.
The adaption towards a US tv audience doesn’t kill it. Its just a bit jarring to begin with, and then you realise, we’re getting new discworld stories.
Not bad, that.
So I wholeheartedly recommend giving it a few eps, it really gets cooking around episode 6 or so. I’m looking forward to the next ep now. I want the series to survive, I want more new stories from the (as yet unmentioned) disc.
And I suspect the series will get even more pratchetty with time.