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Good Omens
I finished the Amazon Good Omens miniseries last night. It was only six episodes, but I made a purposeful decision not to binge them -- I've been waiting for this show forever, and I wanted to savor it a little bit.
Verdict: this is maybe the most faithful adaptation from book to screen that I've ever seen. Perhaps a little too faithful; I'm hard-pressed to say that the film version really brought anything new to the story. Basically, it is the book, translated to moving image, in a way that tv shows and movies made from books rarely manage. I'm sure Neil Gaiman being the showrunner as well as sole writer of all six scripts had a lot to do with that. It's also my understanding that his late co-author, Terry Pratchett, really wanted this mini-series to happen, and I can't blame Gaiman if he didn't want to drift too far from the source material out of respect for Pratchett. Looked at as a love letter from Gaiman to a friend and collaborator, and to the book they created together, the show succeeds, and almost couldn't have succeeded better.
Now, whether this choice served the show as a show, I'm less certain. But I will say that I loved a lot about it. The casting of David Tennant as Crowley is just perfect as I knew it would be. I'm less familiar with Michael Sheen's work, but it's hard to imagine a better Aziraphale. Separately and together, the two of them carry the show and then make it transcend every other limitation. If some of the side characters were a little under-developed -- Adam's friends, all of the Horsemen except maybe War, and Newt Pulsifer especially come to mind -- in the end, Crowley, Aziraphale, and their relationship are the heart of the story, so as long as that's played right I don't care as much. And it worked for me very well.
So I'm quite glad that a filmed version of Good Omens finally exists, after so many false starts and failed attempts. And I hope we see another adaptation someday in the future, maybe made by someone with a little more distance from the source material and who can find something new and different in the story to share. I think there's enough meat in here, about the world and its people and whether its worth saving, that someone could take another bite at it. But if this is the only one we ever get, I'm content with that too.
Verdict: this is maybe the most faithful adaptation from book to screen that I've ever seen. Perhaps a little too faithful; I'm hard-pressed to say that the film version really brought anything new to the story. Basically, it is the book, translated to moving image, in a way that tv shows and movies made from books rarely manage. I'm sure Neil Gaiman being the showrunner as well as sole writer of all six scripts had a lot to do with that. It's also my understanding that his late co-author, Terry Pratchett, really wanted this mini-series to happen, and I can't blame Gaiman if he didn't want to drift too far from the source material out of respect for Pratchett. Looked at as a love letter from Gaiman to a friend and collaborator, and to the book they created together, the show succeeds, and almost couldn't have succeeded better.
Now, whether this choice served the show as a show, I'm less certain. But I will say that I loved a lot about it. The casting of David Tennant as Crowley is just perfect as I knew it would be. I'm less familiar with Michael Sheen's work, but it's hard to imagine a better Aziraphale. Separately and together, the two of them carry the show and then make it transcend every other limitation. If some of the side characters were a little under-developed -- Adam's friends, all of the Horsemen except maybe War, and Newt Pulsifer especially come to mind -- in the end, Crowley, Aziraphale, and their relationship are the heart of the story, so as long as that's played right I don't care as much. And it worked for me very well.
So I'm quite glad that a filmed version of Good Omens finally exists, after so many false starts and failed attempts. And I hope we see another adaptation someday in the future, maybe made by someone with a little more distance from the source material and who can find something new and different in the story to share. I think there's enough meat in here, about the world and its people and whether its worth saving, that someone could take another bite at it. But if this is the only one we ever get, I'm content with that too.