posted
I'm a little surprised this hasn't already earned a topic, as it seems like something right up the alley of a lot of people here.
But for anyone who missed it, it's a sci-fi reimagining of The Wizard of Oz, starring Zooey Deschenel (my one true love) as DG. It's six hours long, a three part miniseries starting tonight (but Part I is being replayed tomorrow night).
So far I've been really impressed. The cast is really good, the writing is good, the plot is the same at a very, very basic level, but every detail is different, and I think it's pretty creative. Thus far I'd really recommend it to anyone.
Also for BSG fans, there was a really, really cool commercial for BSG.
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posted
I'm recording it. It looks promising. If nothing else, I'm willing to give it a shot to see what Zooey is up to (call me!)
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posted
It sounds intriguing. A sci-fi and dystopian re-imagining of Oz is an interesting idea at least.
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posted
I'm not all that pleased with it. I'm something of an L. Frank Baum purist.
One thing Baum understood well was: You can't afford to bore your audience. Don't stretch things out when it's not needed, don't use pointless filler...and by all means, keep the plot moving.
Much as I love Zooey and the idea of an SF Oz...so far this is leaving me cold.
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posted
I'm going to park at my dad's next Sunday when they run all 3 parts together. I no longer have SciFi at home so I have to rely on him for Tin Man and BSG. We need to figure out how to extract from his DVR to something I can watch here.
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posted
Well I caught the first hour and change of it, and then fell asleep, not because it was boring but because I've been up since 7am for work.
And on the whole I thought it was pretty cool. It certainly never lacked for action, and I thought the new take on all the characters was pretty clever. I'll watch what I missed tomorrow night.
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posted
Tonight it's on opposite the season finale of Heroes. While I've been disappointed enough with Heroes this season to watch Tin Man instead, I don't know if my boyfriend is. Good thing we can catch it Tuesday.
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posted
Personally, I was never a big fan of the original Wizard of Oz - though I did enjoy the first 90% of Wicked (the book, haven't seen the play) before it was abruptly force-fitted into the ending of the original, thus ruining it in my eyes.
That said, I really enjoyed Tin Man. It was a true "reimagining" in the sense that it played with themes well without trying to conform too closely to the original.
Some of the dialogue was a little hokey - "There's no place like the O.Z."... ugh. But for the most part, I found the concept interesting. At least interesting enough to watch the next episode.
I've enjoyed what I've seen so far.
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posted
I'll have to give it a try, I guess. It sounds pretty out there, but it can't hurt.
Maybe I'll be pleasantly suprised, although most of the Sci Fi exclusive miniseries have left me cold.
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posted
Lyrhawn, were you aware that Zooey Deschannel is the younger sister of Emily Deschanel, who plays Temperance Brennan on the tv series Bones? Both sisters have very striking eyes--big, clear blue, luminous.
Besides sharing very striking eyes, the two sisters have very similar-sounding voices. I wonder if their mother can tell them apart on the phone.
Zooey Deschanel was the beautiful young music teacher in the recent Bridge to Terabithia. She also played Trillian in Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy. She has been in numerous other films, such as Big Trouble, and Elf (where she appeared as a blonde). Her acting debut was in 1999. Emily's acting debut was in 1994. Zooey is four years younger than Emily.
quote:Originally posted by FlyingCow: Personally, I was never a big fan of the original Wizard of Oz - though I did enjoy the first 90% of Wicked (the book, haven't seen the play) before it was abruptly force-fitted into the ending of the original, thus ruining it in my eyes.
You meant to say 50%, right?
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posted
I thought it was a neat enough book, but I'll admit I haven't read it again since the first time, and I don't feel like I've missed anything by not doing so. So I guess, good for a read, but not fantastic, not enough for me to check out the sequel anyways.
The music that I've heard from the musical version frightens me.
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Also I have mixed feelings about Wicked. On one hand, it's a cool book with interesting characters, The Witch is awesome and cool, it's good satire. But I can't help but being vaguely annoyed at an innocent kid's book being turned into... something rather crude and vulgar and unnessarily graphic in bits. There was no need for it. So I can't even decide. I haven't seen Tin Man yet because I don't get Sci Fi anymore.
quote:Originally posted by Ron Lambert: Lyrhawn, were you aware that Zooey Deschannel is the younger sister of Emily Deschanel, who plays Temperance Brennan on the tv series Bones? Both sisters have very striking eyes--big, clear blue, luminous.
Besides sharing very striking eyes, the two sisters have very similar-sounding voices. I wonder if their mother can tell them apart on the phone.
Zooey Deschanel was the beautiful young music teacher in the recent Bridge to Terabithia. She also played Trillian in Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy. She has been in numerous other films, such as Big Trouble, and Elf (where she appeared as a blonde). Her acting debut was in 1999. Emily's acting debut was in 1994. Zooey is four years younger than Emily.
posted
The pacing is TERRIBLE. The writing is pretty poor, too. *sigh* I really liked the idea, and I'm watching the first part to the end, but so far it's mediocre at best.
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posted
i saw maybe 5 minutes of it and i did not really like it, that could be that it was in the middle and i did not see the beginning but after what i have read it was just a plain out bust
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I just watched part 1 - recorded it last night. I liked it. It's just...fun, really. Quite enjoyable.
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The second part tonight was slightly better, but it's still too decompressed and slow.
Plus, despite the attempts at humor, the funniest thing was how Raw's makeup was very inconsistent throughout the episode. He went from craggy and haggard to baby-cheek smooth then back again several times. Posts: 6689 | Registered: Jan 2005
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posted
I just finished watching the second part, and I thought it was extremely enjoyable. I wouldn't watch a whole season of it mind you, but I love that everything is fleshed out, and the plot isn't as simple as you'd think.
I didn't mind the pacing. Some of it did seem a bit slow at times, but I'm a fan of plot exposition, so I guess it wouldn't bother me as much. It's no slower than the thing it is based on.
I would've liked more Richard Dreyfus, I liked his character.
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posted
I will admit I was not wildly enthusiastic about part one, but I thought part two was much better. Now I am beginning to care about the characters as they begin to care more about each other, and the plot is becoming more interesting, with it no longer just being DG vs. her evil sister. (I carefully worded that to avoid any real spoilers.)
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posted
I think it's kinda cute. I'll watch the third part tomorrow night.
I will admit, however, that it only took the voice for me to place Zero - I was reading an article, heard the voice, and said "LEOBEN?" Posts: 3932 | Registered: Sep 1999
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Yeah I didn't get that at first, but as soon as I caught on the character became 10 times more creepy to me.
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quote: I was reading an article, heard the voice, and said "LEOBEN?"
I'd be the same, except I'd be going 'RAY?'. I still can't find Leoben and Cavil that scary, because of the characters the actors played before. I keep half expecting Fraser and Sam (respectively) to turn up.
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posted
No, I liked the first maybe 80%... everything up to the "Dorothy and Co. getting attacked by witch from her castle" part, I enjoyed. After that, it sort of fell through for me. It felt rushed, out of character, and begrudgingly slavish to the source material. It was almost as though Maguire was saying "I don't want to write it this way, but I *have* to."
So, the ending left a sour taste for me. Enough that I didn't pick up the next book. Now it may be better because Maguire doesn't have to conform to existing plotlines, though it may also be worse because there isn't a preexisting framework to play in. Either way, not on my list of books to read at the moment.
As an aside, my roommate (a high school English teacher) hated Wicked for reasons that I felt comfortable letting slide. To each their own, I guess.
As for Tin Man, I haven't yet seen the second part, but it's taped.
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posted
The play is pretty good, and I believe handles the ending differently. I like the music from it, although I didn't at first. I was scared off by the performance of it at the Gr5ammy's to be honest, which was horrible.
Kristen Chenowith is amazing though, and is perfect for her role, both attitude-wise and voice-wise
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posted
Wicked wasn't very faithful to the source material, even at the end. Baum's Dorothy wasn't the complete and total load MacGuire's Dorothy was, for instance.
(Then again, it's obvious Gregory was basing his versions of events more on the MGM movie than the original novel.)
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posted
Then thing that really gets me is, I think Baum wouldn't have minded the "darkening" but WOULD have a problem with how much filler there is.
He came up with The Wonderful Wizard of Oz almost extemporaneously, making it up as he went along to entertain the toughest audience of all...little children.
He knew that no matter what happened in the story, he had to keep them riveted.
That's why the book is such an odd, vibrant patchwork. Why all the characters are likable or at least interesting.
The writers of Tin Man should have followed his example in that, if in nothing else.
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posted
But, of course, this time they aren't writing for little children, so the same conventions need not apply.
As for Maguire's not being faithful to the source material, I feel it would have benefited at the end by being a *lot* more unfaithful.
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quote:Originally posted by FlyingCow: But, of course, this time they aren't writing for little children, so the same conventions need not apply.
It's a convention that adults -like- being bored.
Have you read The Wonderful Wizard of Oz? Other than the Witch getting splashed, there really isn't much in the way of similarity between it's sequence and the one seen in Wicked. Heck, Baum's Wicked Witch of the West is a relatively minor character...doesn't even turn up outside of that section of the book.
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posted
I didn't find it boring. It wasn't written for those with ADD, surely, but it wasn't 2001: A Space Odyssey, either.
If you think Tin Man is slow, then you must find The Godfather excruciating.
I don't think that Tin Man had to keep the same pace as The Wizard of Oz - it was free to set its own pace.
I'm not sure, though, if you think Tin Man is too slow in comparison to the original, or if you just think it's too slow in general. If the first, I don't think it has to be, but I can understand the sentiment. If the second, I guess we just disagree on how fast something must be paced before it loses interest.
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I have not, nor do I feel compelled to right now, really. There's so much more on my list at the moment.
I saw the movie as a child (and a few times since) and was unimpressed each time (similar to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, actually). I read Wicked because I heard the play was good and I wanted to read the book prior (even after making that mistake and suffering through reading Phantom of the Opera), though I still have not gotten a chance to see the play.
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posted
How could anyone say Tin Man is too slow in its pacing? They don't spend any time breaking into song, or dancing and skipping down the yellow brick road while holding hands. Like TV Guide said, Tin Man is pretty much designed "to slap us out of our over-the-rainbow stupor."
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posted
lol personally i liked the munchkins songs it made the dark plot line of the book more enjoyable in a movie especially the little kids... then again people should show little kids the muppets version of it
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posted
The muppet version was hilarious. If I had to choose between Tin Man and Wizard of Oz the movie was was created a couple decades ago, I think I'd pick Tin Man.
Don't get me wrong, I love classics, but I love Sci-Fi more, and this in particular.
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posted
Aw, good ending. Easy to see how it was going to go, they spent enough time foreshadowing it, but I still liked it. The ending was a bit abrupt, but it was all still good.
As a whole I thought it was quite excellent.
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If you think Tin Man is slow, then you must find The Godfather excruciating.
"If you don't like _____ then you -must- hate ___ as well."
My opinion of one SF channel mini-series has nothing to do with my opinion of completely different stories.
That's like saying "If you love chocolate ice cream, then you must hate strawberries."
The producers of Tin Man hammered down relentlessly that this was their take on 'The Wizard of Oz'. They even have a game on the official website where you can play "spot the reference". So, I don't feel the need to defend my comparing the two, when that was what they did their best to encourage. Posts: 6689 | Registered: Jan 2005
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quote:I'm not sure, though, if you think Tin Man is too slow in comparison to the original, or if you just think it's too slow in general.
I still don't know which you think. Could you please clarify?
At times it seems as though you're saying it's just too darn slow. Then at others it seems you're saying it's just too darn slow for a Wizard of Oz adaptation. I can't tell which.
Is it too slow - meaning you feel that, in general, movies/shows need to move faster than it does and eliminate "filler" (as you put it), then it makes me wonder what other movies/shows you found too slow and too prone to "filler". The Godfather, being a slow to develop film with long spaces between action and a plot that didn't "keep moving", seemed to be something that would fit into that definition of "too slow". Namely, it doesn't really conform to what you said Baum understood so well in your post on 12/2 at 10:36.
But you then say that your opinion of one SF miniseries has nothing to do with your opinion of different stories... which makes me think that you don't think Tin Man is slow, per se, but that it is too slow for a WoO adaptation.
Out of totally honest curiosity, which is it? Too slow, period? Or, alternately, too slow for a WoO adaptation?
If the former, I think we just disagree on what makes a filmed work "slow". If the latter, I think we just disagree on how faithful the speed needed to adhere to the original (especially in light of everything else that was changed).
You have every right to either opinion, I'm just confused as to which of these is correct. Not attacking, just trying to understand.
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posted
I thought part three was pretty good, though not great. Some things about it were not as satisfying as they could have been, but it was an adequate ending. Maybe the ending was foreshadowed just a little too much.
The young actress who plays DG when she was a girl looks just like the daughter of a friend of mine did at that age. The two child actresses got a lot of air time! I think I liked the movie better when they were on screen. Nothing against Zooey Deschanel, but even she is not as cute as the 8- and 12-year olds who played DG and her sister as children. And they were good actresses!
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posted
I am so tired of people thinking Fantasy requires villains that are obvious in every way. Oh, I am evil, that is why I talk this way, and that is why I want to kill my sister. Blah blah blah. Blah.
I am completely impressed with Alan Cummings' American accent, however.
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quote:I am so tired of people thinking Fantasy requires villains that are obvious in every way. Oh, I am evil, that is why I talk this way, and that is why I want to kill my sister. Blah blah blah. Blah.
I'm curious as to how you think that applies to Tin Man, if you do.
It turned out that it wasn't cut and dry. A simple, obvious evil would have actually been her sister and would have just wanted power and to kill her sister, but it was deeper than that, DG had guilt issues from how her sister got that way, and it turns out she was possessed.
Don't get me wrong, I hate obviously evil evil that is just evil for the sake of being evil. I've ranted about it elsewhere, mostly on Stargate, and how I hate one dimensional bad guys and how complex ones are far more interesting. While Azkadelia may not have been super complex, I also don't think she was one dimensional.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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posted
By the end of the third part, I was seriously annoyed that Zooey Deschanel only had one facial expression. Two if we count her closing her mouth as a whole new expression. And I agree that the ending was a bit foreshadowed. I knew exactly how it would end by the end of the second part.
But those are my only complaints. Cain's scenes with his son were probably my favorite. Or maybe DG running through the woods and young DG and Az doing the same. Az's sweet smile for her dad and nervousness about her mom were touching.
A little more denouement would have been nice. A one year later moment when we see how the various guilt issues have resolved themselves or something. Cain's probably leading the Queen's guards and mentoring his son in all the nuances of justice and restraint he missed out on growing up a resistance fighter. Ambrose probably got his brain back. He and Raw are probably Queen's advisors. DG's been walking around making trees bloom. Az needs a serious PR campaign or maybe to leave the OZ all together. People might understand that it wasn't her fault intellectually, but on a gut level her face = evil.
But I can always imagine what they went through afterwards, so I'm happy.
Posts: 2283 | Registered: Dec 2003
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posted
AAUUUUGHHH. I have been watching it all night on Scifi's website. I get to part 3, then of that part 8 of 8. The final part of the miniseries, and it is a mistake and is a repeat of part 7...
Posts: 2705 | Registered: Sep 2006
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posted
Wait for it to come out on DVD. They'll probably have extra features, and maybe even some extended scenes.
You know, the rehabilitation of Azkadelia reminds me a little of the Isle Witch in Terry Brooks' fantasies, who has a similar problem of not having everyone forgive her after she had been converted.
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