r/TopCharacterTropes • u/Morr4Seiya • 8d ago

Hated Tropes An adaptation completely botches the original theme and message

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Mulan(2020)-They give Mulan superpowers which is not only lame it goes against the message of the original about equality and struggle,plus they removes Shang because apparently having Mulan date her superior was "problematic" even though Shang genuienely respected Mulan and their rank was never brought up

I am Legend(2007)-You know why the story is called "I am legend"? SPOILER ALERT the protagonist is the actual monster,humanity is gone and the vampires have a actual society and the protagonist kills and terrorize them

Animal Farm(2026)-On the very slim chance that Andy Serkis ever sees this,here's the thing Andy,Animal Farm was not a children work it was not supposed to have a happy ending,you never heard of cautionary tales before?

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u/ultr4violence 8d ago

The adaptation of The Foundation by Aasimov. The best part of the show is something that wasn't even in the books, while it basically treats the books like decoration while its core themes are completely ignored.

Good scifi, bad adaptation.

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u/Environmental_Leg449 8d ago

I only watched the one season of Foundation, but its comical how the themes of the show are exactly opposite of the themes of the book. Not just different, 180 degree opposite. I think the show writers know this but the dissociation makes it impossible for me to watch

I agree that the generic Empire stuff is far and away the best part of the show

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u/ultr4violence 8d ago

I'm still convinced the writers had the Empire concept as an original show, but got handed Foundation instead.

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u/Brief-Coach-1812 7d ago

Its like a common trope in adaptations. Writers had original idea but studio execs come in and say "no you adapt this established IP". Writers then decide to put their ideas in anyway, its not like the execs will scrutinize their work ...

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u/Sea-Poem-2365 7d ago

Jane Espensen is, I believe, one of the showrunners and exec producers; she's got at least one other show to her name that was an original pitch with a license grafted on to get it launched (Caprica).

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u/ultr4violence 7d ago

I was so bummed when that show got cancelled.

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u/Sea-Poem-2365 7d ago

Rough pacing for some of the season, but they pulled it together nicely and it would have been a great show by season 2 I think.

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u/Zmuli24 7d ago

I also somewhat could have accepted Hari Seldon being a bit more Involved in the second foundation, because IMO Jared Harris was another actor carrying the series in addition to Lee Pace and the empire storyline, and because the second foundation was never that fleshed out in the books.

But then it just started to become more and more just studio exec's shoehorned attempt at making it The Dune during the second season with Gaal Dornik and Salvor Hardin storyline, I just lost interest.

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u/CadenVanV 7d ago

The changes to Salvor Hardin were especially bad. They gave a gun to the character who said “violence is the last refuge of the incompetent”

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u/Pjoernrachzarck 7d ago

Nobody disagrees that the Foundation show is at painful odds with the novel.

But man, it’s a cool show. And it just gets better.

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u/RecoveredAlive 8d ago

I've read the book series and watched the show. What did you see as the best part that wasn't in the books and what themes of the books did the show get wrong. I just want to have a conversation with someone about this show lol

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u/Junjki_Tito 8d ago

The best part of the show by far is the Cleon Demerzel thread

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u/cmarkcity 8d ago

I was baffled to find out that the best part of the show (Lee Pace is amazing) is basically just a footnote from the source material.

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u/HustlinInTheHall 8d ago

If you have Lee Pace, you use Lee Pace.

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u/Last_Suggestion_8647 7d ago

The books are about how individuals don't really matter in the great scheme of things, they are just noise in greater picture of human civilization. What matters are the trends and forces of history. Which is both liberating and a bit depressing.

The show is about how there are these super special people are actually super important, and are the drivers of history.

For instance, the book series swap the entire cast of protagonists out, at least every book, and iirc also a couple of times mid book.

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u/First_Foundationeer 7d ago

To be fair, the books actually ask the question and then flip flops a few times. 

Individuals aren't important.. but then we want smart ones using the big forces to play the enemies against each other! 

Individuals are important? Nah, spend the whole time following the story of this kid only for the general to get fucked over by the emperor (like the Romans, Chinese, Koreans, etc. all loved to do). 

But wait, what about really, REALLY unique individuals? They might be important. That's why you need a whole collection of really unique individuals to counter them.

In the end, I'm not sure if Asimov really ever concluded the balance between the individual and the sociological forces at play. And that's kinda how it is. In the right setup, even a tiny grain of sand can fuck up a whole system.

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u/Odd_Cauliflower_8004 7d ago

Individuals are not important to the limit of that the socioeconomic forces at play will make someone act in a determinate way by the sheer psycho historic pressure. But we do need those individuals to take the reins. And the second foundation subtly influenced the right individual to ensure the correct flow of history

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u/First_Foundationeer 7d ago

No, no, the second foundation does not exist. I swear it, as a first foundationeer.

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u/Last_Suggestion_8647 7d ago

I agree, the books are a bit more nuanced than I initially wrote. Although in my opinion those exceptional individuals are portrayed as expectational people filling historical roles that social forces would have filled with someone else.

For instance, if Julius Caesar had died as an infant, it's very probably that some other extremely competent politician would have filled the role as leader of the popularies faction, because that's how power vacuums work.  And that other competent popularies leader would have been opposed by leaders of the optimate faction, even if Pompey, Cato or Brutus had never been born and so on.

Although the books do go a little off the rails, when psychic powers are introduced tbh.

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u/nir109 7d ago edited 7d ago

Only the first book is about that.

In the second book has a super special guy fucks everything up.

And in the third book we learn that there was a telepath conspiracy to ensure history follows the right path. Because otherwise it won't.

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u/Odd_Cauliflower_8004 7d ago

It might not or it might deviate and take longer. But expecially the first few seldom crisis were orchestrated to ensure that the right path is taken.

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u/nir109 7d ago

We don't know if the plan actually works. The books cover only half the plan. There are 500 years where we don't know what is going on. The mule shows that the plan can be derailed and need restoration.

Even if you believe that the plan will recover and the foundation will create the second empire. The prequel "Prelude to Foundation" shows that the plan being made in the first place is the result of "super special people" (Sheldon and his daughter)

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u/Odd_Cauliflower_8004 7d ago

If you have read foundation and gaia you will understand that the plan cannot fail on a more fundamental level

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u/nir109 7d ago

I can't find this on Google and I am pretty sure I read the entire series. Do you maybe mean foundation and earth? Or did I miss a book

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u/Odd_Cauliflower_8004 7d ago

Sorry its called foundation and earth. Trevize goes searching for earth and finds Gaia - which reminds me a lot of the nemesis planet.

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u/nir109 7d ago

I will be honest I forgot it.

I think it still doesn't return to the themes of the first book.

There is still a super special someone controlling history. Him being a robot doesn't change the fact that it's still a super special someone calling the shots.

This is still not the collective going on an inevitable course determined by macro factors like the first book present.

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u/gin_possum 7d ago

The only film I can think of that tries to take this approach to history is Battleship Potemkin. It’s Soviet Marxism, so its main characters are the People and Historical Materialism. And it falls into the individual character trap a couple times too

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u/Last_Suggestion_8647 7d ago

It's probably hard to avoid entirely while still having a compelling narrative. Humans seem preprogrammed to think in personal narratives. Same reason why ancient humans felt the need to personify and assign intent to various natural phenomena, or why even people who now know better, unintentionally use language of intent to about natural phenomena.

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u/gin_possum 7d ago

Yep, well said 

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u/WhatTheeBlake 7d ago

The worst thing about the show is how much extra bs they go through so characters are around a lot longer than they are in the books.

Salvor Hardin is a special child with a connection to the vault, ever since she was a kid, she's always felt a need to patrol the perimeter of where she lived. She says things she can't explain, because she "has a feeling."

Almost every time the foundation characters were on screen after the first couple episodes, I debated just skipping the scene.

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u/Fit_Addition7137 8d ago

Completely agree. I actually enjoy the show quite a bit, I just hate that it's associated with the book. Lee Pace's scenery chewing is impeccable.

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u/ultr4violence 8d ago

I want to watch the show that is just Empire.

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u/taylorpilot 8d ago

The foundation became harder and harder to watch

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u/TbonerT 7d ago

Yeah, it went from sci-Fi that was almost magical to actually magic.

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u/Mister-builder 8d ago

I, Robot too.

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u/winklevanderlinde 8d ago

really liked the clones plot lines, wish it was somehow retroactively added in the books so you can have everything good with the foundation inside a single thing

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u/pic_omega 8d ago

No ví la serie. Es recomendable o patina mucho como en "Yo robot" ?

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u/Ulq2525 8d ago

It surprised me reading it blindly that the initial characters I get curious about suddenly just disappear. Then you understand that they are secondary to the bigger picture. But not irrelevant.

Which makes Foundation the worst series to adapt and sell to the masses.

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u/BoiFrosty 7d ago

I just finished the original foundation trilogy last week. Is it really that bad? I remember hearing that they basically skipped the whole successive generations thing and just stuck with a core cast.

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u/Albert_Flagrants 7d ago

The Foundation is my favorite book trillogy, but when the serie came out, let's just say I have never been so sad while watching a movie or serie, I genuinely got depressed for a while.

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u/censuur12 7d ago

It's the same true for other Aasimov adaptations? I robot was a mess.

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u/Cent1234 7d ago

Yeah, same with Altered Carbon Season 1: Great standalone show, terrible adaptation of a book.

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u/Sea-Poem-2365 7d ago

THIS. I actually started enjoying it when I just admitted it had nothing to do with the books; it's a solid space opera show with a degree of sophistication about everything except the subject matter. It's wild how big the swing between the Empire storylines (I suspect the actual original pitch for this show) and the Foundation (something I think was bolted on to get the project greenlit) ones.

That said, it's gradually turning into an interesting version of Asimov's Robot stories, which is weird.

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u/ultr4violence 7d ago

My problem was that I had recently finished reading the Foundation series, so I came into the show way too fresh. I think I'll let it run its course and then give it another go when the books are less in memory. Like you said, watch it as its own thing.

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u/joedenowhere 6d ago

I caught a few minutes of some violent, chaotic sci-fi film with Will Smith. I was astounded to learn that it was someone’s idea of Asimov’s “I, Robot.” What were they thinking?

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u/SmartAlec105 8d ago

I remember hearing that they were making an adaptation and wondering "how are they going to do that when the main character is History itself and it focuses on how it moves by collective motion rather than due to the actions of a handful of individuals?"

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u/Wuz314159 7d ago

People don't seem to realise good scifi isn't cgi space battles, but parallels of today's society. Morality Tales if you were.

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u/Beginning-Ice-1005 7d ago

Well, the core themes in the books were either kind of terrible and not well thought out, or shown to be completely wrong from the first chapter. So it's not surprising that the TV series ran with something wise

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u/Arbusc 7d ago

Man why can’t we just get a real adaption of the Robot series.