Earthsea

[spookthis]

Has anyone seen this made for the Sci Fi channel mini series yet? I missed it the first night it was on and also missed again on Tues. It is on again Sunday, but for like 4 hours. Just want to know if it is worth my time.

 

[jazz lady]

I watched it. It was pretty good, but it's definitely a LOTR clone. I haven't looked it up yet, but I swear the lead character is being played by the same actor who played Sam in LOTR (Sean Astin?).

 

[Tonio]

Le Guin wrote an article in Slate magazine disowning the production:

http://www.slate.com/id/2111107/

When I sold the rights to Earthsea a few years ago, my contract gave me the standard status of "consultant"—which means whatever the producers want it to mean, almost always little or nothing...

I said that although I knew that a film must differ greatly from a book, I hoped they were making no unnecessary changes in the plot or to the characters—a dangerous thing to do, since the books have been known to millions of people for decades. They replied that the TV audience is much larger, and entirely different, and would be unlikely to care about changes to the books' story and characters.

 

[SamSpade]

The main actor is Shawn Ashmore - he was Iceman in the X-Men movies.

"The Wizard of Earthsea" was written in 1969, and is the first of a series of books Ms. Leguin wrote through the 70's. While it is certainly true that LOTR (the books, not the movie) influenced every fantasy book to come after it (since he began them in the 30's and finished in the 50's), the Earthsea books stand very well on their own. They're the most readable of Leguin's books - most of her other stories, such as "The Left Hand of Darkness" and "The Dispossessed" I found tediously dull (although *everyone* should read, or watch, "The Lathe of Heaven", a fascinating story about a man whose dreams always come true, and in fact, *alter* reality).

I'm sure Earthsea resembles LOTR on TV, but they're not connected except that they are both fantasy - fantasy stories often look alike.

 

[spookthis]

Thanks for the reviews, books should never be compared to the movie, one can't compare with the other. And I will pick up the other suggest reading soon as I'm done with the two I'm reading now, SS..ever read Chronicals of Amber or any of the Eden series?

 

[Club'nBabySeals]

And I was under the impression there weren't any other dorks in Southern Maryland.....







I wasn't terribly impressed with Sci-Fi's version of Earthsea---as the acting is atrocious, and the story strays pretty far from that in the book.



If you're looking for amazing epic fantasy, though, I would suggest picking up George R.R. Martin's "A Song of Ice and Fire" series.

A Game of Thrones
A Clash of Kings
A Storm of Swords
A Feast for Crows (not out yet...but hopefully soon)


It's by far the most rivetting fantasy saga I've ever read---and it in fact has changed my entire outlook on the genre. Everything else seems to pale in comparison. It's not light reading, though, so if you're used to Harry Potter, don't do this to yourself.

 

[spookthis]

I'm not an official dork, just on the cusp, my brother got me into Sci Fi with Stranger in a Strange Land...I'm not an enthusiast, just like to read a variety of stuff. I will also scope out your suggested reading. I also liked Koontz, The Bad Place.

 

[Steve]

My favorites:

The Foundation Series by Isaac Asimov (read these about 6 times now)
Dune (the original) by Frank Herbert (the rest of the books kinda sucked)
The Once and Future King by T.H. White. This one is a retelling of the Arthurian legend and is definitely not for the gentle reader. Written at an advanced reading level, like Dune.

 

[Tonio]

I'm not an official dork, just on the cusp

That describes me, too. I read some SF in college, and still read Harlan Ellison who hasn't written anything in that genre for decades. I also got into Leiber and Heinlein and Adams.

But I never considered myself a full-fledged SF geek. For one thing, most of the successful authors seemed to be writing fantasy series, and I never liked Tolkein-type fantasy. (To this day, I've never read Lord of the Rings or seen the movies.) I didn't like "hard" SF either, because it was too sterile.

I like Ellison because he includes scientific or fantastic elements in stories as plot devices, but his stories are really about people. That's why I like watching Smallville--the focus of the show isn't necessarily Clark's ability, but how he struggles to fit in as a Kryptonian among Earthlings.