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Divergent by Veronica Roth
#1
Part and parcel of being a parent is reading what your kid reads. Divergent is part 1 of a NYT bestselling trilogy (part 3 just came out) soon be be a major motion picture. It's highly derivative of Harry Potter and Hunger Games - teens separated into 'factions' like Hogwart's houses, dystopian future where the kids have to fight a lot, misfit neurosis and first kisses. Ahhh, teen lit. Reminds me of that episode of the Simpsons where they collaborate on writing a kid's book. One of us should so do this and make our fortune. Roth writes with mediocre descriptive flair and is very heavy-handed with Tris's inner teen monologue. Her characters are pretty flat - typical bullies, pals, nerds, save for main character Tris, rather unimpressive all in all. T luvs this book, btw, as does many of her classmates. The varsity volleyball team at her school has taken 'Dauntless' as their motto, which is the faction equivalent to Gryffindor in courage but are a gang of goth warriors instead of British wizards.

That being said, it should make a decent movie. Kate Winslet will nail the villainess Jeanine and Maggie Q should make a good Tori. Ashley Judd as Natalie...eh. It'll all hinge on Shailene, who was brilliant in the Descendants, but will be invariably compared to Jen Lawrence and that will be a hard act to follow.

Not sure if I'll bother with Insurgent. The most annoying thing is that Divergent is really just the set up. The battle begins in the final chapters.
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#2
I got invited to the screener next week. They are only doing one in SF because they anticipate this to be the next big YA film hit. I was ready for this one, having bothered to read the book, and being up in Hunger Games, the martial choreographer, et.al. I was hoping that it would work out so I could get T there and make her the coolest freshman on campus for a few days having seen this before anyone else. The bulk of the review is already written in my head, just waiting for the screener so I could barf it up like a bad bit of sushi. But no. The screener is next Tuesday and I have to be at the welcoming banquet for the Abbot of Shaolin Temple. :?
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#3
This labeling of 'kids', 'teen' literature pisses me off.

"Alice in Wonderland" is great for adults, "Harry Potter" is great for adults, "Where the Sidewalk Ends" is great for adults, "The Chronicles of Narnia" and "The Golden Compass" are great for adults, and if anyone tells me "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" is for kids only I will smack them with a copy of "The Phantom Tollbooth".

Maybe I'm just generationally retarded but I still like Dr. Seuss.

I may read this as an adult just out of spite.
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#4
Most people our age have moved on to reading their AARP newsletters. Confusedhock:

I should correct my earlier post - 'teen lit' is a dated term. It's YA lit now.

As for the film, Divergent comes off as derivative in entirely new ways that I didn't see in the book. Wait, was that a scene from The Birds? And that...that was straight outta Titanic. The ending surprised me as in my old age, I totally forgot how the book ended. "Are they going into book 2 now?" dm whispers to his daughter. "No, they just messed up the story," she whispers back. Shailene was really good, strangely like Jen Lawrence in that she has a fairly plain face for a starlet, but there's an uncommon undeniable charisma about her. T thinks she'll be excellent in her next YA lit2flick, The Fault in our Stars, which she has read as well. Kate, Maggie and Ashley are all good. The prez from Scandal is in it too - he's not that good. Nor is the lead hunk, who has one expression, which is that sort of smouldering look typical of YAlit2flick hunks. The dystopian feel of the film is about the same as always. There's a huge hallucinogenic factor, which is delivered rather tepidly but y'all know how picky I am about hallucination scenes. For most, the film will be dark in the shadow of Hunger Games, and upon exiting the theater, I was skeptical that it would escape that and be doomed to a one-off YAlit2flick like City of Ember or Golden Compass, but at T predicted, the massive YA following boosted the BO to a $56 mill take, so the next installment looks like a go.

T was still deciding whether she liked it or not. She was at odds with the book, which is funnier. The movie lost almost all the sense of humor that is in the book, save one precious retort to the old standby line "You're not going to shoot me." No swordfights. And the fight scenes were mediocre on the whole - the en guard position for Dauntless H2H was silly. You know what would be really cool? A film which climaxed with a sword fight between Shailene and Jennifer Lawrence....in 3D no less.
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#5
I saw Divergent this weekend. I had only seen part of the trailer. I wasn't up on the story. I hadn't even read DM's book review. All I know was it was a dystopian Sci-Fi flick. DM nailed it with the Hunger Games meets Harry Potter. Maybe a little Starship Troopers thrown in for good measure.

As for "teen" or YA fiction, when the heroine gets kissed by the hunky co-star, she says "I want to go slow", and then they wake up the next morning. All in all, I found myself not drawn into the story. I didn't find Shailene all that compelling. The fight scenes were awful. The story pretty predictable. I was stunned all of the audience applause at the end of the film. I was surprised there was any at all, actually... It really makes me wonder about "kids these days".

--tg
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#6
Well, the sequel was a little better. The 3D was really robust and the effects were amusing. They hide out in the Amity faction, which is funny because that's the hippie commune that grows all the food, and I'm amused by dystopian hippie depictions. It's all still very derivative - there was this scene that T dubbed the "Harry Potter moment" - the good guys (Hogwarts/factionless) are threatened by the villain (Voldemort/Jeanine) to give up the chosen one (Harry/Tris) or innocent will die. What I enjoyed about this was that there was a lot of PTSD dream sequences, and of course, the sims, which were all somewhat hallucinogenic and played with what was real and was was delusion. The filmmakers constantly tried to trick the audience into believing a dream/sim was real; I was never fooled but I was entertained. The kid from Whiplash was in it. He was a character in the first film but he didn't pop out at me until this one. He was good. The fight choreography continues to be mediocre, but not as glaringly so as in the first film. They have cool guns but can't hit anything with time (villains can't hit them running across an open field). The only time they can hit their targets are the execution-style shootings, which are surprisingly brutal - not acts of mercy from the good guys to the prone villain, and an innocent child gets offed so. You don't really need to see the first one to get this one, especially if you've seen Hunger Games or Harry Potter. I wouldn't really recommend it though.

T says book 3 gets stupid and book 4 gets super stupid because it retells books 1-3 from the guy's perspective instead of Tris'.

I think the next book is called Detergent
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#7
Was it better than The Mortal Instruments? That was a classic shitty YA film...

ED - thanks for mentioning The Phantom Tollbooth. I haven't thought of that in a long time. I didn't read that until I was an adult. It's a great book.

DM - there was a copy of The Fault in Our Stars in the house we rented in Palm Springs. I picked it up but only read a page or two. I think teens would like it because the writing style - first person from the main character - would probably seem real to them, but I found it mannered and off-putting, and didn't think I could take a whole book of it. Plus he seemed to be pulling out the tired trope of the teen being wiser than the adults, who don't understand anything.
the hands that guide me are invisible
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#8
King Bob Wrote:Was it better than The Mortal Instruments? That was a classic shitty YA film...
Couldn't tell ya. Didn't read or watch that one.

King Bob Wrote:DM - there was a copy of The Fault in Our Stars in the house we rented in Palm Springs. I picked it up but only read a page or two. I think teens would like it because the writing style would probably seem real to them, but I found it mannered and off-putting.
T enjoyed that book but mostly because all her friends were into it. She wasn't hugely into it. No magic. We never saw the film. Maybe she did but I don't think so.
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#9
Amazingly I talked T into seeing this with me because she told the guy she's dating she would see it with him; the DOOM bros with daughters understand. it was fun to catch a flick together because we so seldom do nowadays and that breaks my heart. Even if it's mediocre YA. But I got this far so I figured I should finish the trilogy.

SPOILER ALERT (as if any of you will even bother with this) what makes this series unique is that the heroine dies at then end. T warned me and I was looking forward to seeing how it would play out. But on the movie version, they bailed. Tris lives happily ever after. T was all 'what!? That's it!?!?' I was all 'you said she died at the end. I'm disappointed.' T said 'I know, right?' She says she may reread the last chapter because she doesn't quite remember the book very well. END SPOILER ALERT

The Whiplash kid was still the best character. There were some special effects that were ok. Jeff Daniels was predictable and a little annoying.
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#10
SPOILER ALERT
So T re-read that last chapter and said that Tris did die because she had to run into the memory-erasing gas chamber which was protected by death gas, sacrificing herself for others ala Spock in Wrath of Khan.  There was even clear security doors in the movie, so they totally could have done a 'needs of the many, few, one' scene.  
END SPOILER ALERT

There is a Book 4 in this series.  It's the whole story retold from 4's perspective.  T said that it was originally written that way, but then Roth changed it to Tris's perspective.  I should also mention that T got some really cool free Allegiant posters from SV comic con, which have very little to do with the movie, but she hung them up anyway because they look cool.  Not nearly as cool as her personally autographed (and now framed) Ray Park 8x10.  I'm sure it will amuse all of you to learn that I cannibalized that frame off an old Stevie Nicks pic.   Blush
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#11
We met Veronica Roth tonight at a book signing event -a gift Stacy got for Tara for Xmas. She won the lottery and got to be one of the 100 people who got to meet Veronica, get her autographed book personalized and take a pic. There was easily more than 200 attendees so it was held at SC high. Veronica is very charming and cute, and young. Made me rather jealous that she's so successful so early and has such a following.
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