The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

[Drunk Monk]

With the movie dropping soon, we thought we'd revisit Dawn Treader as a family night time read. I remember this being my favorite book of the series, but I don't remember why or what happened. It's interesting to see the deviations from the film like Caspian is blonde and Reepicheep is black, 2 feet tall and has a shrill voice. But my main contention is Eustace. Yeah, it's more of my Eu-name-prefix issues, like with Tangled. Eustace is the grumpy nerd who will take over as Lucy and Edmund step out of the Narnia tale. Adding insult to injury, Eustace's parents are are vegetarians, nonsmokers, teetotallers, and wear a special kind of underclothes. He also goes to a progressive school. Damn, good thing DM smokes or Lewis would be eerily on target, especially with the underclothes.

[Drunk Monk]

After reading the book again, it still stands out as the best of the series, but I don't think I quite got it all when I read it in high school. It's really the quest for the holy grail, although the grail is seven lords. The juxtaposition of Eustace as the modern scientific skeptic with Reep as the faithful is Lewis at his best as a Christian writer. It's a great tale, so thick with metaphor that's it's just delicious, like a chocolate Jesus.

As for the movie. Crap.

I can live with little tweaks like Reep not being black and Caspian not being blond. Blond Caspian made the Telmarines seem more ethnic so they could play out some modern metaphors. Dawn Treader shredded the book, flipped all the stories around just to get some stereotypic 'climactic' scenes so prevalent in blockbuster films nowadays. Unfortunately the story arc is so messed up that nothing builds tension towards those climaxes, so they just wind up overdone. Eustace is reduced to a whiner. Edmund fails to live up to the promise of sequel 2, and reverts to a pawn of the White Witch, who appears in some hallucinations, just to be sure Tilda is still in the game. Lucy, who has grown to be a stunning beauty, can't sell the Susan is hotter schtick. Susan, well, she'll never make it to the promised land. She's the only one who gets left behind. Peter is just there for no reason at all, for a tiny cameo. Caspian falls for another star ala Stardust, which is odd. The fights are lame. The effects are okay but nothing new and the Ghostbusters Sea Serpent is totally over done. On the up side, the 3-D is good, not overwhelming but accentuating, making the Dawn Treader look great.

The hardest part is that this will be the a turning point in the series as Lucy drops out. Eustace takes over, and Jill is mentioned in the end (even though she shouldn't be as she doesn't come in until the next book at all. The torch wasn't passed well, so it'll be harder for the franchise to continue. They need to stay with Eustace as the actor will age. But there's the Magician's Nephew and Horse and His Boy that stand out of this timeline. I hope this crew sees the franchise through as Tilda and Liam are good in the roles, but we'll see. This installment messed up a lot of things for the next one. I think it'll all hinge on who they get for Jill.

[Drunk Monk]

I got T the BBC series of Narnia, in a nice little boxed set, which goes all the way to the Silver Chair. I got her them for xmas by trading in some used reggae and crummy sample DVDs I've received. The BBC version is pretty dated, but truer to the original script. I think I reviewed Lion, Witch, Wardobe here, but I'm not about to search for it now. The gist of it was that the pantomime Aslan costume was pretty cool, but the girl they cast as Lucy was godawful.

We checked out Treader. Reepicheep is a dwarf in a rat suit, which completely ruins his nobility. When Eustace becomes the dragon, well, it's another horrid costume. And the sea serpent is just silly, but looks a lot like the sea serpent in the 2010 film. The dufflepuds aren't too bad, all things considered, but for T, well, she's spoiled with CGI and who can blame her? Those old green-screen effects just don't compare anymore.

We're waiting for a rainy day to watch BBC Caspian and Silver Chair. A real rainy day.

[thatguy]

Is that the version with Tom Baker as Puddleglum?

--tg

[Drunk Monk]

thanks for the tip, tg! that'll make it much more enjoyable for me when we get around to watching it.

[Drunk Monk]

Silver Chair totally redeemed the BBC version. It was all about Baker as Puddleglum. Puddleglum is a marshwiggle, which is sort of a frog man, but the character is basically Eeyore and Baker just runs with it. His bug eyes and odd expressions make the role. Gone is the horrid Lucy, replaced by a far superior Jill. There's still the same cool Aslan puppet and a regurgitation of the dragon puppet from Treader. There's one big underground set which is very Dr. Who. The climax is ruined by a laughable rubber snake. Still haven't seen BBC Caspian.

It's hard to explain to T's generation what effects were like before CGI.

[Greg_phpbb3_import1]

Can't the effects in 2001 and Star Wars considered pre-CGI? Or the ones in Gone with the Wind for that matter with it's almost 200 matte shots.

[Drunk Monk]

...and T hates Star Wars. Although believe it or not, she's seen Cocteau's Beauty and the Beast and liked that for its effects. Still, that's no match for those cheesey BBC rubber monsters ala Baker's Dr. Who or this production. There's just no comparison.

[Greg_phpbb3_import1]

Do you mean Cocteau's Beauty and the Beast? Or did Bunuel make one as well?