sᴍᴏᴋᴇ sɪɢɴᴀʟs
Reptile Researcher
be cunning and full of tricks
Posts: 26
Likes: 15
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Post by sᴍᴏᴋᴇ sɪɢɴᴀʟs on Oct 15, 2017 20:45:45 GMT -5
did anyone else feel like the netflix series was disappointingly lacking in gothic influences? thats what the novels always felt like to me... maybe its just because im a visual person, but that bothered me. somehow they managed to have some of the best set design ive seen in years, yet still the world felt a little lifeless. i suppose that adds to the "children's story" element, but i just think they could have pushed the stylization and aesthetics a bit more. thats something i think the first movie got pretty spot-on, actually...
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Post by gothicarchiesfan on Oct 15, 2017 22:53:59 GMT -5
The books have no specific aesthetic and Helquist's drawings of costumes and locations were never particularly gothic apart from the occasional piece of Edwardian influenced clothing. Hell, the few times Helquist actually produced coloured illustrations, they were actually quite bright and pastel. It was only really the movie that had the whole gothic look to it. As for the books' story being gothic influenced, I can only really point to the Bad Beginning as being a specific take off on gothic literature. The rest have almost nothing to do with any of the archetypes and tropes of gothic literature and indeed seem to be far more influenced by all the different kinds of novel that have nothing to do with Gothic storytelling. (Unless you consider characters being sad about the sad situations they're in, to be a storytelling technique exclusive to gothic literature.)
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Post by zinthaniel on Oct 16, 2017 2:00:23 GMT -5
There is nothing in the book series that suggests that a live- action adaption should be Gothic. I'm assuming the culprit here isn't the books but the film super imposing it's interpretation into popular head canon. The books themselves are very quirky and absurdist and anachronistic ( jumping from contemporary to period). The Netflix series, much to the tangerine of everyone's nostalgia fogged glasses, is very in-sync with the book series.
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Post by A comet crashing into Earth on Oct 16, 2017 4:38:09 GMT -5
I do see what you mean - the books' contents are dark in a metaphorical sense, and it's easy to connect that with literal darkness. Plus the influence of the movie, of course (and flawed as that was in many ways, especially next to the new adaptation, it did have pretty cool set designs). I agree that the series is more about exploring different settings, though, and in a way, it seems the most appropriate for it to hide a trove of terrors beneath brightly coloured costumes and technicolour sets.
I can quite easily imagine THH done in the movie's style, actually. Just add a few arches and spires to the architecture, and let the personnel wear faded or worn-down medical coats with a few unneccessary frills here and there. Attempted cranioectomies and half-built hospitals seem like things that could easily be in a gothic story (Quisby, you're an artist! You should draw your vision of this!).
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Post by Dante on Oct 16, 2017 6:48:28 GMT -5
My own perspective is that the series has always been multigeneric, and while the first volume is definitely heavily influenced by the gothic - which Handler has admitted; in a really old interview he talked about having read a lot of Ann Radcliffe when he was younger, and TBB reads like a heavily simplified The Mysteries of Udolpho - then that doesn't really apply to the rest of the series in the same way. They're all picking up different settings of cliché which have other associations.
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sᴍᴏᴋᴇ sɪɢɴᴀʟs
Reptile Researcher
be cunning and full of tricks
Posts: 26
Likes: 15
|
Post by sᴍᴏᴋᴇ sɪɢɴᴀʟs on Oct 16, 2017 9:57:15 GMT -5
There is nothing in the book series that suggests that a live- action adaption should be Gothic. I'm assuming the culprit here isn't the books but the film super imposing it's interpretation into popular head canon. The books themselves are very quirky and absurdist and anachronistic ( jumping from contemporary to period). The Netflix series, much to the tangerine of everyone's nostalgia fogged glasses, is very in-sync with the book series. really? maybe im mis-remembering then. i always heard it described as absurdist-gothic, but maybe ive been hallucinating haha from what little ive seen from the thh sets, it seems to look sufficiently dilapidated to me. a gothic hospital sounds kickass though. i wonder how they will handle the burnt out section!!
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Post by Dante on Oct 16, 2017 11:01:57 GMT -5
People have certainly described the series as "gothic," but they aren't necessarily correct.
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Post by Hermes on Oct 21, 2017 11:25:31 GMT -5
Handler has referred to the gothic in connection with ASOUE on occasion - often just in saying that it was the original inspiration for the series, but sometimes in a way that suggests he sees it as more pervasive, as here, where he says 'I thought if I did write another series, I would write a series that would be to noir novels, what A Series of Unfortunate Events was to gothic novels'. Of course, that's not to say it is gothic, only that it's inspired by the gothic.
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Post by Strangely on Oct 21, 2017 12:53:40 GMT -5
I think the books could be considered gothic, but mostly in theme rather than any visual aesthetic. It uses gloom and decay like a Gothic novel, but in terms of setting the books aren't really Gothic at all.
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Post by colette on Jun 23, 2018 5:20:24 GMT -5
I definetely prefer the show's visual style over the movie visual style's. Well, I generally show prefer over movie.
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Post by Mr. Dent on Jun 23, 2018 11:44:34 GMT -5
I prefer the show's look, specifically the first season. The second season, which is still gorgeous, just didn't seem as dreamlike or colorful as the first season. The costumes and sets and composition are still top-notch in the second season, but I love the "pastel grotesque" aesthetic the first season had. Absolutely beautiful.
I think the movie looks fine, but it's only marginally better looking than the average Tim Burton movie. It blends into most of the other gothic 2000s comedies, with the steampunk bent being one of the few elements that set it apart from the rest of its ilk. (The movie's soundtrack is another matter entirely, absolutely beautiful in every way.)
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Post by Isadora Is a Door on Jun 23, 2018 14:04:14 GMT -5
I prefer the movie
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Post by Reba on Jun 23, 2018 14:39:33 GMT -5
the book's aesthetic is timeless as it was intended to be because snicket is not a descriptive narrator and we never get a full image of anything, only quirky and highly contradictory details. on screen the image has to be complete, and with so little to go on in the books, i think it mainly draws on the Zeitgeist. the movie has a 2004 aesthetic and the show has a 2017 aesthetic.
of the course the same need for completeness is true for illustrations: i don't think helquist matches the books any more than seth matches atwq, but also not any less. i also don't believe the movie is based on helquist's illustrations, they just have the same aesthetic of the time, the same way seth's atwq illustrations seem similar to the show.
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Post by Dante on Jun 23, 2018 16:05:38 GMT -5
Excellent analysis.
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