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40: Treasure Island Part One
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Ahoy Mateys!! Come aboard this here Book Watch ship and embark on a journey through a classic historical fiction story, Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson and its retro futuristic 2002 adaptation, Treasure Planet. Mates Chris and Jordyn enjoy a mutinous episode without their beloved Captain McDee, as they discuss all the scalawag pirate characters in both iterations.
Tell us your thoughts! Did you love or hate this adaptation? Let’s discuss in The Book Watch Lounge on Facebook
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Transcript
Introduction to Treasure Island & Treasure Planet
00:00:01
Speaker
Ahoy meaties! On this episode of Bookwatch, we are setting off on a swashbuckling adventure through Robert Louis Stevenson's Treasure Island, which was first published as a book in 1883. And we are going to the far-flung future for the 2002 film adaptation Treasure Planet, directed by Ron Clemens of Little Mermaid, and Aladdin fame. ah Captain McD is off on her own adventure this week, so mate Chris and and myself are steering the ship alone. Our adventure begins right after these messages.
Book vs. Movie Adaptations
00:00:40
Speaker
Welcome to Book Watch, the podcast where pages meet screens. Each week, we dive into the world of adaptations, comparing beloved books with their cinematic counterparts. From faithful retellings to bold reimaginings, we'll break down what worked, what didn't, and what made each adaptation unforgettable. Whether you are a bookworm, a movie buff, or both, grab your bookmark, grab your popcorn, and let's watch some books.
00:01:07
Speaker
Okie dokie. Welcome back, folks.
Plot Summary of Treasure Island
00:01:10
Speaker
Quick little summary of Treasure Island for those of you unfamiliar. Young Jim Hawkins lives with his mother and together they run the Benbow Inn.
00:01:18
Speaker
One day a strange buccaneer named Billy Bones drops to their doorstep, bringing his mysterious past into the Hawkins' quiet lives. After being chased down by Billy Bones' old crew, Jim Hawkins enlists the helps of a local doctor to set sail in search of Captain Flint's long-lost treasure with the map acquired from the now-dead Bones.
00:01:37
Speaker
Alongside Captain Smollett, the ship's cook, Long John Silver, and the maroon Ben Gunn, Jim and the crew have an epic adventure huntt treasure hunt across Flint's island and find a way to save the treasure and themselves to get back to the Ben Bones.
00:01:52
Speaker
Well, it is an adventure, that's for sure. Yes. that was most That was the book's kind of intro. and There is some few things that are a little different in the book versus the film as far as some of that goes. you know He's got his father that's sick in the book.
00:02:07
Speaker
um There's a part of that whole reason the doctor is there. There's more a lot more time they spend with... um Billy bones in the ah book where there's like a lot of drawn out time where he's just staying at the end.
00:02:20
Speaker
Whereas I feel like in the film, they jump right into, he just dies on their doorstep. Yeah. And the crew comes in. And I appreciate that. yeah think you were saying that too, that you appreciated the action scenes being very punchy in this, like this one after another, it came and went and you were kept on the edge of your seat the whole time. You know, we've, yeah.
00:02:38
Speaker
barely make it out of the window at the top and then they get going on there. Um, uh, figuring out how they're going to do this treasure hunt the, between the doctor and him the doctor super psyched to go on this adventure.
00:02:49
Speaker
Yeah.
Reception and Cult Status of Treasure Planet
00:02:50
Speaker
The pacing is super different between the book and this version of adaptation, in this movie. Um, the book, like you said, it's very slow. We're in the in with Billy bones for probably like weeks, if not even months,
00:03:05
Speaker
um and jim's dad dies during that time and it's like oh whole there's like a whole ordeal they travel to another town and back there's a lot of exposition um that basically the movie is just like we're gonna go ahead and skip that and get right to right to the treasure hunt part so like characters and other things too the ah the 1800s films or the books where a lot of that exposition or even not even that it doesn't even have to be that old a lot of the older books from the fifty s or you know, things like that seem to have a lot more of that exposition that has to be cut down from other audiences. Really? Yeah. It's those dang phones and the attention spans.
00:03:41
Speaker
but Those kids. And the movie is still from 2002. So imagine how bad it is now. Right. This is before we, eat you, you or I ever had phones. So I was forced. You didn't see this. Yeah. and You didn't see this back then. So this is good for you.
00:03:55
Speaker
I literally watched this for the first time, like right now to record. Um, I was four years old when it came out. So yeah, it it went over my head a little bit. And well we can talk about it a little bit, but it was not really well received at the time that it came out. It was like a financial disappointment, not a lot of hype around it, not a lot of people talking about it or like praising it critically. um But now, like, it's a cult classic. And, like, I did see, like, a lot of the um comparisons are made between this and Atlantis. They were actually a part of the same um production, like, attempt. They were yeah both being pushed by the same. was part of a group of movies that he wanted to do. And they kind of got buried by the CEO because he didn't like them. And obviously, they're looking back now, like, those are some of the best films Disney put out at the time. I mean...
Personal Pirate Stories
00:04:47
Speaker
What I would yeah give to go back and watch this again for the first time. I mean, I remember watching the trailers for this as a kid and going, oh, that's amazing. Treasure. What he he doing? He's escaped like he's snowboarding in space with a rocket attached to him. What is happening here? This is amazing.
00:05:03
Speaker
Yeah, it was awestruck for me because I love pirates. I love all things like that. So and then cyberpunk is another one of my favorites. I love pirates too, so I have my pirate ears here to celebrate. um Yeah, i now that I have seen this movie, I'm obsessed. I was first introduced to Treasure Island ah in fourth grade. We did like the whole fourth grade, all of the different classes at my elementary school. put on a stage production of Treasure Island. um And that was my first introduction. So like I can still remember parts of some of the songs. I learned pig Latin because they like added the element of like native natives on the island where the treasure was. And so I got to be one of the natives.
00:05:51
Speaker
Hey, I was a lot more tan back then as a Filipino person. So they were like, you're going to be a native. um Terrible, but okay. it You know, it is what it is. um But yeah, so that was my first introduction to Treasure Island
Treasure Planet's Unique Setting and Design
00:06:07
Speaker
and the story. And I've loved historical fiction too like I was the English history brain person growing up so any historical fiction um I was like this is the best of both worlds right here like and even like Magic Treehouse like the the third book in the Magic Treehouse series is a pirate story so I love pirates um I love the mixing of like
00:06:33
Speaker
fantasy with history like it's so far in the past that almost feels like another world because it kind of is like the the world we live in now is so different from what the pirates were living in the 1700s that it's not really comparable so and then this movie goes so far the other direction to this like space age this like far-flung future where there's a whole moon that is a city and they have you know solar sails that like capture sunlight and like power these ships it's very very cool and really like um ingenious design for for this universe and this version of it
00:07:17
Speaker
It all felt very industrial retro futurism. Like it was very much like it would have a lot of mechanical elements still, but it was like all this stuff is way ahead of anything we have in our world. Even the way the map worked, it's like, okay, that's not projecting from anywhere. I don't know what you guys are smoking over there, but that's not how technology works. But okay, we'll let it we'll let it pass.
00:07:38
Speaker
Yeah. yeah For me, I was... That tech magic combo. Yeah. Yeah, kind of how I felt. Yeah. For me, I actually didn't ever have much exposure to Treasure Island as a story. I read that for the first time recently and any I didn't really have any other connection other than
Character Depictions: Book vs. Film
00:07:55
Speaker
this film. And honestly, that's all I needed. But I did enjoy the story. actually was It was nice to get the full um original story read because I was like, OK, now I kind of understand where some of these elements were pulled from and why they were the way they were. And there was a few areas I say i might say I liked better in the book. um
00:08:14
Speaker
But i I ultimately enjoy the way these characters are portrayed, the way the relationships between characters were portrayed in the film was just a lot more ah heartfelt, a lot more Disney in some ways, but a lot more that ah that growth between characters and in relationships between characters.
00:08:31
Speaker
Yeah. Well, and since you brought up the characters, as usual, our first episode is talking about the characters. So let's get into that. There's some themes and some other things that we'll talk about. kind of I think they'll come up naturally as we talk about the characters. so We'll start with Mr. Jim Hawkins himself, our protagonist. um In the film, he is voiced by a young Joseph Gordon-Levitt.
00:08:57
Speaker
2002 joseph and gordon levitt i i couldn't think of a better person to portray that character he could have probably played a live action version of him at that time i mean he was yeah in his young prime like that so would have been could have been perfect at the time yeah i um i immediately developed a crush on jim hawkins as soon as i started the movie i was like oh hey Same. that i think everybody did. like I mean, every i well, I don't want to speak for all women, but I feel like most women have that like in interest or that intrigue of like the rebellious boy, like the bad boy kind of thing. and like He opens the movie like getting arrested for trespassing. and like he Like you said, he's like surfing on the air or snowboarding, some combination of those things, skateboarding, whatever. like It's very...
00:09:48
Speaker
Yeah, whatever you want call it. Like, it's, a he's just very cool. And like, for me, especially, like, I was always The teacher's pet, like, um they're not paying attention. They're not doing this. Like, are you going to give homework? Like, I was very much the goody two-shoes following the rules kid. And i like, always was – had an eye on the troublemaker kids, usually so that I could bust them, like Candace and Phineas and Ferb. But also because if you happen to be a troublemaker and I thought you were cute –
00:10:21
Speaker
going to let you get away with it. And I would let Jim Hawkins get away with it. if i i i don't i don't know if we would have been friends in school or if you would have just been constantly getting me in trouble. I don't know. It would have been the like epitome of, ah yeah sorry ah so it would have been the epitome ah of like, we're too young to understand what it means to have a crush on somebody. And so we just like, I just need to be around him all. i gravitate towards him, but I hate him because you don't follow the rules, but like, I like you and I wouldn't understand it. I think that's how it would be realistically. We would it just been best friends.
00:10:56
Speaker
And then I would have hated, I would have loved, hated you too. it it would It would have been both. Yeah. We would have just been, you know, hated each other till we became best friends. That's how most of my friendships happen actually.
00:11:07
Speaker
Well, and that's how our friendship started too. We'll get into that another day. Another time. Yes. I hated Chris before I even knew him and now I love him. So, you know, what are you going to do I just have that effect, you know, one of those faces, I guess.
00:11:20
Speaker
Literally.
00:11:23
Speaker
Pretty much. Anyways. We need Sarah Day to keep us on track. Yeah, this is the ADHD. Leading the ADHD.
00:11:34
Speaker
Sorry, guys. Anyways, the next character is Long... Best episode ever. please Please comment that, you guys. and The next character is Long John Silver, and he's voiced by Brian Murray. um i really like this portrayal of Long John Silver. we were talking about a little bit off cast, but I think that the movie version has a lot more depth.
00:11:58
Speaker
I thought the film portrayal was a lot more, like, I think you said, like, it was, like, kind of Disney-fied, it was a lot more heartfelt, and there lot more depth to it than I got in the book. What did you think?
00:12:11
Speaker
Well, I think that the making him a cyborg really added a lot of fun elements to him too. i mean, he you got the character that, uh, um, you just fall in love with because he's just so charismatic. Even in the book, you had a little bit of that, like, yes you know, this guy's got the peg leg, he's got the intrigue, but in the film, he's got all these worrying and, uh, moving parts on his body too Like, you know, his, his gun is in like, uh, his hand that flips around his sword is in there somehow. He's got this, leg with all these actuators and stuff mean his character design is just epic and i love it i kind of part of how i got my uh my screen name i use for everything was thinking about this character as i watched this towards the uh earlier this year i was like yeah cyborg something i want i want something cyborg at my my uh screen name of cyborg knight was kind of a mag amalgamation of some of the cyborg characters and wanting some sort of knight like uh um
00:13:06
Speaker
castle-y, you know, Renaissance-y character, but with some of that techy stuff. So it kind of yeah came from watching this and a few other things. And so um his character is definitely a really cool design.
00:13:19
Speaker
Yeah, I really like how, because the character in the book is like, watch out for the man with the peg leg, with the wooden leg. So I like how they were able to... and Yeah, they kept it going, but and still made it like appropriate. like It would have made no sense for his leg to be made out of wood in this universe because it's so spacey and futuristic. So making it all like metal and, like you said, like making him a cyborg, android – not android, a cyborg.
00:13:46
Speaker
um like It really made sense. and It really fit. And then I like how they also added the the laser eye thing. Yeah. yeah Almost like an eye patch for a pirate, but in his case, he actually the ability to use it as like a sight all that.
00:14:02
Speaker
Yeah, that's really cool. All right, moving along, we've got um in the book, the character is called Dr. Livesey. In the film, it's changed to Dr. Doppler.
00:14:13
Speaker
And the voice is David Hyde Pierce. I thought this, we'll talk more like in depth of different character arcs, but this character in the movie kind of had a couple of different characters like all squished into one. And that happened a couple times.
00:14:30
Speaker
Yeah, so we've kind of got some facets of like Dr. Livesey from the book in there, but also not really because there's a whole line which is funny um about how he's not actually a doctor, he just has a doctorate in astronomy versus Dr. Livesey in the book actually is a medical doctor and when people are injured throughout the story he is actually able to provide medical aid to them like over the course of the adventure.
00:15:00
Speaker
A lot of the, you know, 1800 timeframe, you may have been the doctor, but also been the person of the man of science, the person who was, um, actually doing astronomy and doing these things. So it wouldn't have been surprising for your doctor, your ship doctor to also be, uh, really good with that sort of thing. So I think it fit the book, but definitely was an entertaining way to put it in the, um, yeah in the in the movie here in the time yeah his his whole little explanation and like i have i'm a doctor but not that kind of doctor i have a doctorate which basically means i'm useless very funny i love that one a lot well portrayed such a good performance by that actor i felt like he did a great job with his his mannerisms and the way he you know his little flirty moments here and there with both the captain i even it felt like yeah there was a few moments where yeah he was
00:15:47
Speaker
ah Kind of flirting with Jim's mom and it was just kind of like he was almost a little bit of the player character in the whole thing or just kind of yeah ah kind of flirt with everybody, but also just a really good guy. And so it was like he never was going anywhere, but he was always kind of attempting to court people. And so it's kind of an entertaining way for that character to be shown here.
00:16:09
Speaker
Yeah. And then another book character that he has some parts of their personality in him is Squire Trelawney. And so Squire Trelawney is just another character in the book that another trusted adult, trusted man that Jim has going on the journey. He's the financier like Dr. Doppler is in the movie. He pays for everything for the trip. He funds it all. He also has a big mouth and is like yap, yap, yap in about the treasure map, um which kind of like gets the crew riled up and leads to the mutiny happening at the time that it happens and all of that stuff.
00:16:47
Speaker
Another part of Squire Trelawney is that Roe can shoot. He's really good with a pistol and that trait kind of goes into Captain Amelia in the movie who is a combination of, like I said, Squire Trelawney and Captain Smollett from the book, who is the captain of the
Notable Performances and Characters
00:17:06
Speaker
ship. So what did we think of Emma Thompson as Captain Amelia?
00:17:12
Speaker
ah Amazing. She did a great job with that. i mean, what you said, we were talking earlier a little bit was we were watching and you were saying there wasn't very much female presence in the whole book, which for the timeframe made sense. But I loved that we got this change in the, in this timeframe style of this film to having a female captain of just,
00:17:32
Speaker
made for a much more like, oh, oh, all right. She's in charge. I see. Okay. And yes, ma'am. All right. I just, you you kind of yeah changes the, ah ah the dynamic entirely. And it was just in such a great way.
00:17:45
Speaker
I loved it. I fancy myself a well-spoken big but vocabulary person. I think I learned like three new words from her in this movie. Jordan's going back to school on Monday and she's going to start telling the kids, ah you'll be addressing me as ma'am or captain from now on.
00:18:01
Speaker
And you know what? Maybe I should because it's getting towards the end of the year and they are acting like a bunch of pirates. It's ridiculous. You're going to have a mutiny on your hands. I feel like I have a little bit, but it's okay. I'll get them back. Don't you worry. All right. All right. Yeah. i agree Yeah, and I, like you said, I loved having another, like, well, and even the mom character, um Sarah Hawkins, she's voiced by Laurie Metcalf. I think the changes in her character, too, are really telling of the time in which this was made. And keep in mind, it this was still 20 years ago in 2002. Imagine if this was made now, how many more female characters there would be. You notice they still don't have a dad for him in this story. Like you see him here and there. Yes. But it's like the Disney thing of there's never a dad in these stories.
00:18:52
Speaker
is Or at least you can't have both. You can't have a mom and a dad. Right, right. You had a yeah, it's it's one of the others. Somebody's got to be gone. until Inside Out or something like that. you Yeah, yeah, you never see any of but both of them. But I kind of liked that change for all of their characters in the book.
00:19:08
Speaker
and don't know, in the book, I think it's kind of telling of the time too. But like in the book, like, Jim is kind of a wimp at the start. And like his mom is just like, she barely, had I think she's got like probably three lines. Like she's not prominent at all. All of the action is happening with Jim and the male pirates and then Jim and the male doctor and the squire Trelawney. Like it's all obviously very like male centric because it's, hey, it's written in 1883. And it was based on, you know, a hundred years ago, the golden age of pirates, which is like the 60s.
00:19:42
Speaker
So yeah, there's going be a lot of dudes running around. But the modern interpretation of that letter, instead of Jim's dad dying of whatever illness he has, he abandons them. He leaves the family. And now instead of being like this...
00:20:00
Speaker
woman who's fainting at like oh there's pirates in the inn oh like it's she is like no i gotta i'm a single parent to this kid and instead of being like whatever you say mom like little like more i thought jim in the book was younger but in this movie he seems to be like 1920 ish um maybe 18 somewhere between like 16 when when we see really off with 16 that's what i think my dad point maybe that was just wishful thinking sorry um
00:20:30
Speaker
You just aged him up to be a little closer to where you want. Sorry. um That's made me uncomfortable with myself. I'm sorry, guys. um So, yeah, so he's like 16, but he's much more in the in the book. I thought of him as being younger, like 12, 13, like still very much a little kid. versus the 16 or whatever he is in the movie. Like this is a a young man. He's growing into being a man, being the man of the house. And like, he's a rebellious teen. um And a lot of that is because his dad abandoned them. So I like the changes of these female characters, like the captain becoming a female and then the existing female character, like getting more depth and more agency. Yeah. And like just having the choice of like, I got to take care of my kid. I have to manage this business. Like she's, she's working her tail off to take care of everything. And so I appreciated that from, you know, my modern woman perspective.
00:21:32
Speaker
Now, I think I just remembered we need to go back to the very beginning of the film here and little tiny Jim. You saw that book he was reading. It was like an audio book, video book um that he was that was reading to him. i was like, I want that thing. Yeah.
00:21:46
Speaker
It's like a yeah ah movie in your book. That was super cool. I wish that that was a thing so I could like watch the movie as it's being, as the book being read to me. It's super impractical, but it's such a cool design choice for this sort of story. Yeah, I really liked it. And I liked how it establishes more clearly the relationship between Jim and his mom. Like he, he loves his mom. He is a mama's boy through and through and she loves him and she's willing to, you know, she can, I think she can kind of tell I'm reading into the character, by the way. I think she can kind of tell like through all of his actions of like trespassing and like breaking the laws and stuff like he needs to get out and do something bigger with his life than just run the inn. And I think that's why part of why she's so easily persuaded to let him run off with the doctor and like go on this adventure. Besides the fact that they desperately need the money since the pirates burned their place to the ground.
00:22:43
Speaker
And who hasn't had the experience of reading under their covers after their mom tells them to go to bed. i I certainly do, did all the time. We heard it.
00:22:54
Speaker
We heard it. Do. Still do. assist Sorry to my husband. can i'm still reading. Yes. No. Literally. and Yeah. No. my My punishment when I was a kid, like most kids get sent to your room and I was like, good. That's where all my books are. Yeah. This is great. Oh, you mean I'm going to be in my room with my books and be uninterrupted for three hours? Oh, no.
00:23:18
Speaker
So my punishment was not being allowed to read. when I was a couch. That was brutal. But here we are now here. yeah ah All right, let's we got a we've got to stay focused, Chris.
00:23:32
Speaker
Yeah, we don't got our rudder here. We're good. We can do whatever we want. We're in charge. well ah We have we have established a mutiny. We've moved and hit against Saturday. She's going to come back to ah a um crew of pirates on this podcast here. yep ah Backtracking a little bit, the character of Billy Bones. He's on screen for two minutes, not even, voiced by Patrick McGowan. And we'll talk about Mr. Arrow, the first mate. He's voiced by Roscoe Lee Brown. Again, very little screen time, but
00:24:08
Speaker
I was sad when he died and I didn't like it. You get a little attached to him. Yeah. He's. Yeah. So what we kind of bypass as we talk about these is some of the characters are dogs.
00:24:23
Speaker
They're just anthropomorphized dogs. Yeah. I mean, obviously like Captain Amelia's a cat. Yeah, cats, dogs. i felt like the arrow was more of his character was more like the loyal dog and like a big brood of a dog. But loyal dog, I felt like from him as well. thought he was like a rock thing.
00:24:41
Speaker
I don't think so. I think he was meant to be like, a like maybe he had a little bit of that rocking to the um type of character he was, but it felt very much like a loyal, like a big dog sort to me. So absolutely the doctor was a dog and and not everybody there, you know like Jim and his mom weren't animals, but you got the spider characters and a bunch of these other weird alien characters. yeah But yeah, it's, it's a weird thing where you don't even,
00:25:06
Speaker
notice after a little while some of these things like that these characters were meant to be anthropomorphized other creatures but it's just something you have to point out that definitely there was some weird little choices of character design here that i'm like okay whatever i love the character design again like it's great it's spacey it's futuristic so like yeah of course there's going to be aliens and they're going to be like you said anthropomorphized animals some of them are just like weird monster alien looking creatures and i they all they all fit and they all made sense and i was like yeah of course the spider guy is going to be the main guy trying to come at jim and like cause problems um his name was scroop and he was voiced by michael wincott and he was kind of
00:25:51
Speaker
a rip on Israel hands from the book lol hands because he's a spider he's got eight legs um and as well as like any number of the other like background pirate crew um could be scooped into Mr. Scroop and My favorite one of the aliens was from the movie was the one that was that the head that would like climbed off the body and then the body and him are hanging out together next to each other with yeah a face on the body. was just kind like, oh, okay. Yeah. You're two people. Okay.
00:26:24
Speaker
That was fun. And Pirates the same thing with Pirates the Caribbean. There was that character that was the body, that the head that became crab or whatever. but yeah So I think some of these things were stolen by Disney for other things a little bit here and there with Pirates and things.
00:26:37
Speaker
For sure. i think my favorite alien was Morph. Morph is definitely adorable. And I love how he had his own kind of like moral code where he was like, Long John Silver's kind of not. I don't like what he's doing. I'm to hang out with Jim. And then like, oh, but I love, you know, I love my dad. I love Long John. So I'm going to go back. And I like how he kept like switching sides. Yeah.
00:27:01
Speaker
Yeah. And it never felt malicious either way. He just was very like, i don't feel like doing this and oh, very ADHD. Like, I want to do this. Oh, just kidding. I want to do this. I'm over here and I'm back and forth and all over the place.
00:27:14
Speaker
Which is a huge distinction from the the ah the parrot that was in the film. That was just like it used to belong to like the other guy. i think the um the bat or the main pirate that.
00:27:25
Speaker
um was Flint Flint. Yeah, i think it was his bird. It was just the parent's name is Captain Flint. Yeah. Yeah. So it was definitely a whole different dynamic to more of who is a much more lovey character that just, yeah yeah, makes you fall in love with him.
00:27:43
Speaker
Yeah. Now think another one from our list that we haven't talked about is Ben Gunn or B-E-N. Ben played by Martin Short. Yes. Now you didn't care for him at first. You were annoyed by him.
00:27:55
Speaker
No, I hate the trope of like we're in a survival situation we have to be quiet. We have to be stealthy. And somebody is just like, what's that over there? Like super loud and like giving away their our position. That's a trope like we see it in The Walking Dead and like all sorts of like horror and survival films and shows. And I hate
Animation Style and Nostalgia
00:28:14
Speaker
it. um So I was very anti-Ben at the...
00:28:18
Speaker
early on and then over time I'm like he grew on me and he got less annoying and by the end I was like oh a buddy he's working in the inn he's helping out like he so he went from being marooned and alone and losing his mind to like finding a family and a purpose and I thought that was a nice a nice a thing for him to to have Well, and him being a robot in this made it like I was so when I was read the book, I commented on it to you and Sarah a Day that it actually makes a whole lot more sense for him to have been stranded here for 100 years. That's just this robot that is can't die. So he's just stuck here as this um person that's here once you get here, but without his memory. And so and then the MacGuffin of him finding his memory once they get in. And that's what kind of allows them to finally realize, oh, it's a trap.
00:29:06
Speaker
works really well and honestly i love this performance from martin short it sounded like robin williams's genie to me i was just like oh this could easily have been a robin williams role that he could have done an amazing job with too but and uh the ron or the clemens guy uh did ah do Aladdin as well. So he's worked with both you. So it's kind of probably pulled some of those same elements from the characters, but I just loved it. I think Ben was a lot of fun and, and did have a really interesting arc over the course of the thing. I mean, at the end of it, he's doing the robot and the dancing and the back in the house. It's just cute. Yeah.
00:29:42
Speaker
Yeah. yeah I think a lot of the characters just the way the book is written is it's a lot of, and like we said, it's a lot of exposition. It's a lot of description. Yeah. and a lot of like,
00:29:57
Speaker
not a lot of like internal monologue and like what people are feeling and and not even a lot of dialogue. I felt like it was not as dialogue heavy as I feel most modern books are. So to have the film where like you can, and especially to like visually, you can see people's facial expressions and like you, when, you know, the mutiny is happening, you can see the hurt on Jim's face that Long John is betraying him. He like, he feels He's devastated. You can see that on his face and you can hear that in his voice a lot more than the way it's described in the book is very like, and then Long John betrayed me and I didn't like it. And then we moved on. Like it felt there's a lot more like richness of character um through this medium, I feel.
00:30:43
Speaker
I agree. um I think the two other main things we need to talk about is one um, the animation style, um, the way they did this. I mean, there's a few moments in the film where I'm like, okay, I feel like I'm in a video game, like an old computer game where they're just panning around a 3d environment. So, and I know they had a few of those 3d animation styles pushed in there. So it's like, okay, I see these things, but I am totally okay with it because you still gave me such cool visuals and everything else. So I was okay with panning around a space and feeling like I was, in this 3d environment um but I think it was leading somewhere really well good it was doing a good job of continuing on this type of animation style before they ultimately killed it
00:31:25
Speaker
Yeah, I much prefer the 2D animation style. I'm sure most of that is nostalgia because I was born in 1998. I think that was the year that The Lion King came out. And so like though that like renaissance era of Disney films of like Aladdin, Beauty and the Beast, Hercules, like you know a ah Little Mermaid, King, this Atlantis, like this era of 2D animation, like is what I grew up on. um And so it's always my preferred choice. I also just, I don't like like the modern, like Pixar potato people thing. That's not my jam. And like, I think somewhere in between that is okay. Like Frozen or Tangled, like the in-between 3D animation, I don't mind Certainly like Tangled is one of my favorite movies. But when I sit down, I'm like, I'm kind in the mood for an animated movie. What am I going to watch? Nine out of 10 times, it's going to be some something like this, this 2D animation. um Because that just feels it just feels better to me.
00:32:32
Speaker
Reminds me based on the timeframe, I do need to get this movie on VHS in my collection. I need to find a really pristine copy of this to put on the shelf. Cause this is definitely one that i I love this film and I want that VHS copy and see on my shelf.
00:32:46
Speaker
Yes. Someday I can torture my kid with rewinding the movie over and over again. Good luck in your goodwill search, my friend. Thank you Thank you. So last thing would be ah Jim and Silver's relationship. We've kind of talked about some of that. We could save it for next week's ah um plot storyline. There's a lot there that we could go into each moment or if you want to discuss anything about that relationship and how much we loved it or how much we yeah how the dynamic of it went.
Complex Character Relationships
00:33:15
Speaker
Just a little bit. um i I like the movie version of it more, again, because we get the depth of the character. We get to see Long John's face and get more of those moments where, again, in the book, it feels very dry of like, well, you know, I didn't mean it. Like, I just, I'm just telling them what I need to tell them to survive. Like,
00:33:39
Speaker
He's ultimately, I don't even think that Long John as a character in the book or the movie is very malicious. He's just very selfish. And the selfishness came off a lot harsher in the book versus the movie it was like,
00:33:54
Speaker
Yes, it's more devastating, but it's softer because we get the whole montage of all of these things that Jim is learning from Long John. that And it's directly compared. It keeps switching from the flashbacks of Jim's dad and all the things that his dad didn't teach him and he didn't do with him. um and so that like verse And again, that's happening while they're traveling to Treasure Planet.
00:34:23
Speaker
versus in the book on their way to Treasure Island, it's just like, yes, and we sailed for three days or weeks or whatever, and then we got there. And then this is what happened when we got there. And so you don't get that time, again, like the way that I think modern books do a better job of, of like building that relationship and like going in depth of who these people are and what their dynamic is. And the movie, I think, did that really, really well.
00:34:48
Speaker
um and so... I guess the movie was like better in the book that way. i hate to say it, but. Well, um to me, Long John Silver saw himself in Jim. Jim was the version of him he wished he could be. So he was constantly trying to push Jim to be more, to be better than him, to follow in these footsteps, but do it better. Become a pirate or become, you know, start working on these riches, find, you know, love. You all this. He was telling him all these stories in both mediums. The book had Long John had his wife and he was telling him stories about at times.
00:35:26
Speaker
There was these comparisons of both were pushing him to be the better version of Long John Silver. So, yeah, selfish, but I think he really was sincere when it came to Jim because he saw himself.
00:35:38
Speaker
Yeah. And I think the maybe not like the point of the book, but like something that you can take away from the book is that. good people can do bad things. Like Jim is the protagonist. He's a good guy. He kills somebody straight up in the book. He shoots him. And in this movie, you know, there's something similar, not quite as violent, but you know, somebody dies directly as a result of something that Jim does.
00:36:04
Speaker
And so good people can do bad things. And then bad, I think ultimately Long John Silver is a bad person, but he can still do good things and there can still be redeeming qualities in him. um I mean he has the opportunity probably for sure once they make it very obvious but probably multiple times where he could have killed Jim or let Jim die at the hands of another pirate and he saves him he goes out of his way risking himself and his plot to save Jim and so bad people that kind of nuance in a character is really valuable and it's inspires I think a lot of the anti-hero type of character I mean just with pirates alone like
00:36:45
Speaker
jack sparrow he's a pirate he's a bad guy he's done a lot of bad things but he became a pirate because he was freeing slaves in the in the slave trade and he had depending on which film you pull your lore from since they kind of ruined it with that fourth film of i'm not doesn't exist not real hey that doesn't exist um one through three truth only fair enough um but like he's a pirate he's done a lot of bad things but he can still do good things too you can you can have both and all of us are made up of both um and so I think that you know Treasure Island has a lot to say actually even though it's from 200 years ago yeah
00:37:32
Speaker
do we have anything else we want to chat about with the carrot ah characters or are we roll ready to roll out I think we've droned on for quite long enough. Talking about how much we love all these adaptations of these characters. So I think next week we'll go through that plot. And i think we got, we're in a really good spot right now.
00:37:53
Speaker
all right. Well, Sarah we missed ya. Captain McD we missed you bud. ah Can't wait to have our captain back on our ship and be sure to like, and subscribe mateys and we'll see you next week.
Episode Wrap-Up
00:38:10
Speaker
That's a wrap for this week's episode of Book Watch. We hope you enjoy diving into the world of page-to-screen adaptations with us. If you love this episode, don't forget to subscribe, leave a rating and review wherever you listen, and share it with a fellow book and movie lover.
00:38:25
Speaker
If you prefer to watch along, you can check out the show on YouTube, youtube.com slash at bookwatchpodcast. You can follow the show on Instagram at bookwatchpodcast. And you can follow me, Sarah Day, on Instagram at captain.mcd. That's M-C-D-E-E.
00:38:42
Speaker
And you can follow me, Jordan, on Instagram at jjcorrito. That's C-A-R-R-I-D-O. And you can follow me, Chris, at cyborgnight404. That's night with a K. You can also join the conversation in the Bookwatch Lounge on Facebook at facebook.com slash groups. slash book watch lounge.
00:39:04
Speaker
If you'd like to support the podcast, you can join the Patreon at patreon.com slash book watch podcast. Tears start at only $4 a month and we would love to have you over there. Have a favorite adaptation you'd like us to cover or a book you think deserves a screen adaptation or just want to let us know of any feedback. Send us an email at book watch podcast at gmail.com.
00:39:26
Speaker
Until next time. Keep reading. Keep watching. And we'll see you next week.