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Last King's Director Rewrites Time In Asimov's Eternity
Asimov's Time Travel Epic Heads To Screen

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Evil Tortie's Mom: R.O.A.C.H.
04/24/09

In reply to Last King's Director Rewrites Time In Asimov's Eternity
The historical novel that his next film is based on is a Ripping Yarn indeed, although its central premise/big ending turns out to be not true. So it's based on a true-ish story, kinda like George Washington and the cherry tree.
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gorehound
04/24/09

In reply to Last King's Director Rewrites Time In Asimov's Eternity
I own a 1st edition paperback of the end of eternity in vg/fine condition in my scifi library.

We have seen to much YARM coming out and I just keep saying where is Hollywood's brains that they have to remake evry cool film but finally we will have a brand new never before filmed scifi.I am excited and hope it will come out good.

STOP YARM !!!!

MAKE NEW SCIFI's !!!!

thank you for making an original film
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John
04/24/09

@gorehound: There's only one story anyway, hero succeeds over antagonist. Who cares if it came from an old book or some hack came up with it on her own?
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Evil Tortie's Mom: R.O.A.C.H.
04/24/09

@John: You could say there's three: man vs. man, man vs. nature, man vs. himself.

Or two: protagonist succeeds over antagonist, protagonist fails vs. antagonist.

But it is a small number indeed.
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Grey_Area
04/24/09

In reply to Last King's Director Rewrites Time In Asimov's Eternity
I don't think I've ever read The End of Eternity, better check it out.
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Alasdair Wilkins
04/24/09

@Grey_Area: You won't be disappointed. Unless you are, in which case you have no taste. It's pretty simple, really.
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capnrob
04/24/09

@Grey_Area: It's a good story, and certainly lays the groundwork for much of the Time Travel Organization Sub-sub-sub genre, but it's also, as a result, a bit basic seen through modern, genre-savvy eyes. It's kind of like _Voyage of the Space Beagle_ in that respect - after ninety bajillion riffs on Going Boldly Where No Man, Etc., we're not going to be as gobstruck as the audience was at the time of publication, not after, (in Asimov's case) Anderson's Time Patrol, Piper's Paratime, Leiber's Big Time, Chalker's Downtiming the Night Side, etc., etc., etc.

I mention this not because of anything you said, by the way; I am a bit oversensitive on this subject because I've shown people _Casablanca_ and _Duck Soup_, only to have the people completely miss the point that This Is Where These Tropes Came From, Dammit, and say "Well, he's not as funny as Hawkeye Pierce" or whatever. The successor is *not* better than the originator automatically, and it frosts me to hear people assume that it is, merely because they encountered the successor first.

It's probably Asimov's best writing as writing - lord help us, as good as he was in most respects, there's parts of, say, _The Currents of Space_ that make me want to invent a time machine just so I could go back and hand the man a better thesaurus.
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Grey_Area
04/24/09

@capnrob: Hmmm. Coming from 1955 this could appear rather dated and yeah, it will suffer comparisons to its descendants. We'll have to hope this can be adapted to appear fresh without losing Asimov's brilliance. Hollywood owes the man that much after that I,Robot dopiness.
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Alasdair Wilkins
04/24/09

In reply to Last King's Director Rewrites Time In Asimov's Eternity
I've got to lay my cards on the table here. Asimov is, as anyone who reads my stuff probably knows at this point, my favorite author of all time, and The End of Eternity is my favorite book of all time, so this might my single most anticipated movie at this point (although I'm a bit saddened I won't get the opportunity to make the movie myself, megalomaniac that I am). The only Kevin MacDonald movie I've seen is Touching the Void, which is a docudrama, so I won't draw too many conclusions. Still, I'm excited.
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Alasdair Wilkins
04/24/09

@Alasdair Wilkins: Now if we could only get Roland Emmerich the hell away from the Foundation movies...
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jeffedsell
11/15/08

In reply to Asimov's Time Travel Epic Heads To Screen
What is it about Asimov that keeps his great stories from making good adaptations? All the ones I can think of are pretty awful.
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RRich
11/16/08

@jeffedsell: I think it's just a matter of finding a skilled writer who loves and understands the material.

Not to speak ill of the dead (aw, why not) but Michael Crichton's books are hardly examples of great prose, but the ideas therein were captivating. Asimov's writing is quite a bit better, but it's the strength of his ideas that make them memorable.
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NefariousNewt
11/15/08

In reply to Asimov's Time Travel Epic Heads To Screen
I'm sorry, but the way The Good Doctor's works get butchered on the big screen, I want no part of this. As badly as I would want this novel to succeed as a movie, or to have the Foundation trilogy (yes, only the original trilogy) made, I hold out no hope that it can be done intelligently.
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twDarkflame
11/15/08

In reply to Asimov's Time Travel Epic Heads To Screen
I still want my Foundation miniseries darnit.
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RRich
11/16/08

@twDarkflame: Amen!
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Mathmos
11/15/08

In reply to Asimov's Time Travel Epic Heads To Screen
Unfortunately it is easy to imagine why this appeals to Hollywood.
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RAHfanboy
11/15/08

@Mathmos: You think Reagan might be one of the "disasters" they don't approve of?
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RRich
11/15/08

In reply to Asimov's Time Travel Epic Heads To Screen
I'm surprised that no one has made an Asimov biopic. Plenty of material there - he only wrote THREE autobiographies - and lotsa cool characters, so why not?
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Torley
11/15/08

@RRich: I suspect part of the reason lies in exactly that - the difficulty of digestibility, and what to include (and exclude!) from such a rich and prolific life.
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RRich
11/16/08

@Torley: Oh, I'm sure either of us could cherry pick and come up with a great story, T.

Too much good stuff? Not a problem!
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jp182
11/15/08

In reply to Asimov's Time Travel Epic Heads To Screen
i liked The Fountain
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Necoras
11/15/08

@jp182: Same.
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d_r_e
11/15/08

@Necoras:

Same here. I loved it, as well as the soundtrack.

It seems that no one that works at io9 likes The Fountain, as every time it's mentioned in an article ... it's mentioned in a negative way.
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