Griffith said:Well, you can always watch another anime if you're interested in something where "the direction is good" more than an earnest adaptation of Berserk. Those things aren't mutually exclusive though, and it goes without saying it can't be exactly the same by the very nature of adaptation, but there's a distinction between necessary differences and unnecessary changes, which is why their obligation to adapt it faithfully is so important; otherwise, it's too easy to make a bunch of lazy decisions. I'm ready to appreciate this for what it is, differences and all, but any changes need to serve the adaptation of the original material one way or another, not forsake it.
Gonna have to completely disagree. I have no problems with the changes made to Oldboy (a manga I find to be a masterpiece) when it was adapted into a film, the changes made in the movie were for creative purposes and for mainly downsizing the story into a single film. If that kind of talent and care could be taken with Berserk, it should be fine, especially if we're getting an entire trilogy of a single arc. No matter what they're going to do, the original source material will still be better than what we're going to get, so I feel like for fans of the manga it'd be a waste to go see it expecting it to be a 1:1 adaptation.
Griffith said:Nor I, but it's worrisome when the anime from 1997 already has something over this adaptation in the way of accuracy. Such a change isn't a matter of making a better adaptation, and you can say you don't mind it, but it's certainly not a good thing.
The anime had a whole slew of problems, and I think one of them is the fact that it was too close to the manga. By that I mean that since the actual Golden Age is incomplete in the series, it's really missing what actually gave closure to the series. The anime is almost a mockery to the series with terrible animation, mediocre character designs, and cutting out major core characters and even story arcs. In no way, will it even be close to better to what we're going to get with these movies unless some truly terrible decisions are made, which I doubt.
Griffith said:I'd think it would bother you if you want to see something relatively new and different; Golden Age has been done twice already. This just makes you sound like you don't care what they do as far as Berserk goes as long as it's a cool anime, which defeats the purpose.
No not really. I'd be really bothered if they axed entire core characters like Puck and Skullknight for example - which thankfully we know they won't - but changing the pacing of scenes from the series wouldn't be that much of a problem for me. I want everything to be adapted, alongside the core lore and story, but I wouldn't mind them cutting scenes into the movie from the post-Golden Age to fill in for something like the Blackswordsman Arc being missing. To me preserving Berserk's lore, and plot is most important.
Aazealh said:You're contradicting yourself from the get-go here. If you want the same story (told differently or not) then you can't say you won't care regardless of what they change. That's downright stupid. Unless by "same story" you mean "an angry guy with a sword gets into fights and shit."
I guess if you want to simplify my argument as that, then I guess so. What I want is the same basic plot, which could involve changing the story being told differently quite easily. Like I said above, for example, they could cut various moments from the non-Golden Age arcs into the movies somehow or another to keep the flashback aspect the Golden Age arc had. That I would have no problem with whatsoever unless the direction was utterly terrible. An adaptated movie is a good movie first, then a good adaptation.
Aazealh said:Again, what do you want exactly? If it's Berserk then it's going to be the same story anyway. You'll know the beginning, the middle and the end, sorry to break it to you. It's not like getting the armors and weapons wrong is going to bring so much freshness to the movies you'll feel like it's a new thing altogether, and neither will the omission of crucial material. What a dumb reasoning. If you don't want to see material you already know then just watch something else.
This entire argument in itself is dumb. "Watch something else if you don't want this movie to adhere to our ridiculous standards." This movie could be the biggest piece of shit ever, and still 1:1 accurately portray the manga. For example I don't think too highly of the Detroit Metal City OVA series, cause it's a 1:1 adaptation to the point where the entire SHOW is practically in panels. With any movie, I worry about it being good first.
Aazealh said:Those aren't "small changes" with a purpose. They're mistakes that bring nothing to the table. Continuity errors.
Yeah no, I'm just going to stop here cause clearly you have no idea what continuity actually means. These movies won't ever be in continuity with the manga; they aren't supposed to be. They're in a continuity in of itself, much like how the Lord of the Rings movies have their own continuity in comparison to the continuity of the books. You simply cannot judge a movie properly if all you're complaining about is how well it's adapted, unless you particularly feel that something in the manga was done better in the manga than in the movie.