The Disappointment of A Book-To-Screen Adaptation

Yes…this post is about, for me, the dreadful experience of watching the process of a book I’ve read becoming a movie or show. Ever since I’ve known myself, I’ve never liked it when a book becomes a movie or show. The process of seeing the characters being cast, going to the movies to watch it, and then slowly seeing everyone else watch it even if they would have normally never picked up the book.

Or, to cut to the short, watching a book (especially one I love) become mainstream: I hate it. I’m happy for the author, of course, because they deserve that recognition–but whenever something becomes extremely mainstream (I’m not just talking about popular within the book world), I just…drop it. The old spark to it is gone. And this, my friends, I can say ALWAYS happens when the book is adapted to a movie or show.

There’s a million reasons why I don’t like it. The initial reason is, I am usually disappointed with the cast. I don’t remember a single book where I thought the actors cast matched their characters. And I know it may be superficial, but for me, the appearances matter. I want to see my beloved characters close to how I imagine them, and often times, they’re not cast with their physical appearances in the books.

The second reason is disappointment that comes with the movie itself. They almost never get it right. It’s rare where they change parts of the book and still make it as good. In fact, they almost always change so much of the books that it’s completely different. I mean, you’d think, how can they screw it up so much, considering they already have a plot and characters and everything in the book? But they just do.

The third reason is that it ruins my image of the book. After watching a movie, I can’t think of the characters with nothing other than the actors that were cast. I mix up plot lines and if I don’t like the movie, it sometimes messes up what I think of the book.

Of course, there are a million smaller reasons why, but these three pop into my mind first. The reason I started writing this is because of all the casting news about the To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before series. This is probably my all time favorite contemporary series, and I’m currently reading Always and Forever, Lara Jean. So naturally, I’m really protective about it.

Picture from Jenny Han’s Twitter

At this point I’m kind of tired of hearing books becoming movies/shows, but for this one I was especially exasperated. Not only is it a special series for me, but it just doesn’t seem like it would be that good of a movie. It’s not that the books aren’t good themselves–I love them–but just that I feel they would lose that spark on the screen. These books don’t have that much plot. They’re more of Lara Jean’s thoughts and attitude over time. How is a movie supposed to capture that?

How is a movie supposed to capture all of the small details that make these books so cute? On top of that, I’m not very happy with the cast either. Generally, the characters cast (besides Kitty) are nothing like how I imagined them in the book. For me, Lara Jean has always been the cover model of the books, and I can’t help but feel disappointed.

Obviously, I’m super happy for Jenny Han because she seems really excited about this, but I just don’t feel it. These books are fluffy perfection and I just can’t see a movie getting that across.

Anyway, I think I conveyed what I wanted to in this post and I hope you enjoyed reading it too! Of course there are probably exceptions to the things I said–for example, I thought The Hunger Games movies were really good and as accurate as they could be–but generally, I end up disappointed.

I’m really passionate about this topic and I’d love to discuss it with you!

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