Lit What Books Should Get a Comic Adaption?

Before the move (back) to Marvel I was always hoping Specter of the Past and Vision of the Future would get an adaptation, to go along with the Thrawn Trilogy ones.

 

I wish they wouldn't adapt any. I think it's a waste of ink and paper. Tell us new stories.

The one exception I might make are Ascendancy books, but I would rather we get a proper RPG sourcebook on the Chaos, or better yet a comic that follows Ar'alani by Zahn. I've felt Zahn should have transitioned to comics after Survivor's Quest and Outbound Flight; the Hand of Judgment books would have worked a lot better that way.

 

JAT, NJO, I also think James Lueno's work would be good too, the PT stuff (labyrinth of evil, Dark Lord Rise of Darth Vader, Cloak of Deception, Darth plagueis), as it would be great to see them beyond the minds eye darth plagueis I think could really work with using different art styles for the different 'sides of the Muun and Palps', more abstract when they are Sithing while more normal in the mundane world. Shatterpoint would also be fun, heck I think all of the CWMMP could be great.

Comics aren't just pictures but also artistic, lean into that and it can really add to things.

 

Are the Firefly ones all canon?

(also the buffy ones got weird i remember her getting superpowers and "fighting" someone who also had superpowers.

 

The closest we got was the Specter of Thrawn mini-series that was announced in the fall of 1997 and was set to bridge the two novels before it was cancelled. I still remember the excitement I felt when I read the news in Star Wars Insider when it was announced as an early 1998 release alongside Jedi Academy: Leviathan (initially titled Leviathan of Corbos) and Crimson Empire.

 

IMO, not that good idea. While "Leaves on the Wind" and "No Power in the 'Verse" were great, later Firefly comics were noticeably weaker.
Regarding The Bad Batch - wish it had a companion webcomics series like TCW back in the days.

 

I didn’t know the JA comic had a different name originally. I would have liked to see that roster of early JAT characters developed more in several miniseries, and that’s what I thought was the original intent. Would have been complementary to the Bantam novels, think.

 

That is not the case. The art must still be produced, story must be broken down to fit the format, dialogue must be edited. The only difference is that the basic story has already been created, and a "script" exists from which story and dialogue can be adapted. The entire production process of the comic still happens, just like it does with non-adapted comics - at best, they're simply able to omit one early step and modify another.

 

Sounds like Clonegeek is correct—relative to the normal production, it’s easy because it’s more efficient by skipping a step.

 

That's sort of the opposite of the point I was making. The only part of the process that is skipped is the writer having to generate a plot (and gaining editorial approval of that plot). From writing (yes, the comic still has to be written, that's why a writer is credited) to artwork to editing, the entire process of producing a comic book remains. None of it is "easy" even in comparison to comics that are not adaptations. The work is still there.

 

"Easier" is not the same as "relatively easy."

 

But it’s not there from the writing perspective. All you’re doing when writing an adaption is cutting dialogue. Which is more complex for book adaptions as much more dialogue needs to be cut.

But other than that a writer is just copying and pasting dialogue which just sounds utterly boring. While not the same the art is also assuredly a bit easier as your just translating screen to print in that case. More challenging for a book caption I would wager.

 

This is not even close to reality. Writing an adaptation is not simply "cutting dialogue." Here's one hint: a comic book is a different format for telling a story than a television series. The story needs to be translated to the comic medium, which involves considering how panels should be laid out, marrying dialogue to panel format, working out how to recreate the drama and impact of a given scene through art and layout, and quite a bit more. None of this is trivial, whether you're writing an original story or adapting a series episode.

Cavan Scott, among others, has put out some interesting material regarding what writing a comic book looks like. He doesn't write adaptations, but one can clearly see how the work involved is similar. Anyone interested in any of this should consider checking it out.

 

An adaptation doesn’t require you to come up with a storyline, plot it out, make characters, figure out ways to develop them, etc, etc

 

I don't know, I watched dubbed anime back in the 90s and 00s. They made a LOT of changes.

But yes in general it is easier in some ways.

 

Well still I don’t think adapting on screen material to comic sounds at all fun. However much work is put into it. That work could be better spent on more creative endeavors.

It’s why I only read the adaptions of the shows and books because I have marvel unlimited. I wouldn’t buy them otherwise. Not worth my money. Plus when I probably buy them eventually I’ll be sure to buy them second hand cause then I won’t contribute to sales. If no one buys them then they would stop being made.

again my problem isn’t with adaptions as a whole it’s just screen to comic adaptions. Screen to book can add a lot. Book to comic can add worthwhile illustrations.

the only advantage of screen to comic is I can read a comic book faster than I can watch a show. So sure it was nice getting a refresher for the mandalorian. But in every other way would I prefer something new? Yes.

 

I imagine whatever effort is required to adapt a tv/film into comic format, it’s significantly harder to do so when the source material is hundreds of pages of prose novel. Not just in terms of condensing the story into something shorter, but also in having to design characters, settings, creatures, vehicles etc with very little visual reference.

 

FWIW, there's an argument I've seen that film comic adaptations have largely outlived their usefulness, in that they were originally specifically meant for the era before home video when you couldn't just rewatch a movie whenever. (IMO this is a big part of why so many people have false memories of having actually seen deleted scenes from the OT like Luke and Biggs on Tatooine). Now that watching a movie at home has almost completely displaced theaters, while there still may be a niche for comic adaptations it's much more of a niche.

 

True, but you have descriptions, so that is a start. It is a little easier than making a comic from nothing.

 

Just as an addendum to this, I also don't think it helps that they don't seem to be willing to experiment too much stylistically with the comics medium for adaptations. I'd be way more interested in a "TROS literally in the style of Dark Empire" adaptation than a photorealistic one, for example.

 

The Force Unleashed comic adaptation tells the story of the game from the perspective of Proxy Galen Marek droid telling Galen Marek's story to Bail Organa comic adaptations can be different in the Force Unleashed 2 comic adaptation is the story of the game but from Boba Fett's point of view in AOTC comic adaptation Quinlan Vos appears in the battle of Geonosis, something that does not appear in the movie and the comic adaptations of the OT are somewhat different like the appearance of non Hutt Jabba in ANH comic

 

See if your going to do an adaption at least do something unique like that.

 

A novel is much better than a comic adaptation but comic adaptations can do different things, such as telling a story from a character's point of view