Richard's Animorphs Forum
Animorphs Section => Animorphs Forum Classic => Topic started by: Hylian Dan on December 08, 2008, 11:45:02 PM
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It's easy to come up with a bunch of reasons to hate the TV show, but what aspects of it do you think were done well?
I liked a lot of the scenes when the Animorphs were hanging around bantering with each other. The crocodile episode is one of my favorites since, aside from swapping Rachel and Cassie's roles, it does a pretty good job of presenting a (simplified) story from one of the books without needing a bunch of bad special effects. That one has some good scenes with the group hanging out in the barn and behaving like they do in the books.
I also really like the episode based on book 8, aside from the Andalite arm wrestling at the end. The opening with Ax at the theater came straight out of the book and was really funny.
I thought the two-part episode based on book 5 was also one of the better ones, despite the usual problems with the TV show. I like the actor who plays Marco's dad. I love the piano theme that plays when Visser One is revealed. And I like seeing the rivalry between Vissers One and Three. Visser Three spends too much time in human morph of course, given the limits of the show, but the guy who plays Victor Trent is fun to watch.
The two-part episode based on book 6 was another good one, especially the ending.
The other episode I particularly liked was the one based on book 7. Again, it had plenty of problems, but the scenes with Rachel's family were good, and the vision of the future Yeerk-ruled world was pretty awesome. It was great to be able to see that.
Yeah, the TV show was very lousy and I really really really want to see a good film adaptation of the books, but there were times when the show was okay. Not great. Not hideously awful. Okay.
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Hmmm... I only saw the first season of the tv show. And come to think of it, yeah, it had its moments, yes. But I generally didn't really like it either.
I liked how they split the books up into a series of episodes, like you say. How they took book #5 and split it into two episodes. The episodes with book #6 were well done, too, I agree. Didn't they use the Jake-actor's twin to play that scene in which Ax morphs Jake?! Can't quite recall how the two went together. The ending of that two-part was quite possibly the most efffectively executed scene in the whole tv series. I remember how touching it was. :'(
But the episode I remember liking most was the one (which wasn't even book related) where the Ellimist grants Jake his wish to never become an Animorph leader. And Tobias is shown fighting solo against the Yeerks. It was actually well thought, I reckon.
The sequence where Jake-Controller and Tobias are shooting daggers and spikes at each other at the school hallway was brilliant!!! ;D
The actors themselves weren't too bad. The human/Aximili could pull off the awkward 'Ax in human morph' moments well. I think they managed to portray Jake well. Marco came off as a hommie at times. And I recall not understand what Cassie would say sometimes.
I reckon the red-tailed hawk they used had potential to become a REAL star if it could have had more screen appearances without the leash thing on its leg.
Rachel as a lion was a bad choice. Andalite and Hork-Bajir dummies were pathetic. NO TAXXXONS???? The Yeerk Pool complex looked rather small, almost like a little beer tavern. HATED the torches they used for Dracon Beams... Sorry, this is meant to be good stuff about the tv series. Oops!
Here's me being a critic when god knows the amount of work that went on to make the tv show.
I say, it is watchable for 'diet' fans. ;)
PS: Blaaaarrrrgh! Andalite-wrestle episode... I had forgotten about that one...
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The actual morphing looked fairly decent for a cheap 90's show.
Tobias' character was dead on and Marco wasn't that far off.
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I liked the Ax character Paulo Costanzo did a good job
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If you watch the TV show with a grain of salt, KNOWING it will be different from the books, then it's actually quite good.
I like the one where the Yeerks were starting to starve after destroying the Kandrona, and Jake nearly reveals everything to Tom. Er... actually he DID reveal everything, Tom just didn't hear him. I had somehow missed this episode when it had passed on TV, so when I was watching them later on, I was all "WTF?!?!" at that point. (In a good way)
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The actual morphing looked fairly decent for a cheap 90's show.
Tobias' character was dead on and Marco wasn't that far off.
i didn't like how he wasn't blonde-haired.
plus, the characters were way too old.
what i did like was the morphing, when they actually showed it.
of course, it was sped up about 20x and wasn't very nicely animated, but as musicman pointed out, it was a cheap 90s show.
i still have an episode somewhere taped. :)
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I actually preferred the age changes, and minor things like hair color and eye color don't bother me at all. I'd rather someone that looks nothing like the part, that does a good job acting it, then someone that looks perfect, but can't act the part worth ****.
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I actually preferred the age changes, and minor things like hair color and eye color don't bother me at all. I'd rather someone that looks nothing like the part, that does a good job acting it, then someone that looks perfect, but can't act the part worth ****.
Well said! I agree!
I recall getting confused seeing the Jake-actor and the Tobias-model-for-The-Test-Cover and such and getting really confused as to who was Jake and who was Tobias in general.
Old or not, the Tobias actor did do a good job and he did look like the first model. And Jake and Cassie kinda didn't gel in looks to the book descriptions also, but did a fairly decent job.
The effects were ok for the grade of the show, yes.
Would have been cool to have seen more effort on the morphing show though.
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I liked the Ax character Paulo Costanzo did a good job
Me too! I watched the show just for him.
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PROS
It's an Animorphs show
I thought making Cassie allergic to the crocodile was better since Cassie is the last person you'd expect to be allergic to any kind of animal. Plus I also heard they changed it cuz Rachel had too many episodes about her(which was true)
Not noly did Cassie look like a girl. but she was HOT!
The effects were pretty good for a 90's show, especially one on Nick
although different, the episodes were actually pretty good
They remembered to include Visser 1
the "Disk" subplot was pretty kewl
CONS
It was on Nick(tht's a one way ticket to failure)
The Andalites looked like giant furbies
No Taxxon and stupid looking Hork Bajir
Ellimist looked stupid
Elfangor was seen a little too muh(He's suppose to be dead! Leave him dead he's been in like 4 episodes which is a lot when you think about how many episodes the show had) and while the disk was a nice subplot it was basically another way to fit in an Elfangor/Tobias moment, by having Elfangor give Tobias his morphing power back
No David arc, no Crayak, no Drode, not even any hints of wanting Crayak, Visser 1 was only in 2 episodes
Too many Rachel and Tobias episodes. WE GET, THEY LIKE EACH OTHER AND THEY'RE POPULAR CHARACTERS! CAN WE SEE A CASSIE OR MARCO EPISODE NOW?
I didn't like how they found Ax.
Their battle morphs were really screwed up. Jake: Whte Tiger(not very bad), Casse: Horse (oooook what's going on?), Marco: Wolf(WTF), Rachel:...LION!?(I'm still convinced they did that on purpose to make fun of Rachel and David's relationship)
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It was on Nick(tht's a one way ticket to failure)
Avatar did damn good.
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PROS
It's an Animorphs show
I thought making Cassie allergic to the crocodile was better since Cassie is the last person you'd expect to be allergic to any kind of animal. Plus I also heard they changed it cuz Rachel had too many episodes about her(which was true)
Not noly did Cassie look like a girl. but she was HOT!
The effects were pretty good for a 90's show, especially one on Nick
although different, the episodes were actually pretty good
They remembered to include Visser 1
the "Disk" subplot was pretty kewl
CONS
It was on Nick(tht's a one way ticket to failure)
The Andalites looked like giant furbies
No Taxxon and stupid looking Hork Bajir
Ellimist looked stupid
Elfangor was seen a little too muh(He's suppose to be dead! Leave him dead he's been in like 4 episodes which is a lot when you think about how many episodes the show had) and while the disk was a nice subplot it was basically another way to fit in an Elfangor/Tobias moment, by having Elfangor give Tobias his morphing power back
No David arc, no Crayak, no Drode, not even any hints of wanting Crayak, Visser 1 was only in 2 episodes
Too many Rachel and Tobias episodes. WE GET, THEY LIKE EACH OTHER AND THEY'RE POPULAR CHARACTERS! CAN WE SEE A CASSIE OR MARCO EPISODE NOW?
I didn't like how they found Ax.
Their battle morphs were really screwed up. Jake: Whte Tiger(not very bad), Casse: Horse (oooook what's going on?), Marco: Wolf(WTF), Rachel:...LION!?(I'm still convinced they did that on purpose to make fun of Rachel and David's relationship)
we're only supposed to post the pros, not the cons...
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Well, it went off the air so that's a pro. But if your talking about good effects I think they got Tom right I guess and maybe Jake. I'm sorry but I really don't think they read the series at all. I mean the disk was kinda interesting, but in the end did it do anything? Yea, I know, give Tobias the morphing power back, but if it can be done that way why have a cube? Or why not have Elfangor say, "Tobias take the disk its the cure to being a nothlit." And will someone please tell me how Ax makes a space ship out of crap he finds? I mean yea, he can get free cable using garbage he finds, but that isn't hard already. If there is one thing I did legitimately like it was that Tobias was a hawk, not a redtail, but at least a hawk and that is cool. I don't want this to become a flame thread.
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There were plenty of things that the show did that went well. One of the bad things about adaptations, in general, is that they are too critically compared to their original source material (and rightfully so), but often times people focus entirely too much on the negative and miss out on the good things that were done well.
First off, I liked the writing changes. There, I said it. Say what you will, but there was absolutely nothing wrong with the way the show was written. The biggest problem that people have with the show is from the cause of the show not having a decent budget -- the wrong morphs, the lack of enough morphing or fight scenes, or good FX for aliens in general (resulting in Visser 3 and Ax ending up mostly in human morph) -- they were all the cause of not having a proper budget, but it was NOT related to bad writing. The writing simply adapted to what they couldn't afford to do.
The storylines spread for each episode worked well, and were properly paced and directed. All of the Animorphs were written in character as well. The actors for Jake, Rachel, Marco, Cassie, Tobias, and Ax, were all good also. I never understood the negativity towards them other than the fact that they were much older than in the books, or that they didn't look the way the fans imagined them. But most importantly, as I said above, I always felt that the writers did a consistently good job at adapting to what they could or couldn't physically do on the show. It probably was very hard to write for a sci-fi show that could barely afford to morph more than once for a weekly episode, but they pulled it off imo.
A few other things that I also liked on the show:
a) Elfangor's Disc. This plot was brilliant imo, and I can't believe that K.A didn't think of it herself. The fact that Elfangor's Hirac Delest is unlocked by Tobias' DNA (go back and notice that Tobias doesn't touch the disc once until it's unlocked) to reveal that Elfangor is his father was much better done than in the books, where Tobias simply finds out by a letter read by some lawyer. I also liked that, in the beginning, the disc had a sense of mystery around it where it could've potentially worked as a sort of guide to the Animorphs if the writers had chosen to go that route.
b) The music. I loved the music choices on the show. I really wish they had more of the original score released that they had playing in the background so I could listen to it.
c) The barn discussions. I know that most of the time they hung around in Cyberia, but I feel most fans overlook the many discussions they also had in the barn for certain episodes. Most of those scenes felt like they were right out of the books where they would discuss about what to do, or if something was morally right or wrong. I also liked the way the barn scenes were set up in general, where you would see Cassie working on her chores or tending to animals, where Tobias would be sitting up on the rafters, or where the others would be sitting on a bale of hay. They even had rare occasions where once and a while they would have Ax standing in the corner as his Andalite self.
d) The humor. Marco and Jake actually joked around like they should as best friends, and because of this, most of the Jake/Marco moments were the best whether they were funny or dramatic. Also, Ax as his crazy self as a human in general, especially around food, was hilarious (the actor, Paulo something was excellent at pulling this off). I felt that the writers did an awesome job of breaking up the episodes with moments of proper humor. It was what sold the characters believably as kids as they went about their missions. This was improved drastically in Season 2 when they got a better grasp at what they could and couldn't afford do on the show. Most of the episodes were more character driven and funnier because they realized this, and I think they were heading the show at the right direction at this point too, had the show continued on.
Really, even though it was nothing like the books, the Animorphs show was a fun show to watch regardless. I used to watch it every time it would be on, and I'm actually kinda sad that it was canceled by the poor treatment it was given, by both the network and the fans.
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It was on Nick(tht's a one way ticket to failure)
Avatar did damn good.
Avatar was a huge exception! LOL tht's my favorite show. I guess I should change tht comment to "any live action show on Nick is doomed to failure"
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You remind me so much. When I heard it was coming out, I actually planned that night. My dad was there too cause he read the series too. We watched episode one. Then we stopped. To be honest, I couldn't bare watching more. But now I have tolerance and even love for most failed attempts so I'm going to have to watch it all again.
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I think they did quite a few things right, to be honest.
Like when Marco and Jake morphed lizards to follow Chapman (I know in the book it was only Jake, but still), I think they got their reactions spot on. I also think Marco's character was great, and Jake's, and Tobias'. Rachel's......I dont know, she didnt have that spark that the real Rachel has, to me.
Also, one very important moment (at least in my eyes) is when they first become Animorphs, and Marco reminds them that they dont know the truth about reality because they have never lost a loved one before (that is one of my favorite scenes in Animorphs, so I'm glad they kept it completely in tact in the show).
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I watched a number of episodes before stopping. I had some difficulty because they came on Friday evenings, and the family and I already had a friday night tradition we did during the summer.
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i remember not caring about all the mistakes lol i was just so happy to have it on tv that i made sure to never miss it.
one of the things i loved was human Ax(is the actor named Paul?....i just remember him from being on Joey and i was like "omg ax!" lol).....he didn't look like the human Ax i pictured, but the way he acted was like spot-on for me lol
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I looove Tobias actor!!!
Rachel was cheesy and wussy and not tough.
Shawn Ashmore did a really good job on Jake
Marco wasn't too bad.
I liked Tobias' hawk-version. It could've been made a HUGE star!! I can imagine...
TOBIAS THE HAWK!!! On Broadway.... Screeing the national anthem! Go Tobias theeee Hawk!!!
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his name is Paulo Costanzo and he was in road trip very funny