Percy Jackson and the Olympians
I was never into Greek Myths. They either get you at a young age or you're immune, kind of like ponies. I wasn't a horse girl either. And I sure as hell wasn't Rory and Paris spending their Spring Break in a Florida motel watching Joseph Campbell and the Power of Myth. Every few years I think to myself, maybe I should give the Odyssey a second chance. Only to very quickly remember how much I hate Odysseus. And if there was any show that would finally change my mind about Greek Mythology I can safely say that this was not it. The problem is that Percy Jackson and the Olympians wrongly assumes that their audience knows all the Greek Myths and would know who everyone was and what was going on from the start. You know what they say about making assumptions? Well, I don't like being made to feel like an ass. This first season, because, yes, they bafflingly renewed it, only has eight episodes in it and it wasn't until Edge showed up and did a big infodump in episode five that I actually was able to kind of figure out what was going on. And while I'm not a fan of the infodump, Edge as Ares delivers it so perfectly, so insouciantly, that I can't help but love it, even if the arrival of the information is too little too late. Edge, or should I say Adam Copeland, is one of the reasons I turned into this show. The children are nobodies, and Walker Scobell as Percy is the most punchable lead ever unless you factor in the actor playing Percy when he was younger, because Azriel Dalman has made me a hater for life, but the adults, good gods damn, they're a stacked cast; Toby Stephens, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Timothy Omundson, Megan Mullally, Jason Mantzoukas, Jessica Parker Kennedy, Suzanne Cryer, Jay Duplass, and Lance Reddick! But I felt like it was a bait and switch. Our hero's father is Toby Stephens and you get to see him exactly twice in this show. No more, no less, and yes, it will break your heart. Perhaps they're trying to put us in Percy's shoes with how he feels about not having his father in his life, but he never knew his father was Toby Stephens and those of us who did now feel cheated. And also have a desperate need to rewatch Jane Eyre or Black Sails, hell, I'd even rewatch The Camomile Lawn! And I know I'm not the target demographic, I was just hoping I'd enjoy it. And yes, sometimes there's occasionally a really great music choice that made me laugh, but guest stars and jokes that will go over most people's heads like Lin-Manuel Miranda humming the theme to Arthur shouldn't be the only things you like about the show. You shouldn't sit down and think, you know, these end credits really are the strongest part of this series. And yet, that's what I thought after every episode. Because if someone asked me right now what exactly happened in this show I would in no way be able to tell them. But if someone asked me to describe the end credits, I would be waxing lyrical about their WPA mural roots and how perfect they are. Dammit, now I want to go watch the end credits again. Especially because I do love Bear McCreary... OK, that's settled, off to watch the credits and ignore the amazing guest stars they have lined up for season two. Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, I will come for you.
Circe by Madeline Miller
My awakening to vampires didn't happen until 2001. Of course I knew about vampires, I just didn't seek them out. It took Buffy and William the Bloody for that to happen. But prior to that I wasn't in the dark. I knew who Anne Rice was because of an art class acquaintance who was obsessed with her books. I think she was actually the only Goth at my high school which makes me sad. There should have been more. And then you could not be alive in the nineties without knowing about the Tom Cruise Lestat casting controversy. But again, it was background noise. I didn't even see the Interview with the Vampire movie until it was on basic cable. Then I saw it. A lot. Randomly. It's one of those movies you just kind of watch some of and get drawn inexorably in. Eventually, as in only about ten years ago, I thought it was time for me to finally read Interview with the Vampire and I really didn't like it. Gave the book away didn't like it. What's odd is the only thing I actually remember about the book, other than hating it, is Claudia's death scene. That's very vivid in my mind. Also I kind of what to re-read it to see if it's really as bad as I thought it was, so it just goes to show I should hold on to all my books for ever and ever. Which makes it oddly strange that I was so excited for AMC's new Interview with the Vampire. But I was. And it was magical. It transformed the book into something more. The book became a starting off point and from their it grew to be about sexual identity, racism, family, justice, relationships, trauma, abuse, truth, as Louis says at one point to Daniel, now older, wiser, grumpier, and played perfectly by Eric Bogosian, we are on an odyssey of memory. And memory changes, becomes warped, distorted by love and hate. This adaptation is very insular, an almost claustrophobic little world, where thought and language and words are king. Daylight is never seen, everything happens in these opulent little rooms in New Orleans that look and feel like jewel boxes. You actually feel the suffocation that Louis feels while around Lestat. The words swirl around and around in your head so that after an episode you feel lightheaded, as if somehow they snuck into your house and drained you of blood while you watched. Every change is so much for the better that I can not praise the writers of this series enough. But the biggest improvement is when Louis refuses to talk about Claudia's rape at the hands of another vampire. He says that he will not exploit her pain. And that's when I realized the showrunners really knew what they were doing. Claudia's exploitation almost to the point of child pornography in the book is what alienated me from it and they knew they had to point blank say that this adaptation was going beyond the book, making it more modern, more thoughtful, and yes, even a bit more Grey Gardens. And if this entire adaptation just existed to give me Lestat and Louis as Big and Little Edie, then I say it was a job well done.
