Skip to main content

How is the movie adaptation of R.I.P.D. different from the comic?


How is the movie adaptation of R.I.P.D. different from the comic? There appears to be no wiki for the comic. But seeing as to how the movie is considered to be a flop, I'm curious to know how faithful the script was to the original.




Answer



Quite a bit different, in terms of story elements, things chased, people chasing and locations chased to. But I suspect even if they followed the comic to the letter, there was something missing from this movie, an inner connection with the viewer it fails to make; a film full of snazzy props and witty patter, but alas, signifying nothing.


The comic promotional information sold the comic thusly:



Welcome to the Rest In Peace Department--the devoted, yet dead, officers of divine law enforcement "patrolling the deadbeat. . . reporting to one boss." Yep--THAT boss. Nick Cruz died an untimely death, at the height of his personal and professional life. Why did he join the R.I.P.D.? Well, not knowing the identity of his killer has left his soul a bit. . . restless. Now he hunts some of the most fiendish creatures, hoping for the chance to find out who set him up so he can get into heaven.



enter image description here


The movie producers, however, cannot blame the comic for the changes they made in the screenplay:





  • The initial premise of a frame which results in the death of the young police officer (Nick Cruz, in the comic, Nick Walker in the movie) is the same.




  • The magical MacGuffin (object which powers the plot, bad guys want it, good guys want to prevent them from having it) is different. The comic uses the Sword of the Archangel, Michael, the movie, the staff of Jericho.




  • The comic has a chase scene where the protagonists end up in hell putting down a rebellion, defeating the bad guy and recovering the McGuffin. The movie puts the viewer in hell (as the bad guys invade Heaven, steal the Staff of Jericho and some other artifact which creates some techno-magic device bringing the dead back to Earth.




  • The two works are completely different in their story and tone and does not seem to be a true adaptation of the work but more of a derivation of the characters and setting with a completely different story written for the screenplay.





This sounds as if this was definitely a case of Adaptation Decay (where the subsequent materials is much worse than the source - obligatory TVTropes warning). Critics also found it unbearable to watch:



Film critic Roger Moore gave the film one-and-a-half out of four stars, calling it "the worst comic book adaptation since Jonah Hex." - Moore, Roger (2013-07-19). "Movie Review: R.I.P.D. - "Jonah Hex Redux"". Movie Nation. Retrieved 2013-07-19.



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

harry potter - Do the Kwikspell courses work?

In Harry Potter we are introduced to Kwikspell course in The Chamber of Secrets (and never hear about it again). We see Filch taking courses, presumably by mail. The descriptions of Kwikspell make me think it is for people who are weak in magic (kind of like how Neville was supposed to be when he was younger), but had magic in them nonetheless. However, Ron's comments later in the chapter make it sound like it is mainly for Squibs to learn magic. However, it is strongly implied through out all the books that Squibs are essentially Muggles, and will never be able to do magic. How then is a Kwikspell course supposed to work? Do we have any information to know if it works at all? Is it a scam? An answer from any level of canon is welcome. Answer Kwikspell courses are (probably) useful to some wizards, but not to squibs. The Kwikspell course literature comes with two testimonials. Madam Z. Nettles of Topsham writes: ‘I had no memory for incantations and my potions were a family joke...
Post a Comment
Read more

futurama - How much time is lost in 'Time Keeps on Slippin''

In time Keeps on Slippin' , Farnsworth creates a basketball team which he matures by abusing Chronitons. This leads to time skipping forward by random, but ever increasing amounts. How much time was skipped in this way? Answer Unfortunately, I don't think a good estimate can be made for this, for two reasons: Many of the time skips move forward by an indeterminate amount of time. At one point, the Professor mentions localized regions of space skipping forward much more than others. We then see two young boys on the street below complaining about having to pay social security, only to suddenly become senior citizens and start complaining about wanting their money. Thus, each individual could have experienced a different amount of time skippage.
Post a Comment
Read more

languages - Do we ever see written English in the Star Wars films?

In Empire Strikes Back , we see a transcription of what R2's beeps and bloops mean, but it's not English (sorry for the low quality, it's from the 2004 DVDs): I'd assume it's what Basic looks like when written, but is there some point in the the Star Wars films we see written English instead? (This sort of spun off from a discussion in How do people understand astromech droids? .) Answer At one point there was English but it has been phased out in subsequent versions of the films. Chris Gould at DVD Active did a comparison of all versions of each of the Star Wars films, and in his comparison of Episode 4 , there are a couple of screenshots showing how the power gauge for the Death Star tractor beam was changed. I imagine there are probably more to be found in his other comparisons but I haven't got around to reading those yet.
Post a Comment
Read more

Was the "pure soul" of Harry's what had really hurt Voldemort?

In the Order of the Phoenix, Voldemort possesses Harry, and it hurts. Greatly. I think that Dumbledore explained that it was because Voldemort's rotten soul was incapable of assimilating Harry's pure soul, that Voldemort didn't understand the love and friendship etc that Harry has in his heart. But, I think it was a lie. Remember that in Deathly Hallows, while looking for information regarding Horcruxes, it is discovered that it is in fact possible to merge a soul fragment back, but that the process was extremely painful. Now then, if Voldemort tried to possess Harry, and Harry had a fragment of Voldemort's soul, I think that it could have been the true cause of Voldemort's pain: the fact of having his soul so close of another fragment. I think that Dumbledore knew that fact, but had to lie to Harry because it was inappropriate to let him know that he had one of Voldemort's soul fragments at the moment. Is that right? Or was it truly the pure soul of Harry's...
Post a Comment
Read more