Suddenly imagined a Princess-Bride-esque modern frame to the period piece with teen incredulous at how no-one intervened. (That said, my teen finds a lot of US school movies bizarre, for the exact same reason.)
Stephen Bush
@stephenkb.bsky.social
Associate editor and columnist @financialtimes.com. Post too often about culture, public policy, management, politics, nerd stuff, Arsenal the champions, wosoc. Wow! (center) Try my UK politics newsletter for free here: www.ft.com/tryinsidepolitics
This is 100 per cent correct in my view. Carrie is, as someone on here put it, ultimately a tragedy based on 'what if, on the absolute worst moment of the worst day of your awful life, someone handed you a fully loaded gun?' and for various reasons the crescendo leading up to that doesn't work now.
Martin Concagh@mconcagh.bsky.social · 19h agoActually my hot take about Carrie, and The Stand, is that they could/should only be adapted as period pieces.
Really interesting piece this on the Houthis' military capabilities:
Houthis show military reach with deadly missile strikes on Riyadh
Yemen’s Iran-backed militants demonstrate that they are not just ‘guys in flip-flops’
ft.com
hey man, we’re all here because we love you, and because we’re worried about the number of interventions you’re staging these days
Just saw the very sad news that Chris Wickham has died. A superb historian - and a superb writer of engaging history.
The death of Harry Webb and London’s gas-and-drive problem. www.londoncentric.media/p/nitrous-ox...
“The killing of Harry Webb wasn’t just another statistic”: London’s gas-and-drive crisis
Plus: What will pedestrianised Oxford Street look? • Where in London are the Greens targeting next? • Phone theft decline is a central London thing
londoncentric.media
The problem is - understandably! - people starting from “what’s a kids book I like?” not “what’s a successful 10 hour adaptation of any book?” eg The longest TV adaptation of Anna Karenina is still an hour and twenty minutes shy of 10 hours.
Stephen Bush@stephenkb.bsky.social · 22h agoA handful of great shouts here, but most have the same “do you know how long an hour IS and do you understand that TV is a different medium to books” problem as the HP series.
The extent to which the Conservative leadership has convinced themselves, to the point of falling out with other Tories who go “come on, it’s not gonna happen”, that an election is imminent is crazy.
Sunder Katwala (sundersays)@sundersays.bsky.social · 19h agoThis seems to be quite a silly front-page splash, since the mounting speculation about the PM calling a snap 2026 election is largely imaginary. (There is rather more chatter about 2027 now) A 2026 election is available at odds of 18/1 from Ladbrokes if you believe it
Where an adaptation can get longer and better suited for TV not film - and this is where I am excited for The Husbands TV show and dreading the Tomorrow and Tomorrow film - is when what you need is precisely to convey time passing, rather than plot.
James Ball@jamesrball.com · 20h agoTV *eats plot*. It just absolutely devours it. The sheer amount of story you need to fill even six hours is absurd. It doesn't feel like it as a viewer (if they've done it right) but once you've seen it through the other side of the process...oh boy.
TV *eats plot*. It just absolutely devours it. The sheer amount of story you need to fill even six hours is absurd. It doesn't feel like it as a viewer (if they've done it right) but once you've seen it through the other side of the process...oh boy.
Stephen Bush@stephenkb.bsky.social · 22h agoA handful of great shouts here, but most have the same “do you know how long an hour IS and do you understand that TV is a different medium to books” problem as the HP series.
In theory having ten hours of a TV season instead of two hours of movie to play with should allow showrunners to go full Tarkovsky, but the only guy with the courage to do that right now is Vince Gilligan on Pluribus. Mostly other showrunners crowd those hours with meaningless incidents.
Stephen Bush@stephenkb.bsky.social · 22h agoA handful of great shouts here, but most have the same “do you know how long an hour IS and do you understand that TV is a different medium to books” problem as the HP series.
Thomas the Tank Engine episodes are about 5 minutes each, and I’m just not sure what to say to people who think those can each be easily turned into 20 minute episodes (let alone hour-long episodes), other than just “No they can’t”
That first point hits the nail on the head, and I'd further refine it to "do you know how long an hour is *to a child*?" – even if you could adapt a children's book to a 10-hour series, 1hr episodes are simply too long for the target audience. Frankly, 30mins is pushing it. 20-25mins is ideal, imo.
A handful of great shouts here, but most have the same “do you know how long an hour IS and do you understand that TV is a different medium to books” problem as the HP series.
Tom Ewing@tomewing.bsky.social · yesterdayI am now wondering if there are *any* children’s books you could get an excellent 10 hour series out of
Excited for the Fawlty Towers Extended Universe; a dark and gritty Manuel reboot; a miniseries on meeting Sybil; and this winter The Major as he confronts his greatest enemy: The Germans.
Stephen Bush@stephenkb.bsky.social · yesterdayEither this show will be a massive failure, which will have big commercial consequences and therefore terrible creative ones elsewhere in HBO/Skydance, or it will be a success, which will result in new frontiers of padding across every other established property.
That's about one hour per 25 pages of book.
Stephen Bush@stephenkb.bsky.social · yesterdayEither this show will be a massive failure, which will have big commercial consequences and therefore terrible creative ones elsewhere in HBO/Skydance, or it will be a success, which will result in new frontiers of padding across every other established property.
Ted Lasso season 1: 32-36 minutes Ted Lasso season 2: 37-53 minutes Ted Lasso season 3: 47-79 minutes
Stephen Bush@stephenkb.bsky.social · yesterdayEither this show will be a massive failure, which will have big commercial consequences and therefore terrible creative ones elsewhere in HBO/Skydance, or it will be a success, which will result in new frontiers of padding across every other established property.
This is a fair point but it fails to take account of the fact that four of the ten episodes will focus on the 1991 ITV franchise auction. HBO looked at the ratings smash of "Rivals" and saw a big opportunity to lean into this side of the story
Stephen Bush@stephenkb.bsky.social · yesterdayEither this show will be a massive failure, which will have big commercial consequences and therefore terrible creative ones elsewhere in HBO/Skydance, or it will be a success, which will result in new frontiers of padding across every other established property.
“If the rule you followed brought you to this, of what use was the rule?”
I was going to reply to this with”two and a half hour treatment of I Want My Hat Back” but in a sense, that is No Country For Old Men.
Effy, Walker Among Sunflowers@mseffy.myatproto.social · yesterdaySkydance announces 6-hour Goodnight Moon miniseries, with the hopes of "really bringing out the nuance possible in the book".
Doing one of the great afternoons out: the Thames Clipper through East London.
"We're bringing back Animorphs! And each book will be ten episodes and the aliens finally land & make them Animorphs in episode 9!" "You mean episode--" "No, I mean 9."
Skydance announces 6-hour Goodnight Moon miniseries, with the hopes of "really bringing out the nuance possible in the book".
Stephen Bush@stephenkb.bsky.social · yesterdayEither this show will be a massive failure, which will have big commercial consequences and therefore terrible creative ones elsewhere in HBO/Skydance, or it will be a success, which will result in new frontiers of padding across every other established property.
Canon expanding like Red Weed in War of the Worlds. Every media surface covered in canon, every narraive angle, gap or depth filled in.
Stephen Bush@stephenkb.bsky.social · yesterdayEither this show will be a massive failure, which will have big commercial consequences and therefore terrible creative ones elsewhere in HBO/Skydance, or it will be a success, which will result in new frontiers of padding across every other established property.
gotta get in all the kinds of Herbology class Harry experienced from "pretty boring" to "extremely boring"
this is the final boss of prestige tv