Ready Player One (dvd)

In just 25 years, society has all but collapsed and we are all living in a MMORPG-type world. Presumably to escape the harsh reality of the real world. Much like living in The Matrix...except voluntarily. And, I suppose, happily (Seeing how things are in 2020, I can absolutely see the appeal of taking my mask-less avatar on an adventurous romp through a pandemic-free world...). At least this is according to the setup of Ready Player One, a film based on the 2011 sci-fi novel by Ernest Cline.

The film opens with the death of James Halliday, the inventor of OASIS, the  epic virtual reality universe that pretty much every single person on the planet practically lives in 24-7. Halliday has decided to leave his entire fortune to the one player who discovers the Easter Egg that's been (very well) hidden somewhere within the massive the OASIS world. Among those searching is underdog Wade Watts, a nice kid from a poor neighborhood who just happens to excel at OASIS. Of course there are some truly nasty bad dudes hunting for the Easer Egg too. And they'll stop at nothing to find it...and they'll take down anyone who gets in their way. 

Ready Player One is that rare film that just might be better than the source material. It is fast-paced, exciting, and will keep you on the edge of your seat the entire time. And the CG effects are phenomenal! And I love all the callbacks to classic 80s movies. Basically the whole movie is epic. But I would expect nothing less from legendary director Stephen Spielberg!

Of course it's predictable too. I mean, of course the good guys are going to win! It's that sort of story. But it's such a fun ride getting to that point that you won't care how predictable it is. You'll just enjoy every second.

Ready Player One can be found in the Teen DVD section. And if you want to read the book, we've totally got that too!

--AJB

Space Boy (series), by Stephen McCrane

Have you ever moved do a different city or state? Where you had to leave your friends and everything about life as you knew it behind? Where, suddenly, you were the New Kid among people who had grown up together? Was it awkward? I'm guessing it was. That's how it is for Amy, the main character in Stephen McCrane's awesome graphic novel series Space Boy. Except Amy's situation is a little more hardcore than a move from, say...Michigan to Ohio (just for example). Amy was forced to move when her dad got a new job, but she didn't just move to a new town. She moved to a new time!

Amy grew up on a mining colony in Deep Space, a 30 year journey away from Earth. But then her dad lost his job and her family had to move back to their home planet, a place Amy had never set foot on. When she woke, she hadn't aged a day (although her best friends back home were now adults with teenage children of their own). Having missed 30 years of, well, everything, it's easy to say that Amy has a lot of catching up to do. Imagine that adjustment! Space Boy is Amy's story of adjusting to life on a strange planet after having traveled 30 years into the future. Oh yeah...and there's a mysterious boy named Oliver Amy just can't stay away from...even if her friends warn her he's dangerous.

I won't say too much more about Space Boy except that it's an awesome series that's definitely worth reading! Find it in our Graphic Novel section today!

--AJB

Wrinkle In Time: Book vs Movie

 

I was around 7 or 8 when I first encountered Madeleine L'Engle's scifi/adventure epic A Wrinkle In Time through a classroom read-aloud situation. At that age, my brain wasn't quite ready to grasp the abstract concept of high-speed inter-dimensional travel... although not long afterward my cousins and I would become obsessed with Star Wars which, as you know, utilizes a concept similar to Tessering so the heroes and bad guys can chase each other from one end of the universe to the other in a matter of moments...just with ships, not people (although pretty sure Yoda could've managed, if he wasn't so busy being a hermit). All that said, I wasn't really too into the book. Nor were many of my classmates.

When the Disney movie came out a few years ago, I decided to revisit the book so I could watch the film adaption...which looked pretty visually stunning (at least from the trailer). So I reread the book and ended up kind of liking it. Unfortunately, life got in the way of seeing the movie. Until this past weekend when I remembered I wanted to see it and rented it from Oxford Public Library's Teen Collection.

And I wish I hadn't.

Yes, the film adaption was as visually beautiful...almost to the point of overkill. But the rest if it was awful. Scenes central the plot were cut while other scenes that didn't further the story in the least were added for no other reason that to create unneeded drama (or just to dump in more CG effects). Not even one of the actors were right for the parts they played and the characters themselves were written all wrong. For example, the three Mrs. W's were not at all like they were in the book. And the overall tone was wrong. The book is actually pretty dark, but the movie was a brightly-colored, candy-coated bit of fluff that was so different from the source material I felt it was disrespectful. I told my husband that Tim Burton or The Duffer Brothers would have been a much better choice to direct this movie adaption.

So... I would absolutely recommend the BOOK A Wrinkle In Time. But do yourself a favor and skip the movie.

--AJB

p.s. That disturbing creature that's part Sting Ray, part cabbage will haunt my nightmares for the rest of my life.

Looking for Alaska (dvd)

Ever since I first learned John Green's novel Looking for Alaska might be made into a movie (this was some 10 or so years ago), I was excited to see how the story would play out on screen. I was curious to see who would be cast as Miles a.k.a. "Pudge" (back then I pictured Michael Cera), The Colonel, Takumi, and, of course Alaska. I wondered what Culver Creek would look like. I was curious how the whole sad saga could be made to fit into 90 or so minutes, what scenes would be cut, if I would even like the film version or if I would be sorry I watched it.

Well...I found out.

After several misfires and even more delays, it was finally decided to make the book into a TV Miniseries. I gotta say, this was absolutely the right decision! The story didn't suffer from essential scenes being cut, as it most definitely would had it been adapted for the Big Screen. What's more, it allowed for better character development...and not only that of main characters. Side characters that only briefly appear in the novel are brought into the spotlight and given their chance to shine (I especially loved Dr. Hyde's story arc. And the Eagle leading a school-wide Macarena was priceless!). Other bits are added too, but I'll let you discover those for yourself. Was everything and everyone like I pictured when I read the book? No. It was better! Infinitely better! I highly recommend it!

A personal observation: Watching the story unfold onscreen, I was Big Time reminded of My So Called Life, a made-for-TV High School drama I loved as a teen that aired for one season (and sadly only one season) back in the mid-90s. And I couldn't help but wonder if Mr. Green was influenced by this show (directly or subconsciously) when he penned Looking For Alaska. 

--AJB