Board Thread:Spoilers!/@comment-25551215-20160315233708/@comment-4636650-20160518132838

Eskaver wrote: I guess my final note on this convo: Ummm, "Victorian Gothic seem relatively tame", then you have proven the other point. Saying that modern horror has sex, nudity, etc means absolutely nothing when the source is "comparatively tame". You are pretty much saying Frankenstein wasn't done well in Once because it was practically as tame as the source material and didn't have enough sex, nudity, and violence like in modern horror. That's what I get from what you are saying.

Jekyll and Hyde had some murder.....this show has murder......I don't see your point. It's not like modern horror does anything with source material and it's not like you need to throw sex and nudity, etc into that. As you said, it's about atmosphere and other things, so what's the basis that Once won't have those good aspects? Once has suspense, it can have atmosphere, etc.

Sure in the past, there were different societal flavors, but it doesn't mean that they won't do it justice.

Hyde was done wonderfully, imo, just as Jekyll. I think they'll be fine as long as the dialogue and more importantly plot stay strong. 5b had a villain without motivation, so there was that.... What I'm saying is that society has diluted the source material to a point where it is believed to be more tame than it actually is and that when people assume that all horror must conform to the standards of modern horror (a very different genre to Victorian gothic horror) they overlook the reasons why these characters became horror icons in the first place. Consequently most adaptations choose to rely on society's expectations/previous (bad) adaptations rather than returning to the original source material, and therefore very few adaptations actually manage to capture the essence of the original works.

My point about 'societal flavours' was that if Once can't capture the essence and atmosphere of the period in which the stories were written, which is clearly what they're aiming for based on the costumes etc (or at least a close approximation given that Frankenstein is often set in the late 1800s and relocated exlusively to England to fit better with the other gothic horror novels, as opposed to taking place in the early 1800s and primarily taking place in Switzerland) then the adaptation will be mediocre at best. A well generated atmosphere, suspense and fear of the unknown can be, and ususally is, far more potent than gore and shock tactics/jump scares because they leave a lasting impression, after all there is a reason why these books are still read today, even if we can't fully comprehend them. Once's format and target audience simply won't allow for the appropriate type of atmosphere to be generated, instead it will be ridiculously toned-down (look at the recent episodes of Doctor Who for examples of the way this kind of thing is toned-down and cleaned up) as the Victorian period will be viewed through rose-tinted glasses because the darkness of that period (in particular the brutality associated with the kinds of science/medicine that these tales deal with) is not palatable to a general audicence and certainly isn't appropriate for family viewing. I've seen several dramas that include pretty accurate depictions of Victorian medicine and those scenes are usually far worse and far more brutal than a lot of horror, modern or not, because of the truths they contain.

There's also a difference between the heart pounding suspense of horror (whether modern or a good adaptation) and Once's drawn out plotlines that try to convince us that the heroes won't win or that they'll kill off a main character for good in the middle of an arc.

Also I'm not entirely sure what Hades' lack of motivation in 5B has to do with the adaptation of Jeykll and Hyde or Frankenstein?

Though tbh at this point I just hope that they stay away from Dracula.