Human-Focused Adaptation: Difference between revisions

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[[File:~~rockydvdcover_8529~~.jpg|link=Rocky and Bullwinkle|frame|[[Visual Pun|Walking away with the movie right from under the title characters' eyes.]]]]

[[File:rockydvdcover 8529.jpg|link=Rocky and Bullwinkle|frame|[[Visual Pun|Walking away with the movie right from under the title characters' eyes.]]]]

{{quote|''"The action is intercut with human scenes that seem dragged in kicking and screaming from another movie... If there is one thing everyone in Hollywood thinks they know for sure, it's that the three most important words in movie development are story, story, story. This is not a story: A group of inconsequential human characters watch animation."''|'''[[Roger Ebert]]''', [http://blogs.suntimes.com/ebert/2009/06/the_fall_of_the_revengers.html regarding] ''[[Transformers (film)|Transformers]]: Revenge of the Fallen''}}

So a [[Live Action Adaptation]] of your favorite childhood [[Funny Animal]] cartoon is coming out. You go to see it, and... what's this? Who's this guy? Where's the cartoon character? Why should we care about this guy? Can you move it along and get to the cartoon character now? Oh, there he is! And now they're back to that guy again. Looks like it's gonna be another [[Human-Focused Adaptation]].

So a [[Live Action Adaptation]] of your favorite childhood [[Funny Animal]] cartoon is coming out. You go to see it, and... what's this? Who's this guy? Where's the cartoon character? Why should we care about this guy? Can you move it along and get to the cartoon character now? Oh, there he is! And now they're back to that guy again. Looks like it's gonna be another '''Human-Focused Adaptation'''.

Family movies that are live action (and sometimes even animated) adaptations of cartoons that otherwise probably wouldn't work as a live action blockbuster, or actually ''would'', normally seem to focus more on a newer human character and his [[Romantic Plot Tumor|love life]], [[Demoted to Extra|rather than the character from the series the movie is adapting]]. More often than not, the plot has an [[Unlucky Everydude]] with a crappy job and a crush on his hot co-worker, having a run-in with the cartoon character of the day, or having said cartoon character as a pet. [[Hilarity Ensues]], and the cartoon character's hijinks somehow bring Everydude and his love interest together, and they live [[Happily Ever After]].

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These subplots mostly, if not always seem to do with the unlucky new guy [[Romantic Plot Tumor|in love]]. This even applies to ''already existing'' human characters who never had a love interest, and are either given a completely new one, or they take an existing character and pair them up, accuracy be damned.

This is probably caused by a combination of the costs (both time and money) of CGI and the beliefs that a human character might be [[Most Writers Are Human|more relatable]] or that people want to see a love ~~story--no~~ matter how much it has to be shoehorned in. This trope, while common to live action, is not exclusively a live action trope. There are many examples within anime, comics, and Western animation itself. If any adaptation reduces the importance of the major characters (or major non-human characters) to focus on more humanistic or traditional characters, it should count as being this trope, regardless of the medium. Note that this doesn't always mean "non-human characters are barely in it" but that the ratio is shifted considerably. The amount of human importance may shift from 10% original to 60% adaptation, it still leaves 40% of the movie to the non-human characters. It isn't always about "making it relatable" but being a [[Pragmatic Adaptation]] if you are going to make something in a different medium.

This is probably caused by a combination of the costs (both time and money) of CGI and the beliefs that a human character might be [[Most Writers Are Human|more relatable]] or that people want to see a love story—no matter how much it has to be shoehorned in. This trope, while common to live action, is not exclusively a live action trope. There are many examples within anime, comics, and Western animation itself. If any adaptation reduces the importance of the major characters (or major non-human characters) to focus on more humanistic or traditional characters, it should count as being this trope, regardless of the medium. Note that this doesn't always mean "non-human characters are barely in it" but that the ratio is shifted considerably. The amount of human importance may shift from 10% original to 60% adaptation, it still leaves 40% of the movie to the non-human characters. It isn't always about "making it relatable" but being a [[Pragmatic Adaptation]] if you are going to make something in a different medium.

Related to [[Adaptation Decay]], [[Most Writers Are Human]], [[Developing Doomed Characters]], [[Romantic Plot Tumour]], [[Just Here for Godzilla]], [[Spotlight-Stealing Squad]], [[Demoted to Extra]].