Indecisive Medium: Difference between revisions

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A work in one medium, that heavily relies on the unique quirks of ''another'', different medium, as if it would try to remind us every time that the story is just adapted from another form.

It might happen because the original work is so famous, that everyone will think about it in that format anyways: [[The Bible]] is a book, ''[[Romeo and Juliet]]'' is a theater play, and ''[[Super Mario]]'' is a video game. If you are making an adaptation of these, your audience won't be fooled into believing that they are watching an equal version to the original, so you might as well stylistically remind everyone that yes, this is a mere imitation of the real deal.

Another cause might be that the original format influences the plot so heavily, that it simply wouldn't work in the other format.

Common versions, with their usual traits:

* [[Literature]] to Animation and [[Film]]: Starting with a [[Storybook Opening]], or keeping whole written passages from the original work.

* [[Video Game]] to [[Film]]: Working the [[Multiple Endings]] into the story as parallel universes, or keeping gameplay mechanics like reliance on [[Loot|Looting]]ing [[Healing Potion|MedKits]].

* [[Comic Books]] to Animation and [[Film]]: Dividing the screen to comic book panels, or keeping the onomatopoetic illustrations as effects.

* [[Visual Novel|Visual Novels]]s to [[Anime]]: [[Dating Sim Shot|Dating Sim Shots]]s, maybe even with menu options.

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{{examples|Examples: }}

* ''[[Ore no Imouto ga Konna Nini Kawaii Wake ga Nai (Light Novel)!|Ore Imo]]'', as [[Visual Novel|Visual Novels]]s are a recurring theme in its plot, had choice screens, a [[Bad End]] screen, and at the ending of some episodes, still pictures imitating the style of CGs you get at the ending of a [[Visual Novel]] route.

* Every episode of ''[[Bakemonogatari (Light Novel)|Bakemonogatari]]'' begins with long written quotes from the original [[Light Novel|Light Novels]]s.

* ''[[Bakuman｡ (Manga)|Bakuman｡]]'''s [[Show Within a Show|manga within a manga]] was preserved in the anime adaptation as a several minutes sequence of showing still, black and white manga frames, and reading its dialogues.

* In the ''[[Clannad (Visualvisual Novelnovel)|Clannad]]'' anime, some of the jokes based on gag options, were conserved as Tomoya having a random [[Imagine Spot]] about what option would he choose if this where a visual novel, and it was shown on screen with an actual scene from the original game. Also, there is this whole thing about the light orbs, that were basically completion points in the game.

* In the ''[[Haruhi Suzumiya (Light Novel)|Haruhi Suzumiya]]'' light novels, they would sometimes make it ambiguous as to whether [[Unreliable Narrator|Kyon]] was thinking or speaking. In the anime, they keep the ambiguity by not showing his mouth when he speaks.

* ''[[Umineko no Naku Koro Nini]]'', in its anime adaptation, keeps the use of colored text so vital to the original [[Visual Novel]] despite the fact that the dialogue in the anime is audio-based rather than text-based.

* In the first episode of the anime version of ''[[The Idolmaster (Animeanime)|THE iDOLM@STER]]'' the Producer's lines are all subtitled and not voiced, leading several people to think that the adaptation of the game would be ''literal''.

* ''[[Hulk (Filmfilm)|Hulk]] (2003)'''s screen was divided into comic book panels for a scene or two.

* ''[[Repo! theThe Genetic Opera]]'' appears to follow this trope, but the comic book panels were actually due to budget constraints.

* There's a lot of scenes in ''[[Unbreakable]]'' where characters are pictured in door frames and such, to mimic the frame effect of the comic books that form an integral part of the plot.

* The Laurence Olivier film of ''[[Henry V]]'' is purportedly actually a film of an Elizabethan-era performance of ''[[Henry V]]''; at the beginning, we get to see some glimpses of the backstage. As the film goes on, it gets less and less theatrical, presumably corresponding to the audience's increased immersion in the plot.

* In [[Kenneth Branagh]]'s ''[[Henry V]]'', [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B5dI65LvbrE The Prologue] - which is about making theater magic by suspending your disbelief over the people prancing about on stage are pretending to be the ''real'' Henry V etc. - is said in an empty soundstage. Then at the very end: "Who, Prologue-like, your humble patience pray / Gently to hear, kindly to judge, our play!" and he throws open some doors showing a production utilizing the hyperrealism of film.

* Arguably the point of the film adaptation of ''[[Sin City]]'', or it would have just been a [[Film Noir]].

* The ''[[Doom]]'' movie kept whole scenes in first person POV, in tribute of the original game, that defined FPS.

* ''[[Watchmen (Filmfilm)|Watchmen]]'' has the "Rorschach's Journal" sections that narrate parts of the graphic novel as internal monologue in the movie.

* ''[[Fight Club]]'' is narrated by Edward Norton's character, to mimic the book's first person narration.

* ''[[The Princess Bride (Filmfilm)|The Princess Bride]]'' was presented as a movie about a grandfather reading a book to his sick grandson, echoing [[The Princess Bride (Literaturenovel)|the novel]]'s [[Framing Device]] of annotations in which the "editor" recalled being read the book himself as a boy.

* ''[[The Royal Tenenbaums]]'' parodies this with chapters showing sections from a nonexistent Book Of The Film, partly because the movie is inspired by [[JDJ. D. Salinger]]'s Glass family stories.

* The 1975 ''[[Wonder Woman]]'' series used comic book panels both over the titles and for some transitions within each episode.

* The onomatopoetic "Biff! Bam! Pow!"s in the ''[[Batman (TV series)|Batman]]'' '60s TV series.

* ''[[The Adventures of Brisco County Jr]]'' had each episode broken down so that each act was a chapter in a pulp western. One episode even had a father (in-universe, mind you) reading one of these books to his son, in a manner not unlike ''[[The Princess Bride (Filmfilm)|The Princess Bride]]''.

* The credits of ''[[The Cape (2010 TV series)|The Cape]]'' show comic book panels coming to life.

* [[Heroes (TV series)|Heroes]] portrayed itself as a comic book in television form, calling its episodes "chapters" and its seasons "volumes."

* ''[[Odin Sphere]]'' is framed as a little girl reading a series of books about characters whose stories interconnect, so each character's tale starts with pages flipping and is separated into prologues, chapters, and epilogues. The 2d graphics are also a bit reminiscent of a picture book.

* ''[[Max Payne (Video Gameseries)|Max Payne]]'' was never a graphic novel, but the cutscenes are presented as a dynamic comic strip.

* ''[[XIII]]''. The whole game has [[Cel Shading]] to look like a 2D drawn comic book, onomatopoeic effects and speech bubbles appear during the gameplay,

* The sides of most of the stages in [[Jump Super Stars]] and [[Jump Ultimate Stars]] look like a stack of pulp paper, mimicking the pages of [[Weekly Shonen Jump]]. Because of this, you can [[Die, Chair, Die!|rip the sides away,]] allowing you to ring out your opponent. As your health goes down, you colors become more washed out as well, becoming greyscale when you only have a sliver of health. And, of course, the [[Inventory Management Puzzle]] that uses actual panels from the manga to determine your lineup.

* ''[[Tyrian (Video Game)|Tyrian]] 2000'' displays an "INSERT COIN" message in its [[Attract Mode]], though it never was an [[Arcade Game]].

** And as for ''[[Homestuck (Webcomic)|Homestuck]]''... It's styled as [[Interactive Fiction]], originally ''was'' an [[Interactive Comic]] (although that has since stopped), is a webcomic that is in style is reminiscent of an illustrated novel, occasionally includes animated features involving sound, and less commonly involves actual games that range from simple [[Fighting Game|Fighting Games]]s to RPG-style games revolving around interacting with various characters. Homestuck isn't just [[Indecisive Medium]], it's ''[[Serial Escalation|Schizophrenic Medium]]''.

* In 2006, ''[[Bionicle]]'' had these non-canon on-line animations that, similar to the ''[[Hulk (Filmfilm)|Hulk]]'' movie mentioned above, had shifting comic panels instead of normal transitions, adopted 3D [[Thick Line Animation]] to enhance the effect, and were also a series of [[Mini Game|mini-games]].

* [[Where Onon Earth Is Carmen Sandiego?]], a [[Saturday Morning Cartoon]] based on a video game: The characters are aware that they are characters in a video game, and often speak directly to the player. Also, each episode begins and ends with a brief live-action sequence of the Player sitting at his/her computer.

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