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Sometimes when you're doing a version of a story, the writers are smart enough to know that for whatever reason -- budget, censors, pacing issues, et cetera -- there are things that just aren't going to make it through. So they make the best of a bad situation and explore other aspects of the story. Hopefully, this will put a new and interesting spin on the series.
Time is often a factor in this. When you're adapting a 600-page book (or, for that matter, a [[Batman
[[Fan Dumb]] tends to be [[They Changed It, Now It Sucks|rabid]] about this kind of change, although the rise of DVDs and bonus production commentary often include rationalization (or guilt-passing) at this sort of thing.
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== Anime & Manga ==
* [[Area 88]]: The anime adaptations of the manga leave out the quirky humor that occassionally showed up in the manga. It also wisely chose to leave out the quasi-[[Science Fiction]] elements that seemed to belong more in [[G.I. Joe]] than a serious war melodrama. In the manga, the anti-government forces employed devices such as land based aircraft carriers, robot controlled F-18 fighters, a drill missile, laser sentries, and a massive [[Air Fortress]]. There was also an inexplicable connection between the Asran Civil War, [[The Mafia]], Communists, and various other groups. The anime adaptations remove all of the byzantine subplots, conspiracies, and eccentric guest characters. In the original manga unlike the OVA, Kanzaki's arrest is hardly the end of him. The anime's focus is on Shin's perceived loss of his humanity. Also, it should be noted that the manga series, which lasted seven years (1979-1986) inexplicably lasted more than twice as long than Shin's forced mercenary contract of three years. It was still running when the original OVA was produced. The OVA's ending had to be different from the manga in order to avoid spoilers. The U.S. manga adaptation lasted briefly (42 issues and then briefly in Animerica magazine) and was nowhere close to the end but by the time of the brief Animerica run, the series had already began to [[Jump the Shark]] due to the meandering subplots. What little is known (to non-Japanese speaking readers) about the manga's ending is that fans feel it was a copout. The OVA's strong and powerful ending is widely considered preferrable.
* ''[[
* The anime of ''[[
* The anime of ''[[Berserk]]'' certainly [[Lighter and Softer|toned down much of the series's violence,]] but is perhaps more well known for emphasizing themes of friendship and ambition -- and [[Downer Ending|not in an optimistic way]] -- more than the manga did. This was a compromise with ''Berserk'' 's long supernatural plotline; most of the series is actually a flashback. The changes are usually accepted by fans, seeing as creator Kentarō Miura [[Word of God|gave his approval]].
** Also, the anime did away with all the slapstick and face faults, which created a more consistently dark and adult mood, which a number of fans actually prefer to the manga where it can actually vary wildly in tone. Some also believe that {{spoiler|removing things like Gut's emotional breakdown during his sex scene with Caska and making it look like he got out of the Eclipse without Skull Knight's help}} actually made the main character more strong and likable.
* Zoisite of the ''[[
** By the same token, Haruka and Michiru's lesbian relationship is glossed over from many dubs, such as the North American dub which changed them to cousins. Amusingly, the dub seemed primarily concerned with modifying only the most blatant comments; the two are still unusually affectionate, if not [[Kissing Cousins|outright unplatonic]].
* The first ''[[Galaxy Angel (
* The ''[[
** Especially Live Alive, where we get [[Crowning Music of Awesome|God Knows]].
** A good example is how Kyon does not have quotation marks when he talks, so it is ambiguous if he's talking or narrating. You can assume he is narrating for the most part, but sometimes character will ''reply'' to his supposed narration, much to the surprise of the reader. The anime actually manages to ''keep'' this by changing the camera perspective away from Kyon's mouth, so you don't actually see if he is narrating or talking.
* ''[[FLCL]]'': The manga adaptation isn't so much a retelling of the story in the anime as it is taking the same premise and characters and telling a completely different story.
* The ''[[Grenadier]]'' anime, ''Grenadier ~The Smiling Senshi~'', follows a [[Broad Strokes]] account of the manga, but without the [[After the End]] connotations of the later volumes of the manga, the last four members of the Juttensen, and the <s>[[Big Bad|Jester]]</s>[[Big Bad|Iron-Masked Baron]]'s final assault on the Capital. Oh, and Rushuna's surrogate big sister's name is completely different in the two adaptations. Then again, the manga was four volumes finished out of seven at the time, and Namari was first named in volume six, so...
* The [[Fullmetal Alchemist (
** They also added in characterization earlier in the 2003 anime for characters who became important in the manga later. For instance, the manga's Kimblee and the 2003 anime's Kimblee are ''vastly'' different. Also of note, the anime team worked extensively with the mangaka on the ending--what tone should it have, what feeling should the audience leave with--she didn't write any of it, but she had a lot of input.
** It is surprising how many elements after the manga and 2003 anime diverge are fairly similar, whether thematically or literally.
* When ''[[Excel Saga (
** The Mexican dub also toned down Excel's [[Genki Girl|genkiness]] a little bit, because in the Japanese original she screams so much, that American dubber [[Jessica Calvello]] ended up ''destroying'' her vocal cords.
*** Don't worry, [[Unexplained Recovery|she got better.]]
* ''[[Persona 3]] -Trinity Soul-'' supposedly takes place in the same universe as ''Persona 3''. (At least, the presence of Akihiko implies that much.) However, the rules for Persona summoning are drastically changed for pragmatic reasons. In the games, a Persona has to be repeatedly summoned for every skill you use. This works wonderfully for a turned based game, but it would lack the same effect in an animated series. So in Trinity Soul, the "rules" for Personae were changed so that the battles would look more visually engaging.
** Some of the other changes to the series probably fall more under the [[Adaptation Decay]] side of things (statements that are contradictory to the games, such as that adults can't have Personas).
* In ''[[
** Similarly, the team no longer uses weapons, since it's a whole lot harder to convince viewers that the investigation team has been sneaking swords and chairs into Junes under their clothes when everything is being fully animated.
* ''Many'', ''many'' things were shortened, or taken out, of the ''[[Higurashi no Naku Koro
* In ''[[Rebuild of Evangelion]]: You Are (Not) Alone'', Ritsuko's "hedgehog dilemma" speech from [[Neon Genesis Evangelion|the show]] was comparatively glossed over. Due to all the material that's been condensed into the movies so far--2.0 consists of events from episodes eight through nineteen--this has happened with several other parts. This has lead to the ironic situation that a lot of the canon that fans took ages to figure out may not even apply to ''Rebuild'' at all.
* While the anime version of ''[[Hana Yori Dango]]'' closely follows the original manga, the live action show compressed the story into a neat two-season package. There are instances of both characters (Kazuya and Makiko's roles are now given to Sakurako, making her ''much'' more devious) and events (important events from three separate parties now all occur at one party) being combined, and several storylines where someone tries to seduce Tsukasa or Tsukushi are done away with entirely.
* ''[[
* ''[[Bokurano]]'', since the director of the anime didn't like how the story got ''way'' too dark for his taste. OTOH, the manga itself didn't finish until years later...
* This was apparently what they were going for with the ''[[Wandering Son]]'' adaptation. Starting [[In Medias Res]], the various changes, etc. To fans of the manga though it comes off as ''[[Adaptation Decay]]''.
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== Film ==
* Most comic book inspired movies are like this, though many fans can't get past [[They Changed It, Now It Sucks]] (or whatever it is). Examples:
** The original example is ''[[Superman (
** [[Batman (
** The ''[[Spider-Man (
*** One item that certainly caused controversy at first was the change from [[I Love Nuclear Power]] to [[Genetic Engineering Is the New Nuke]] in regards to Spider-Man's [[Super-Hero Origin]]. But the point of doing so was that it was slightly easier to [[Hand Wave]] a scientifically altered spider than a random million-to-one chance of an irradiated spider (not to mention that [[You Fail Physics Forever|irradiating a spider wouldn't make it do that]]).
*** Fans also initially balked at Peter having organic webshooters in the movie. The comic book's artificial ones were dropped because the movie didn't have time to believably show Peter inventing them (and because they felt that a single teenager being able to invent a wonder adhesive that 3M couldn't strained [[Suspension of Disbelief]]). The comic book version had followed suit, prior to [[One More Day|part of Spider-Man's past including his marriage being retconned]]. Ironically, the Spiderman character was originally envisioned with organic webshooters, but Stan Lee decided on artificial ones instead because he thought it would be more believable.
*** Writer [[Peter David]] sometimes likes to remind fans that he first came up with the idea of organic web shooters in Marvel's ''[[Spider
*** [[James Cameron]]'s interpretation of the webshooters in his aborted script was very interesting: Spider-Man has organic webshooters but makes fake scientific webshooters in order to avoid people thinking he is a freak, a monster. At the end of the script, the bad guy tears off the fake shooters and tells to Spidey he isn't human and in fact a predator of the human race.
** The ''[[X-Men (
*** That explanation for Jean's Phoenix powers was in fact the original one, before later comics [[Retcon|RetConned]] them by creating the Phoenix Force as a godlike cosmic entity.
** The ''[[Iron Man]]'' [[Iron Man (
*** Also Jarvis was changed from a butler with a fake English accent in the comics to an English sounding talking computer. Probably because another [[Batman|more famous and popular superhero]] already had a British [[Servile Snarker]]!
** Say what you will about the ''[[Fantastic Four]]'' [[Fantastic Four (
** The ''[[Watchmen]]'' [[Watchmen (
*** As for the climax, they decided upon {{spoiler|a device that emulated Dr. Manhattan's energy signature, allowing the world to scapegoat ''him'', rather than the alien squid}}. People are undecided as to which works better ''overall,'' but it's definitely the best they could have done with that ending in film.
*** The moment where Rorschach snaps was changed, mostly to avoid comparison with ''Saw''. But the new scene also allows us to see the moment his mind snaps without an overabundance of narration. The end result works better on screen, in no small part due to how well [[Jackie Earle Haley]] can act with his face completely obscured.
* The first [[Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (
* The ''[[Thor]]'' film didn't use the pseudo-Elizabethan English that the character has historically been known for in the comics. In fact, the comics themselves have already dropped this highly campy element.
** While movie Thor doesn't use the pseudo-Elizabethan English, he ''does'' still speak in the largely antiquated and hammy style of the comics to largely the same effect (just minus the Thous and Thys).
** In animated versions, Thor usually has an educated and polite English accent. A Nordic accent would be more appropriate, but let us be honest: To most English speakers, such accents sound rather... comical. Not a good choice for a god.
* ''[[The Avengers (
* ''[[Jurassic Park]]'' contained huge chunks of material and detailed exposition about the nature of the dinosaurs, the setup of the park, and the complex interplay of chaotic factors in the environment. It was impossible to include all of this in a movie, so they trimmed it down and presented it in the form of a park orientation cartoon. There are also a large number of exciting incidents that were cut because they added little to the actual plot. In this case, author Michael Crichton had a heavy hand in adapting his own novel for the screen.
* ''[[
** Pragmatic, or simply hallucigenic...given that {{spoiler|the entire final third of the movie is the punchline to a joke made in the first fifteen minutes.}}
** The 2005 movie Tristram Shandy: A Cock and Bull Story is similar. It's a mockumentary about the filming of the famous (and "unfilmable") book. The premise of the book is that it's a autobiography written by an author so distracted that he doesn't even get to his own birth in the first 3 volumes. The movie is about a production of the book that gets so sidetracked and distracted that it, also, goes nowhere... it's brilliantly meta.
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* [[Dune]]: In the 1984 David Lynch film, The Bene Gesserit Wierding way was changed to weirding modules that employed sound as a weapon. Lynch justifies this by explaining that he didn't want a [[Kung Fu Movie]] in the desert. The [[Talking Heads]] nature of the novel was replaced with a more moody and atmospheric environment, thanks to surreal direction and trippy visuals.
* The well-known 1980 film, ''The Elephant Man'', while generally held very highly as a good movie, has little to do with the events in the title character's life. However it has earned good standing with most Joseph Merrick aficionados.
* ''[[The Lord of the Rings (
** At the start of the movie, several years of time in which Frodo has the Ring in the Shire are left out.
** Arwen has a [[Affirmative Action Girl|much more active role]] in the first movie than in the book. This caused some controversy but generally works well. The [[Ass Pull]] of her "fate being bound to the Ring" in the third movie is much less well-received, however.
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** The books in general did not focus on a great deal of [[Character Development]], as the idea was these were noble characters acting in a noble quest. The movies gave a lot of dedication to how the characters behave at the start of their journey and how that journey changed them. Particularly, the first book had Aragorn rather quickly taking on his role as the next King of Gondor and he took up the reforged blade of Narsil, Anduril. At several points during the books Aragorm steps in place and asserting himself as the King of Gondor, brandishing Anduril. The films had Aragorn being given Anduril towards the beginning of the third film and from there he asserted his place as King, while earlier he was hesitant to step on others toes.
** Also notable is that Eowyn makes no attempt to hide her identity from Merry (and therefore the audience) while riding to Gondor. It was obvious that we could tell it was Miranda Otto no matter how she disguised herself, so Merry would have looked quite dim for not figuring it out.
* The ''[[Harry Potter (
** Despite ''[[Harry Potter and The Order of The Phoenix]]'' being the longest book of the series adapted into the ''shortest'' movie so far, the choices of what and how to cut and add has made it possibly the best film in the series. On the one hand, everything related to the Quidditch B-plot was cut, but partially cutting it instead would have no doubt made things choppy and awkward. A nice touch was also significantly emphasizing Harry's [[Not So Different]] fears -- which in the book take the form of fears of being possessed.
** It does, however, leave out a crucial scene from Snape's Worst Memory, where {{spoiler|Snape calls Lily a Mudblood, destroying their relationship and sending Snape on his [[Start of Darkness]], instead making it seem like he was only affected by James' bullying into becoming who he is. ''Deathly Hallows Part 2'', during The Prince's Tale scene, shows this moment, though.}}
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*** And the scene where Harry and Hermione rescue Sirius while on Buckbeak's back would never work in a visual medium. Changing the scene made it a lot better.
** The change from the spell that kills {{spoiler|Sirius Black}} from Expelliarmus to Avada Kedavra. In the book, Expelliarmus (a relatively harmless spell) was used to push him into an artifact that sent him into afterlife (or somesuch) with no hope of return. However, this left many fans hoping he'd [[Unexplained Recovery|get better]] and come back in later books. Avada Kedavra is instant death (kinda like getting shot in the head but less messy), which means there's no such ambiguity in the film.
* ''[[James Bond (
** ''[[
*** In a bit of [[Fridge Brilliance]], anyone who scoffs at this new plan working should remember that the Fort personnel were warned about it by Bond and they played along to make it seem to work so they could ambush the invaders.
** ''[[
* The ''[[Battle Royale]]'' movie is generally considered as good as or better a work than the novel it's based on, by removing most of the more ludicrous political justifications for why a school class would have to fight each other on a deserted island, giving the [[Big Bad]] a more sympathetic relationship to the class, and generally attempting to focus on fewer characters. The Manga on the other hand is condensed [[Rule of Cool]], to the point where it almost parodies itself.
** On the other hand, they also cut out the backstories and development for several characters, glazed over their deaths, and completely changed some of the characters. No longer is Kiriyama a classmate without emotions [["Stop Having Fun!" Guys|who chooses to play to win]] -- he's just some random guy who volunteered for fun. Same with Kawada; no longer a classmate, but a stranger who got pulled back in.
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*** The third film itself is an adaptation of the G1 episodes "Megatron's Master Plan" and "The Ultimate Doom".
* James Ellroy's books are good examples since the outrageous number of subplots and characters make them pretty much unfilmable (Ellroy has admitted that he does it ''on purpose'').
** The scenarists who made ''[[
** The scenarist who worked on the adaptation of ''The Black Dahlia'', however, tried to keep every single detail of the book in. [[Adaptation Decay|It didn't work that well]].
* The novel of ''Hard Core Logo'' took a "scrapbook" approach (telling the story through character monologues and documents such as journal entries and phone messages) that would have been difficult to convert to film. The movie is a Mockumentary with an [[Unreliable Narrator]]. The movie script also added lots of [[Ho Yay]] and substituted a {{spoiler|main character's suicide}} for the rather anticlimactic ending of the book, creating a more emotionally compelling work.
* A particularly good [[Made for TV Movie]] adaptation of ''[[
* The stage musical version of ''[[Little Shop of Horrors]]'' (itself a [[Adaptation Distillation|distilled adaptation]] of an overlong [[Roger Corman]] comedy horror) finished with a rave-up ending. The action breaks off when Seymour Krelborn confronts Audrey II, the [[Greek Chorus]] announces that this scene is being repeated in places up and down the country, and the cast file on and perform the final number -- "Don't Feed the Plants!". The writers knew that this wouldn't work in a feature film, even if it was a musical, and so ditched it and wrote a new final number, "Mean Green Mother from Outer Space" against which the final confrontation could play out to its conclusion.
** At first, the writers wrote an even more extravagant ending, also set to "Don't Feed the Plants!" that was already filmed and ready to go. The film's current ending is a result of test audiences rejecting an ending in which {{spoiler|the main character and his innocent girlfriend get eaten alive by Audrey II, and the plants go on to go Godzilla on New York.}}
* [[The Bourne Series|The Bourne movies]] revitalized the spy thriller genre, making it popular and profitable again, even displacing the books to most. However, it outright discarded significant portions of plot from all three books (especially the last two) - most would argue that this was a straight-up improvement, though.
* In original ''[[In the Heat of
* The film adaptation of ''[[The Prestige]]'' directed by Christopher Nolan has very little in common with its source material, the lesser known novel by Christopher Priest. The changes are so many, it would be pointless to list them all here, changing everything from the plot to characterization, going so far as to actually leave out ''the main characters'' from the book. Without detracting from the original work, all the changes make for a film far better than your usual adaptation, and despite the wild differences it's obvious the Nolan brothers love the novel and prioritized respecting its spirit and originality instead of the superficial details.
** After the premiere, [[Word of God|Priest himself]] said that the film was better than anything he'd written.
* The film version of ''[[The Mask (
* In ''About A Boy'', the ending of the book is centered around Kurt Cobain's (the character Elle's favorite musician, and the guilty pleasure of Will) suicide. In the movie, Will's guilty pleasure is changed to hip-hop music, as the novel was written in the early 90s and the movie made nearly a decade later. The end of the movie also focuses on a talent show instead, completely different than the novel version- yet it still plays out rather well.
* There's quite a difference between ''[[Field of Dreams]]'' and the book it's based on, ''Shoeless Joe''. For instance, the movie omits lengthy subplots about Ray's twin brother Richard and an elderly ex-Chicago Cub named Eddie Scissons; and the movie uses fictional writer Terrence Mann as a replacement for [[Real Person Fic|J.D. Salinger]] from the book (undoubtedly for various legal reasons). Plus, the movie saves the bit about {{spoiler|Ray's late father joining the team}} as a big reveal for the end, when it actually is revealed pretty early on in the book and is significantly less poignant.
* ''[[Who Framed Roger Rabbit?]]'' differs significantly from its source material, the novel ''[[Who Censored Roger Rabbit? (Literature)]]''. For one thing, the book deals with comic book and comic strip characters, not cartoon characters, who all speak in physical, tangible word balloons. This is clearly unadaptable to film, wherein all Toon characters would have had to be mute, so they received the power of speech. Additionally, they became animated cartoon characters and the story was set in 1947, smack-dab in the middle of the golden age of American theatrical animation. Not to mention that Toons went from being just as vulnerable as humans but possessing an elaborate method of faking their own deaths for theatrics' sake (it's complicated) to really being as unkillable as they seem.
* [[David Cronenberg]]'s adaptation of the unfilmable ''Naked Lunch'' took story elements from the book and melded them together with parts of William S. Burroughs' biography.
* [[The Film of the Book|The Films of]] [[The Chronicles of Narnia]] have done this.
** [[The Lion, the Witch
** [[Prince Caspian]] was much more deviant than its predecessor. [[Angst? What Angst?]] is again invoked in the book, as the Pevensies seem to have had no trouble returning to their lives as children. The majority of the book is Trumpkin retelling what has happened to the kids, and at the end of the book, [[Angst? What Angst?|not a word is mentioned]] when they hand Caspian the crown of Narnia and leave for London. Compare to the movie.
*** The kids (Peter being the worst) have ''not'' completely adjusted back to life in London.
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**** Plus, if you don't have the time to set up the fact that the [[Always Chaotic Evil]] creatures ''are'' in fact always evil, saying "We don't want ''their'' kind of help" just sounds racist.
** ''[[The Voyage of the Dawn Treader]]'' adds a plotline about the green mist, the "Dark Island," and the swords of the lost Narnian lords in order to turn the novel's string of individual adventures into a more unified storyline.
* While Old English purists loathed the [[Beowulf (
** The liberties are taken mostly in the parts where the storytellers would have nothing to go on except Beowulf's word. Further consider that the written piece is mostly Christian propaganda meant to convert "barbarians" and you're in a situation where you really can't take anything for honest truth anyway. Ripping the Christian values out would likely be rendering the story more accurate to the original versions. Note that Beowulf being humbled at all for his "slaughter everything in my way and achieve glory!" is a Christian theme, in most ancient myths he'd be treated as a hero so long as he showed proper deference to the gods.
* [[The Film of the Book]] for ''[[Twilight (
** Perhaps most notable is that the first book is pretty much nothing but Bella and Edward's developing relationship, until a more typical vampire story is shoved into the last few chapters. The film makes Victoria, James, and Laurent present in the story from the beginning as they occasionally show up to kill a minor character. Though the attempt to do the same thing in the second film with the Cullens chasing Victoria off as she tries to kill Bella, never to be seen again until the next film, comes off more as a [[Big Lipped Alligator Moment]].
** This is understandable as, in the book, Bella intentionally has no personality. The intention is that the reader overlays their own personality on her. This, unfortunately, doesn't work very well in film, so a personality had to be manufactured.
* The ''[[Silent Hill (
** Not just Alessa was simplified. The antagonist went from a demon-summoning cult with [[Chronic Backstabbing Disorder]] that was heavily into drugs and deliberately kept Alessa alive to feed the demon on her pain to a blindly-fanatic intolerant church that wanted to burn her as a witch and was prevented from doing so by the good people of the town.
* The adaptation of ''[[A Series of Unfortunate Events]]'' changes the order of some of the books' chronology. In the books, Count Olaf is exposed as a villain at the end of ''The Bad Beginning'', after which the children go on to stay with their Uncle Monty and later Aunt Josephine. In the film, the children are taken out of Olaf's care after an apparent display of irresponsible parenting and go on to their respectful guardians before winding up back in Olaf's care where they finally expose him. In the [[DVD Commentary]], Brad Silberling says this change was made for the sake of narrative, it wouldn't make sense for Olaf to be unmasked as early as the first act.
* The [[Made for TV Movie]] of [[Avalon High]] does this with Ellie (Allie in the film) rather than Will is {{spoiler|King Arthur}}. Rather than Marco, Mr. Morton (Mr. Moore in the film) {{spoiler|is Mordred}}, whereas Miles {{spoiler|is Merlin}} as opposed to Mr. Morton. Presumably, this is to make the film more unpredictable. Also the students are the [[Reincarnation|reincarnations]] of the actual characters as oppose to merely corresponding to them. Many scenes were cut out and scene settings were changed to make the movie more appropriate for younger children because the book has violent and some threatening scenes.
* Irving Berlin's [[World War II]] revue ''This Is The Army'' gained a storyline when adapted into a movie, because Berlin knew that plotless [[Sketch Comedy]] didn't work so well on film.
* In ''[[Mortal Kombat (
* Both ''[[The Thing (
== Literature ==
* The ''[[
* The [[Novelization]] of ''[[Revenge of the Sith]]'' was written by [[Matt Stover]]. Obviously, a book of the film loses the [[Visual Effects of Awesome|visuals]], the [[Crowning Music of Awesome|music]], and any appeal from various actors. Most novelizations are basically phoned in, since they'll be bought because of the title. But Stover didn't phone this in. Most of the dialogue is the same as in the movie, it ends the same way, scenes go in the same order and directions, but the whole thing is considerably darker and more thoughtful. The mood is darker; lows are lower, highs are more fleeting, there is a sense that ''things will get better'' but it will take a long, long time. This, plus the near-total axing of [[Star Wars/Narm|Narm]] and the addition of quiet [[Continuity Nod|Continuity Nods]] to the [[Star Wars Expanded Universe]], makes a number of fans prefer the book.
** You can compare two scenes from both to illustrate this perfectly. The scene where Vader's suit is completed and he wakes up, in the film, is known best for the infamous [[Big No]]. The novelization doesn't have that. Instead, the entire scene is in second person - ''This is what it feels like to be Anakin Skywalker, forever'' - and between the description of constant pain, the intrusiveness of [[Vader Breath]], and details like how different senses filtered through the suit are, it's thoroughly unsettling. Plus, he tries to kill Sidious using the Force - but he's so reduced that he can't, and the end doesn't want to, because this is the only thing remotely like an ally he has left.
** The audiobook of this is ''even better''. There are sound effects and sometimes music in the background. More importantly, the person reading it, in that scene, is able to transition seamlessly from the Emperor's quietly malicious gloating to Vader's rapid succession of emotions - stunned pain, stark disbelieving horror, denial, realization, mounting self-loathing, despair...
* S.D. Perry wrote a series of novels based on the Resident Evil games. The four that were straight adaptations (of 1, 2, 3 and Code Veronica, two of the novels were original stories) streamlined the events considerably by adding in an original character named Trent, who provided the protagonists with intelligence on the sites in question, thus allowing the signature (if somewhat nonsensical) item puzzles and fetch quests to remain in place while not bogging things down and also making a bit more sense. These were also streamlined a bit as well. For example, the crest door from the first game became an emergency lockdown system, and Wesker forced Barry to collect some of them instead of Chris/Jill finding them all.
* Some of the old Target [[
** The nature of the novelisations in general required some level of [[Pragmatic Adaptation]]; they were, almost uniformly, about 100 pages long -- which, considering the length of the stories they were adapting ranged from two-to-six (or in some cases ten or twelve) episodes long, meant that they would often either have to compress or add things in order to meet the page requirements.
* ''[[Crysis (
* The first three ''[[Bionicle]] Chronicles'' books by C. A. Hapka, based on the story told through the comics and the ''Mata Nui On-Line Game'', are generally this, with some examples of [[Adaptation Expansion]] and [[Compressed Adaptation]] thrown in here and there. A lot of the lines are recited word-for-word, and some classic scenes survived intact, but several other scenes received a unique spin, and the thoughts of the characters are explored better. Sadly, they are also ripe with [[Continuity Snarl]], especially the first book (which, despite being the longest by far, had to leave out too many details), and a lot of the material is considered [[Canon Dis Continuity]].
== Live Action TV ==
* [[M*A*S*H
** [[Magnum Opus Dissonance|One of the creative writing team for the novels was thoroughly insulted by this fact]] and tried to deliver a [[Take That]] to the TV series and its fans by having Hawkeye, in "Mash Mania", proclaim that he loved to go down to the State University to "kick the shit out of a few liberals" whenever bored.
* The phenomenon of many people preferring the ''[[The Incredible Hulk]]'' TV show to the 2003 big budget CG-fest movie. While the former removed and simplified elements from the comics original, the latter added whole layers of story that were never there - the "more is less" principle at work. ([http://www.agonybooth.com/recaps/Hulk_2003.aspx Agony Booth recap])
* The BBC show ''[[
** Ditto for ''[[Moonlight]]'', although they do make it clear that digital cameras work just fine, to the vampires' chargrin (the older cameras only made blurry photos). No silver-backed mirrors are shown in the show, probably to avoid extre CG costs. The vampires are also able to walk in the light, as long as they stick to the shadows and cover as much skin as they can. Bursting into flame or dusting is also CG-costly, so they instead went with extreme dehydration in sunlight, although vampires still dust when exposed to flame.
* ''[[The Dresden Files]]'' TV series replaced the talking skull Bob from the books with a ghost inhabiting said skull so they could have an actor providing a visual component and emotions to the character.
** The original "Storm Front" pilot did have Bob as a skull.
** [[Word of God|Jim Butcher]] says that the TV series is essentially an alternate universe.
* ''[[Merlin (TV series)|Merlin]]'', the BBC series, has Merlin as the same age as Arthur, early 20's at the latest and his servant, living with the Court Physician and former sorcerer Gaius, Uther is still alive and banning magic on pain of death, Gwen and Lancelot being commoners, Gwaine (Gawaine) pretending he's a commoner and Percival only being introduced as a minor character in the 3rd season finale. Gwen also has a brother and . And somehow it all works ''really well''.
* The ''[[Dexter]]'' novels eventually get a ''lot'' darker and weirder than the first book, with Dexter's "Dark Passenger" turning out to be {{spoiler|a fragment of an ancient god of murder}}. The series maintains the balance of dark humor and creepiness evident in the first book, and keeps things realistic by comparison.
* In the transition from [[The Sookie Stackhouse Mysteries]] book series to [[HBO]]'s ''[[True Blood]]''; cutting out Sookie's (often [[Wangst|Wangsty]]) first-person narration and adding in occasional snatches of thoughts Sookie catches made Sookie instantly a more sympathetic protagonist.
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*** Many of the seasons count, especially ''[[Power Rangers in Space]]''(the Sentai counterpart ''[[Denji Sentai Megaranger]]'' is about electronics and technology, not space). In an example of this trope ''not'' being good, ''[[Power Rangers Turbo]]'' (whose counterpart ''[[Gekisou Sentai Carranger]]'' was ''also'' a light-hearted comedy series that parodied the usual anime and ''Super Sentai'' tropes, and whose main theme revolved around cars).
*** There's also, [[Power Rangers Lost Galaxy]], a space themed [[Power Rangers]] adapted from [[Seijuu Sentai Gingaman]], which was natured themed.
* Some of the characters from ''[[Homicide: Life On the Street]]'' are changed from their [[Real Life]] counterparts. Tom Pellegrini who inspired Bayliss was an older detective from Pennsylvania who came to police work later in life and was assigned to Homicide two years before the Latonya Wallace/Adena Watson case. Other changes include changing Irish-American Mclarney to Italian Crosetti and removing his legal training. Italian D'Addario became Black/Italian Giardello and Landsman became Munch with his family history in the department removed.
* The TV series of [[Lark Rise to Candleford]] was very different to the original books, sharing only one or two complete stories, the names of Laura's family and Dorcas Lane, and some peripheral characters and situations (the Pratts, Cabbage Patterson, the Arlesses) with Flora Thompson's memoirs. Part of it seems to be the book has some perspectives on late Victorian society that modern audiences would find disquieting (Laura's age when she goes to work at the post office, for instance, or the lack of [[UST]] between many of the characters). The book provides a lot of plot hooks for many episodes, but the writers went out of their way to create a series that expanded on the books, provided modern audiences with a nostalgic "theme park" experience, and made more dramatic sense than the book allows for.
* In the live-action series ''[[Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon]]'', numerous alterations to the setting were made to make the show a little more plausible. The talking cats are replaced with talking stuffed toys, a [[Toyetic]] decision to rationalize carrying a stuff animal is more likely than an actual cat; the Sailor Senshi themselves look like normal Japanese girls when they're not transformed; and many settings and accessories that were typical of an early 90s teenager are updated to what a modern teenager would be associated with. The plot also dealt more strongly and harshly with the implications of their past lives. Not that it didn't indulge in some of the campy stuff...
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== Theater ==
* ''[[Wicked (
** And [[Word of Gay|extremely]] [[Ho Yay|romantic]] [[Romantic Two-Girl Friendship|female]] friendships. In the book, it's less noticeable on Elphaba's side, but arguably more noticeable on Glinda's side.
** Another change, albeit a minor one, is that Elphaba's sister Nessa doesn't have arms in the book. Obviously difficult to portray onstage, so they just stick her in a wheelchair instead.
*** And of course the biggest- {{spoiler|Elphaba and Fiyero live}}.
* The musical ''[[The Most Happy Fella]]'' abandoned most of the social commentary of its source play, ''They Knew What They Wanted'', so it could focus more on the love plot, which provided better opportunities for singing.
* The Takarazuka musical adaptation of ''[[Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney]]'' only dealt with a single case (written for the play), unlike the multiple case formats of each game. They also ditched the spirit channeling plot device, having Phoenix mock Maya for believing she was a spirit medium, and made Edgeworth a simple ruthless prosecutor rather than Phoenix's childhood friend in need of redemption.
== Video Games ==
* ''[[Warhammer 40000]]: [[Dawn of War]]'' was quite well-received for capturing the "grim and dark" feel of its source material. Of course, there are fanatics who claim it was not close enough to the tabletop game's gameplay mechanics and either prefer the earlier title ''Final Liberation'', which followed the system even more closely, or are working on mods that attempt to replicate the tabletop's style.
* ''[[Fate/stay
** [[Anime]] adaption: You really can't do ''[[Fate/stay
** ''Unlimited Blade Works'' film: Especially noticeable, where some of the romantic undertone between Shirou and Rin is lost, as well as merging separate visits to locations in the original into a single very eventful one and things happening for different (but more easily explainable) reasons.
* ''Q-Basic Gorillas'' is, in its original form, a very simple strategy game with no real plot. The [[Q-Basic Gorillas
* The [[Nintendo Entertainment System|NES]] version of ''[[Metal Gear]]'' is this.
** As is ''[[Castlevania Rondo of Blood|Castlevania: Dracula X]]'' for the SNES.
*** Cutting the levels and playable characters back to fit the SNES hardware is acceptable. There was no excuse for cutting Shaft from that port. And he went on to be an ''important'' character in ''[[Symphony of the Night]]''!
*** There is an excuse. [[Executive Meddling|Legal Issues.]] Apparently, NEC managed to prevent them from doing a straight port.
** And ''[[Castlevania
* [[Street Fighter]] 4 on the Ipod Touch probably qualifies. While it's highly simplified from the console/PC version. (only 10 characters, reduced movelists, simplified controls, and lots and lots of contents removed), it manages to be a fun experience on it's own right, despite the system not being fit for such a type of game. Of course, YMMV.
* ''[[Astyanax]]'' for the NES has a completely different story than the arcade game it's loosely adapted from.
* Most RPG games made under the infinity engine (''[[
* ''[[
** [[Lot RO]] serves almost like a POV Sequel to the books, where the player is experiencing the events of the books from the perspective of someone outside The Fellowship. The player does interact with members of The Fellowship (and other famous characters) and even assists them in important plot points (The reforging of Narsil, walking with Frodo before his journey and more recently delivering Arwen's banner to the Grey Company and riding with them.
** Most of the liberties taken with the story is a result of the implications of having thousands of "heroes" at the disposal of the people of Middle-Earth. Because of that extra manpower it does seem reasonable that certain events could be pushed forward - such as the reclamation of Moria, and the assault against Dol Guldur.
* The N64 version of ''[[
* The [iPhone] version of ''[[Metal Gear Solid]] 4'' was stated to be this by [[Word of God]]. The original game had a stealth element, but when Konami playtested it they found that it was really tedious and distracting for a casual game. So Kojima Productions took over development themselves, concentrating on shooting-range stuff.
* The [[Turbo Grafx 16]] version of ''Impossamole''.
* A number of changes were made to the [[
** {{spoiler|Zukovsky is killed a couple dozen seconds after you meet him. After all, he does die in the films eventually, and it's not like they're planning on making a ''[[The World Is Not Enough (Film)|The World Is Not Enough]]'' game later.}}
* ''[[
* Most ''[[Sam and Max]]'' media, while most of the media is a bit [[Lighter and Softer]] than the original comics (well, until ''The Devil's Playhouse'', of course), they've more or less had some pretty good games for quite a while now, demonstrating the dark comedy and wit that the series is known for.
* The [[Rainbow Six]] novel deviates from the game in a number of ways by having different missions, plot points, snipers that were not available in the game, and a different ending.
** This is because the book and game were actually made separately and the game came out first, after which the book's ending was changed.
** The console adaptations of ''[[Rainbow Six]] 3'' have a completely different story and considerably different gameplay, although some of the locales from the PC version make an appearance.
* More of a technical limitation, but if anyone asks why [[
* [[Invoked Trope|Invoked]] in ''[[The Matrix]]: Path of Neo'', where the Wachowski brothers literally stop time and interrupt the game to explain that the sacrificial ending to the movie wouldn't have worked in a videogame.
== Western Animation ==
* Nearly every adaptation of Wolverine in a [[Marvel Universe|Marvel TV series]] tends to focus more on building his characterization (notably ''[[X
** ''[[Wolverine and
* ''[[Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles]]'' started as a violent and gory (if satirical) black and white independent [[Comic Book]] with an ongoing storyline. ({{spoiler|Shredder dies messily in the very first issue; later his surviving minions feed what is left of him to a colony of worms that take his form and his intelligence. Worm-Shredder destroys the Turtles' and April's home, and nearly kills Leonardo. After a year of healing, Leo heads back to New York, chops off Worm-Shredder's head, and burns him.}}) In the early process of licensing and adaptation, the Turtles developed a litany of catch phrases, color coded costumes, a [[Garfield]]-like food fetish, and an army of ineffective recurring villains; Raphael changed from a sociopathic [[Jerkass]] to "cool but rude", Baxter Stockman was changed from a homicidal black man to a feeble white guy, Splinter's whole backstory was rewritten to avoid the question of death; they abandoned character and plot development for syndication-friendly standalone episodes... and yet it all kind of worked. The 2003 series is a much closer adaptation of the comics (even bearing some traits of [[Adaptation Distillation]]); any carry-over from earlier adaptations (such as Michaelangelo's use of lingo from the earlier show) is generally [[Lampshade Hanging|Lampshade-hung]]. There's still much conflict over which cartoon was actually better -- ratings and profit wise, they did the same.
** In the comics, Splinter is the mutated pet rat of a ninja murdered by Shredder. In the (first) cartoon, Splinter is a human ninja (and rival to Shredder) mutated into a rat. This change feels less like a [[Bowdlerise|bowdlerization]] (even though it is) and more like an [[Adaptation Distillation]]. It simplifies Splinter's back story, gives the turtles a more direct tie to ninjas (trained by an actual ninja as opposed to the pet rat of a ninja), and gives scenes between Splinter and Shredder a personal edge. The show even did a good, touching episode where Splinter briefly regained his human form.
*** This change was commented on in [[Turtles Forever]], where the 80s turtles are surprised that the 2003 turtles see Splinter as a father figure. As noted on the [[Adaptation Distillation]] page, whether or not the change is an improvement or not is up to the viewer's interpretation.
* The second animated adaptation of Herge's ''[[Tintin
* [http://www.angelfire.com/la3/goldenroad15/episode36.html Frank Maggiore] commented on a change made to a ''[[Winx Club]]'' episode; in the dub, Sky went from being killed (it's [[Never Say "Die"|never explicitly said as such]], but Flora mentions his lack of pulse at one point) to being [[Never Say "Die"|put into a deep sleep]] (by having the Trix, who "killed" Sky, explicitly mention this a few times). It seemed to him that it made a lot more sense when Bloom revived Sky; this changed a never-before-seen magical [[Back From the Dead]] ability to a ''Sleeping Beauty''-style awakening that seemed more [[Magic
** That said, they still left in Flora mentioning Sky's lack of pulse, thus confusing the viewers a bit. Also, Bloom's resurrective powers would become a plot point later on... and then get retconned again!
** There's another change in a different episode, where the girls (except Flora) cut school and go to Earth. Layla, Stella and Musa are stopped by a police officer and asked why they're not in school. In the original, Layla gives the excuse that they have permission from their parents to be out of school and offers to give the cop the phone numbers, but the cop declines and lets them go. In 4kids, Layla speaks a foreign language, making the cop think they're not from Gardenia and so he lets them go. The 4kids version is more believable because, by law, the cop should've taken in all three girls and called their parents (not that he could call them, but you get it) since skipping school (aka truancy) is illegal. Of course, Italy's truancy laws may be different...
** Then again, Gardenia is implied to be an American city (Mike and Vanessa are not Italian names, let alone Bloom)
* The first half of ''[[
** It also manages to squeeze in a little of ''Funeral For a Friend'' which took place in between with a funeral scene and a few mourning scenes. One effective choice was leaving out Pa Kent which cut his heart attack subplot and intensified Martha's mourning by leaving her without both of them (it also ties in better with the Superman movie franchise which audiences would be familiar with.)
* ''[[Green Lantern: First Flight
* ''[[Watership Down]]'''s [[Animated Adaptation]] left out a number of rabbits from the book, including Bluebell, the comedian, and Strawberry, from the {{spoiler|snare farm}}. Speedwell, Buckthorn, Hawkbit and Acorn aren't much missed, though.
* ''The Adventures Of Sam And Max Freelance Police'' was given a very [[Lighter and Softer]] treatment, but it kept a lot of the strange hijinks and ideas that the duo are known for.
* The series of the [[DCAU]] have a lot of this. Most of the time when a characters and their origin were changed it helped to enhance the essence of the original comics. In several cases, changes in the DCAU were so well-received that they were actually integrated into the main DC universe. (Harley Quinn and Mr. Freeze's backstories are probably the two most well-known cases.)
* ''[[Young Justice (
* ''[[The Spectacular Spider-Man]]'' made a number of visual changes to Spider-Man's supporting cast, notably [[Race Lift|making several white characters into minorities for the sake of diversity]] and giving modernized designs to a number of Spidey's villains.
* ''[[
* The ''[[Mega Man (
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