Adaptational

It's every filmmaker's dream, and every young artist's Achilles' heel. The adaptation. The desire to tell another man's story in your own way, or else in the way you believe is the right way. But what can you do when the world outpaces you? What is left for you when your aspirations stretch beyond their reach? What stories are you left to tell? In this special self-isolation bonus episode, your host Skye Thorleifson recalls the aspirations of his youth, reflecting on the stories that he wanted to retell, and what influences they left on his art and his soul. And yes, this is the exact tone of voice he intends to use throughout this entire saga.

How does an album make the transition to Broadway and from there to film? Also, why the hell is that film taking so long to get made? And where the hell would Lin-Manuel Miranda fit into this!? Find out on our season finale episode about the story, characters and adaptation of one of the most iconic rock albums of the 21st century, Green Day’s ‘American Idiot’! (All the lyrics and instrumentals for the songs featured in this episode are the copyrighted property of their respective artists, Green Day or otherwise. I do not own the rights to any of these songs and am merely using them for the purpose of this discussion.) Now available on all podcast apps: The Hardcover Edition, featuring the Appendices. Stay until the end of the episode to learn more about the material, its cinematic history, and my personal connection to it.

What makes for a successful collaboration between creator/illustrator and writer? Can you find the right balance between visual and verbal storytelling while also appealing to children? Should books for children make you cry? In this special episode, illustrator Justin Currie and writer GMB Chomichuk – the hosts of the Super Pulp Science Podcast – join me to discuss the process of developing and adapting their own work into animated form, focusing on their collaboration on the children’s book 'Cassie and Tonk'. Recorded live at FanQuest 2018. Now available on all podcast apps: The Hardcover Edition, featuring the Appendices. Stay until the end of the episode to learn more about the material, its cinematic history, and my personal connection to it.

What constitutes horror in either video games or film? Can you translate a lack of free will in a traditional cinematic media? What is the best way to kill a Big Daddy mech? Take the plunge into these questions and more on today’s discussion about director Ken Levine’s Ayn Rand-inspired masterpiece, ‘BioShock’. Recorded live at FanQuest 2018. Now available on all podcast apps: The Hardcover Edition, featuring the Appendices. Stay until the end of the episode to learn more about the material, its cinematic history, and my personal connection to it.

What are the makings of an exceptional female protagonist? Whatever happened to movies set in the medieval period? How do you pronounce Saoirse Ronan’s name? Join my quest to answer these questions on this episode about Tamora Pierce’s 'Song of the Lioness'. Now available on all podcast apps: The Hardcover Edition, featuring the Appendices. Stay until the end of the episode to learn more about the material, its cinematic history, and my personal connection to it.

Do video game heroes need to have the moral high ground? How do you write for a silent protagonist? Can any movie break the dreaded ‘video game curse’? Journey into the unknown and the uncertain on this episode discussing director Fumito Ueda’s ‘Shadow of the Colossus’. Featuring Harris Gale of ‘Superbomb!’ and Jackson MacGillivray of ‘Press Start Gaming’. Now available on all podcast apps: The Hardcover Edition, featuring the Appendices. Stay until the end of the episode to learn more about the material, its cinematic history, and my personal connection to it.

The potential to feel empathy for an unusual band of felines, the differences between live performance and digital effects, the question of whether to sell a movie to either adults or children... and the quandary of whether or not that movie should exist at all. These and other discussions on today’s episode about Andrew Lloyd Webber and T. S. Eliot’s ‘Cats’. (All the lyrics and instrumentals for the songs featured in this episode are the copyrighted property of their respective artists, Andrew Lloyd Webber, the T. S. Eliot estate or otherwise. I do not own the rights to any of these songs and am merely using them for the purpose of this discussion.) Now available on all podcast apps: The Hardcover Edition, featuring the Appendices. Stay until the end of the episode to learn more about the material, its cinematic history, and my personal connection to it.

The dramas found in a small British community, the differences between British and American culture, and the question of how to respectfully depict a character who may or may not be on the spectrum. These and other discussions on this episode about Mark Haddon’s ‘The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time’. Now available on all podcast apps: The Hardcover Edition, featuring the Appendices. Stay until the end of the episode to learn more about the material, its cinematic history, and my personal connection to it.

What makes a comic book starring people with animal heads stand out as a literary masterpiece? How brutal can a depiction of the Holocaust get on the page? What happens when an author is determined not to have his work adapted? All this and more on the latest episode, discussing Art Spiegelman’s ‘Maus’. Now available on all podcast apps: The Hardcover Edition, featuring the Appendices. Stay until the end of the episode to learn more about the material, its cinematic history, and my personal connection to it.

What came before us? Where did they go? When will they return? Join us in an episode chockfull of ancient aliens, existentialism, and geeking out about Guillermo del Toro. Today, we dive into H. P. Lovecraft’s ‘At the Mountains of Madness’. Now available on all podcast apps: The Hardcover Edition, featuring the Appendices. Stay until the end of the episode to learn more about the material, its cinematic history, and my personal connection to it.

What do we think of when we talk about teenage angst? How much can one author and/or main character hate the cinema? How many times can I say the word 'society' in one episode? Find out on our first episode as we dive into the troubled history of J. D. Salinger’s classic novel, ‘The Catcher in the Rye’. Now available on all podcast apps: The Hardcover Edition, featuring the Appendices. Stay until the end of the episode to learn about the material, its cinematic history, and my personal connection to it.