This is discussion archived from a time before the current discussion method was installed.
Dokph: I was just about to add the wild mass guess that Moist von Lipwig was being groomed to become the new patrician after just having finished reading making money. Apparently my guess wasn't so much wild as it was mass. Just thought it was a cool thing to mention somewhere. Aaaaaaanyhoo.
Claire89: In addition to the plea that people not spell "Discworld" as "Disc World," we need to put somewhere that Pratchett's novel "Nightwatch" is very distinct from the Russian trilogy "Night Watch," with a space. I keep seeing the Discworld novel spelled with a space, or the Russian book spelled without, and it upsets me because it's a crucial mistake.
Gloating Swine: Actually, the Discworld story is called Night Watch
◊ as well. Confusion ahoy!
German Troper: Is it really okay not to add trope examples? I, for one, think this would really be fun.
Reg Shoe: I think the server would die a short and painful death if exposed to an article that long, Novels 1 and 2 are basically "Bobbing for Tropes". No matter how much I agree that it would, indeed, be fun.
Shadow Warden: I think making individual pages for all of the books, and adding tropes based on that, would be a reasonable approach to the issue, and allow those tropers who have to add them all an outlet. We could have a character sheet for the characters, or, if even that's too long, multiple ones for each 'sphere' of the Discworld continuity. I personally think it would be tons of fun. Opinions?
Looney Toons: !!! Which one became a live action movie, and where can I find it?
Robert: A made for TV movie, not a theatrical release. Hogfather appeared on Sky in the UK over Christmas, so might be available on DVD (sticking to legal means.) It's been announced that Sam Raimi will be making The Wee Free Men, but I don't know how far that's got.
Ununnilium: Ahem:
Eeeee Discworld eeeee <3 <3 <3
That is all.
Looney Toons: Ah, the IMDB is a wonderful thing. Here's their page
on the production. And better yet... here's the official page at Sky One, complete with photo gallery and lots of other stuff. Damn, but I want this. <begins eyeing torrent sites speculatively>
Kat Kit: I found the screenplay, with pictures from the movie and production, in my uni bookshop the other day. Susan looks just like I imagined her. <squees>
Tabby: She probably sounds and acts just like you imagined her, too. I've never seen better casting.
Mister Six: The casting was amazing, yes (Ackland was perfect for Mustrum), but the direction was leaden and — in places — pretty much incoherent, the "next time" showed almost the whole fucking programme and the wizards could've been cut from the script without losing anything much at all. I'd like to see them adapt Reaper Man all the same.
Dot Dot Dot: How about the "Animated Series" mentioned? Also, are the plays any good, who did the adaptations, and is it possible to obtain them outside of the UK?
Silent Hunter: With The Colour Of Magic have a TV adaptation on Sunday and Monday, propose starting to separate these out into book entries.
Silent Hunter: The first two book (The Colour of Magic and The Light Fantastic) are directly connected, so a single adaptation makes sense.
I have an idea which would drive me insane if I don't share it: I'd give some internal organ to read a Terry Pratchett Batman/Superman story, based solely on how he handles Vimes/Carrot interaction. Anyone had the same thought?
Mr Death: Not until just now, but now that you mention it, that would be pretty awesome.
Why is Where's My Cow not listed as one of the Discworld books? Although, admittedly, I don't know how you'd categorize it in that list.
Taken care of!
Dragon Quest Z: I know the main page says not to make a trope list, but even looking at all the tropes, I think there can be a reasonable amount listed if the tropes are a) not specific to one character (Ankh-Moorpork is a spoof City of Adventure, and of course not about just one character) and b) appears in more than three (maybe five) books (again, Ankh-Moorpork as a City of Adventure). Meiriona: Fuck it, let's just make an entry for each book already, there's enough in any one book to merit its own page, if things get really bad we could just make a Discworld namespace like Harry Potter got.
rsm109: As we're going the route of a separate page for each book, it'd probably be for the best if any entries that pothole the title of a Discworld book to the main article were edited accordingly. I'll do all the ones I see.
I removed all this natter. It doesn't really add anything to the trope example:
- Do elaborate, please.
- Possibly the tract against the Gold Standard in Making Money (This Troper is not an economist though, so he might be wrong)? Also The Science of Discworld III: Darwin's Watch regarding evolution vs. creationism and intelligent design.
- The Science of Discworld III was mostly written by a rather militant atheist, with Pratchett contributing only the in-story portions.
- Besides it's the science of Discworld, so it would have been rather surprising if it was pro-creationism.
- On the other hand, it's the science of Discworld, a universe where it makes perfect sense for libraries to cause time travel using the following formula: books contain knowledge, knowledge is power, power is energy, energy is mass, mas has gravity, and gravity causes bends in the time-space continuum. Therefor, a sufficiently large library will distort the fabric of space-time enough to allow time travel.
- Interestingly enough, according to these books, our universe really was magically created, and while evolution does happen, there is a god for it. So you sort it out.
- OUR universe?
- To clarify, within the Discworld verse, Earth ("Roundworld") and the universe containing it exist as an experiment created at Unseen University to consume excess magic generated by one of Ponder's experiments. The God of Evolution is a Discworld god (introduced in The Last Continent), and only makes a brief appearance in The Science of Discworld III. The books do not in any way claim that our universe really was magically created, or that evolution is really governed by a god.
And I must say that I dislike the tendency (on this wiki) to dismiss anything that doesn't treat Creationism/Intelligent Design with equal respect to evolution as an example of Writer on Board.
rsm109: Exactly. It's no more Writer on Board than if someone dismisses geocentrism, phlogiston or the luminiferous aether.
Caswin: I'd have to say that there's a difference. Details and surely-lengthy debate aside, "dismissing" something isn't an automatic indicator of a Writer on Board. However, for what it's worth (not that I've read it, mind), that one does sound like it might be a genuine case.
Daibhid C: The Science portions of Science of Discworld are actually at pains to point out they don't rule out the existence of God; the writers consider the existence of God to be unnecessary to explanations of how life and the universe came to be, and they don't personally believe, but they could be wrong. ("We apologise to any real gods".)
While Cohen and Stewart do appear to be atheists, I'm not aware of them being particularly "militant" ones. (Perhaps the above troper has Professor Stewart confused with the covener of Atheism Scotland, who is also named Ian Stewart.)
Jonn: I added "Cerebus Syndrome" a while back, with the caveat that the series still remains funny. It's on the trope page, and P Terry himself has confirmed it. Why was it deleted?
Added REDACTED. Spoiler tagged it because the mere existence of REDACTED is something of a plot twist in Unseen Academicals. Explained it here because somebody removed it.
Mr Death: Okay, that explains it, but sheesh. You couldn't have held off for a little while before popping a plot twist of the book onto the main series page? The release date isn't for another three days. I know it's in spoiler tags, but still, it's a trope listing (which means just mousing over it is gonna reveal it).
- A fair point. Let's take it out.
Daibhid C: Anyway, as I understand it, a trope which only appears in UA should only go on the UA page. Once it's appeared in a few books and become a standard part of the setting, it goes here.
Foxtrotpenguin: I just checked out the Discworld page. Is it true that the last two books on the list aren't going to be written by Pterry?
Coolzar: I was wondering that to. Could any one so me where it says this?
Shay Caron: I'm wondering about that myself. I did find an interview that says (near the bottom) "He’s planning to dictate the next novel after Unseen Academicals." Could that be what that line is meant to get across?
Due to the Alzheimer's, he can't write any more, he uses dictation software to write his books now. That's probably all that the above means.
Garyuu On account of me being unable to find things after some two weeks of searching that would verify that Terry isn't writing Discworld anymore, I am going to delete the notation. It's not that it wouldn't be notable, it's just not TRUE as far as I can tell.
