The Chronicles of Narnia: The Silver Chair

It's hard to answer convincingly in favor or against that; it's riding the thin line between the needs of adaptation and Fix Fic. Removing the Scouring of the Shire basically just removed a side plot that didn't change the themes of the book (other than to show just how badass the hobbits have become). Messing with the themes of the source material can go well (Wicked) or badly (The Golden Compass).

edited 19th Jan '16 7:56:41 PM by Elle

Well then fuck that shit about Susan, don't adapt it. It was unnecessary for Lewis to even write that in there.

Aside from seeing Jadis' dead homeworld, i wouldn't see much appeal coming out of The Magician's Nephew. It only works as an origin story.

There is no actual proof that The Green Lady is the White Witch or Jadis, is there? Aside from the obvious parallels, was it ever stated?

I liked The Horse and His Boy because it and Prince Caspian were the ones that made Narnia feel the most like a fleshed-out world. Wardrobe does this too, but is more of a stock epic fantasy, while Dawn Treader and Silver Chair are more purely adventure stories.

Prince Caspian is my favorite of the books, personally.

The owls of Narnia speculate they may be related, but that's all that's written on the subject.

The character section on this site treats them like the same person

Well that's probably not accurate. Though it is is odd that the Lady of the Green Kirtle has no origin, as least that the characters know of. She only appears as a witch from the north that wants to conquer Narnia.

Maybe more heavily focusing on the Pensive children will solve the Problem with Susan and the esoteric nature of the final book by then keeping those elements to a minimum in favor of the ones that solve other issues?

I'd say remove the obvious christian allegories all together and just try to make it more... cinematic, for a lack of a better word, but I feel that'd result in a backlash considering a number of people who love the books love it specifically because of those christian allegories.

Personally the allegories ruin it a little for me and I still wouldn't want them changed.

Cutting out bits of a work the author really cared about is just despicable.

The Lady of the Green Kirtle has a really different approach than the White Witch though. Jadis basically terrifies everyone into submission while the Lady mind controls everyone. Jadis has a huge presence, while the Lady seems nice at first glance. For all we know, she came from another world at some point, since there's apparently a bunch of random portals scattered around the world Narnia is a part of. Maybe there's something in the far west?

There was definitely something in the far west, since that's where the Telmarines came from.

And the White Witch took a gentler approach with one of the Pevensie kids in Wardrobe. She and the Lady work similarly in that they'll try being nice until it's clear guile won't work, then they'll just smash your face.

The Lady violates one of the evil overlord rules. Turns into a snake and gets offed by the Black Knight.

Jadis is plenty nice as long as you do what she wants and she has a use for you.

The Silver Chair is a strong story, and differs from the other Narnia books in being a tad less mythic. In The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, the kids (except from Edmund) pretty much do everything they're supposed to. In the The Silver Chair, Jill and Eustace screw up pretty much constantly. Arguing, falling off cliffs, failing to follow directions, trusting people they shouldn't, going wrong at pretty much every turn...

If The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe is an allegory for the Gospel story, much of The Silver Chair is an allegory for Christian life. You're going to screw up at times, just keep trying, do your best, and have faith.

Having characters who are more three-dimensional than the ones in some of the other books could do a lot for the movie. The key is getting good actors, especially for Puddleglum, who could be anything from a major Ensemble Dark Horse to the equivalent of Jar Jar Binks, depending on how he's played.

edited 21st Jan '16 5:06:19 PM by Galadriel

I hope they twist it so that the Lady of the Green Kirtle is identical with the White Witch, because then she will be played by Tilda Swinton, who was awesome as White Witch.

And I hope they make Aslan a more sympathetic character. Scaring little girls may make him similar to the Christian god, but it is not exactly what people expect of the Big Good in a movie. Not what I expect, anyway.

Extra points if Eustace is the one who acts all cutesy to get information out of the giants.

I also hope they don't put in a narrator, as the narrator in the book accuses Jill for everything that goes wrong, even though Eustace messes up just as much, and in some cases she just couldn't have followed Aslan's mysterious advice. (Also, the book provides no explanation for why he can't just tell them what they need to know. Great for metaphor and stuff, but ... Dumbledore had evil wizards with spies as an excuse, what does Aslan have?)

As for the Last Battle ... I don't think they will dare to show Susan crying, but it would be awesome if they did.

Did the Lady of the Green Kirdle/White Witch twin theory come about before or after the original TV miniseries double cast the roles because of budget issues?

Also, I'm with however said that Magician's Nephew would be good to make into a film just to see Tilda Swinton beat people with a lamppost.

It's implied in the book that the two are related somehow when the owls say that they suspect the Lady of the Green Kirtle may be "part of the same crew" as the White Witch, but that's the most that's ever said on the subject. Aside from that, the Lady of the Green Kirtle is given no origin.

Ah, now I remember. I feel like the Lady should be played by someone pretty in a Disney Princess kind of way to add to her being deceptively sweet while mind controlling people.

Sort of like Daemon in ReBoot. Tell me someone knows what I'm talking about.

She's an evil sorceress who puts out anti-Aslan arguments. It would be weird for Narnia to have two of those, and helps tie the story in better with the over-myth. I thought the link between them was self-apparent when i read the books as a kid.

So basically she's a magical athiest?

I don't recall if the White Witch ever tried to cover up the existence of Aslan. In any case, as soon as Aslan did return to Narnia, she became an anti-theist.

While the Lady of the Green Kirtle had her own underground kingdom from which she could make a much more convincing argument that Aslan didn't exist. In fact, her most dangerous enchantment is to convince others that her cave is all that exists, and your memories to the contrary are just daydreams that got out of hand.

Incidentally, the Lady of the Green Kirtle's arguments against the existence of the outside world parallel the Giant's argument from another of CS Lewis' novels, The Pilgrim's Regress.

One thing about the White Witch that was kind of odd to me was that she was entirely focused on Narnia. I know the other countries don't show up until later, but references in the Horse and His Boy imply that the Witch's rule stopped exactly at the border between Narnia and Archenland.

I do remember the Magician's Nephew mentioning that Jadis ran to the north near the end of the book. Maybe the Lady of the Green Kirtle was a daughter or a student or something?

I don't think the White Witch would have bothered with a cover-up. She knew Aslan existed, and might well come back at some point, so there was no reason to try and hide him.

edited 19th Feb '16 11:11:30 AM by Zendervai

It wasn't about trying to hide him logically, though. The arguments were just a short-term distraction to get them to fall under her mind control.

And yeah, now that you mention the White Witch running north, i think that's why i thought the connection between them was obvious. She ran north, and eventually an evil anti-Aslan sorceress with strange powers shows up there? I really don't see how they're not the same, especially since Jadis changed her form somewhat to become The White Witch anyway.

But. Didn't Aslan kill Jadis?

Yup. It's doubtful she could resurrect on her own, since Aslan needed a loophole to do it and a subplot in Prince Caspian involved Nikabrik trying to summon the White Witch from the dead.

Wasn't that only added in the movie though? Or am I miss remembering something?