It seems like a lot of these examples aren't "The creator prefers the adaptation" so much as they are "the creator approves of a few specific decisions made by the adaptation".
Edited by Darth_Marth
Wizzard
Pulled some examples which were "Original creator has no objections to the adaptation" rather than "Original creator thinks the adaptation is better than their version". Putting them here in case there's more context that would make them examples.
(There's some others that I wondered about, but decided that "Original creator thinks the adaption is better than their version in some respects" probably counts.)
- Nobuhiro Watsuki heartily approved of casting Takeru Sato as Kenshin in the movie of Rurouni Kenshin. He was also happy that the English title of the anime was Samurai X, since he's a big fan of the X-Men.
- Anne Rice originally wasn't a fan of the film adaptation of Interview with the Vampire, in particular opposing the casting of Tom Cruise as Lestat, but she changed her mind when she actually saw the film and fell in love with Cruise's performance. She later flip-flopped on Queen of the Damned, as she initially doubted it would succeed, changed her mind after meeting star Stuart Townsend, then changed her mind once again, calling it a "mutilation" of her work.
- Bruce Timm, co-creator of Harley Quinn, has stated he approves for her redesign
in Suicide Squad.
I actually think the wiki has a missing trope in the gap between Approval of God and Creator Approved Adaptation (this trope). A good number of examples like the ones you removed are listed on Approval of God even though both trope descriptions specifically say only fan works & parodies apply there (a distinction worth making since the context is different when it's not intended to be a straight adaptation). Tropers are searching for a place to note creator praise of adaptations without meeting the strict "creator clearly prefers the other version" standard of this trope.
We should either: - Expand the definition of Approval of God to include approval of adaptations (possibly splitting the examples between the original and...adapted definitions) - Expand this trope to allow for any specific praise of an adaptation, and rename it to something like "Creator Approved Adaptation" - Create another trope with a name like the above for that purpose, with this trope being a subtrope of that one
I don't think repeatedly removing misuse of these two tropes is sustainable (the other trope could use a trim right now for example)
"Neil Gaiman prefers his novelization of Neverwhere. Although he wrote the TV show, The BBC wouldn't let him make all the decisions he wanted to, prompting him to write the novel."
Is it really an example if the same creator is responsible for the adaptation? I mean, you'd expect someone to prefer their own more recent version of the same story — it's like preferring an end product to an earlier draft. That's very different to openly admitting someone else did a better job than you.
(Especially if he specifically cited Executive Meddling with the original — that makes the latter adaptation more similar to a Director's Cut.)
Edited by johnnye Hide / Show Replies
Your take is true but it is technically still an adaptation of the original concept, so I'd say it still qualifies. It's definitely not a director's cut since it's a totally different format. Fact is executive meddling is much more common in on-screen works, and adaptation is much more common from page to screen rather than the other way around, so the whole situation just isn't that common, so I don't see the harm in including an oddball case :)
I'm not sure about this one:
It seems to me that there's a difference between a creator thinking an adaptation of their own work is better than the original, and thinking an adaptation was an improvement on a different creator's work that they never liked in the first place.
Edited by DaibhidC