EQ Movie and Author Involvement

Comic book movies – as we  are all aware of – are super popular at the moment.

Obviously, comic book movies are super popular at the moment.

One of my most favorite comics is Battle Angel Alita/ Gunm. I'm not going to watch the upcoming movie, because a. uncanny valley, this CGI face* ugh and b. Hollywood is notoriously bad at adaptations

So this got me thinking. Apparently Mr. Kishiro, the author of Alita is not involved in the production of the movie (all he takes is his remuneration and the extra new readers).

Apart from cameos and an honorable mention in the credits, Stan Lee was, as far as I know, never involved in the making of any of the Marvel, Spiderman or Fantastic Four movies.

Alan Moore is famous for disliking all adaptations based on his works (rightly so), so I doubt he was ever involved in any.

So, might this have been a problem with the realization of the EQ movie? The Pinis not letting go?














*the forum software doesn't like emojis

I'd have to read interviews and articles and listen to podcasts in order to form my own opinion of this. But they do comment on the topic at elfquest.com FAQ page:

"Update 2018: Now that Final Quest is finished, wrapped up, in the bag, for the first time in Elfquest’s history we are able to bring to Hollywood the complete story of Cutter Kinseeker, Blood of Ten Chiefs. For the first time, a producer or director will able to envision a saga start to finish. We’re already in talks with interested parties – not only about a movie, but also about something new (for us), perhaps a series approach (a la Game of Thrones). We’re ever-optimistic. Stay tuned.

Hm... did a VERY short research on the FAQ page and didn't find this topic. Okay, I'm not good in this and I was not very patient either. Blame me.

You mean the discussion about a movie or a TV series is up again, Trollbabe? Well -I'll "stay tuned" as always when I hear about possible new EQ. Doesn't mean I'm too exited about it.

The "wrapped up story of Cutter KKinseeker" is nothing that sparks my interest - especially not with the final result. :/ And "Game of Thrones" is the wrong trigger for me - I decidedly dislike practically everything that's praised about this series.

What I will always appreciate are updates of any kind of EQ stuff. Thank you for sharing, Trollbabe!

Elfquest will never not soon (at least) be made into a movie or TV series.

With only relying on this and the last forums, I'm assuming most fans are female (at least 60%, probably higher). While there is nothing inherently wrong with that, most successful franchises are geared towards male audiences (while having many female fans as well). Star Wars, Marvel and DC movies, Jurassic Park etc. Content (mostly) aimed at female audiences rarely attracts male viewers, but male viewers are the most important demographic.
"But EQ is not aimed at any specific gender", you say. Well, in any EQ movie or TV show, Cutter's conflict with Rayek and his courting for Leetah is gonna be the major part of the first movie/ the first episodes. Basically, the major conflict is love, not overcoming a badie and getting the love interest as a side effect.

Recognition would have to be changed completely. Recognition is basically glorified rape, in this day and age, no sane producer would green light a script with recognition. How, do you think, would a feminist audience react to a film, in which the female protagonist has no agency over her own body, a film in which she is forced to have sex and have children with a man she does not love? And this, recognition, is shown as something good. It will absolutely not work.

Humans. One problematic aspect is the lack of humans in the first part of the story. How willing are audiences to stare at weird CGI faces? What about Avatar, you say. Avatar had a big name director behind it and CGI was a novelty back then.
Also, slender, graceful and well-meaning white tall elves get slaughtered by dark skinned, ugly, stunted humans. Problematic. Admittedly, just give the paleo-humans white skin and it should be fine.

Maybe the Wolfblood thing would have to get changed as well? Studios rely heavily on test audiences. If they think wolf blood is icky (or rather Timmain letting a wolf bang her is and having his child), Wolfblood might very well get cut.

Another important factor: any EQ movie would be extremely expensive. Why? CGI fur. Fur is very hard to animate, which is why we almost never see it in movies (just try to think about it, most animated hair is long and sleek, not the fluffy, short type*). It was a running gag among Game of Thrones fans, that the direwolves fell victim to budgetary constraints (kill dire wolves to have money for dragons).

Movie producers don't take risks nowadays. EQ is a risk. Its fanbase is not large enough to guarantee a large movie going crowd. If you'd write a script for a EQ movie or TV show, what would the climax of the first arc be? Now compare that to any big budget production. How does it compare?

Again, how much do you think the Pinis are willing to give up of the original story to see it in moving pictures? More action, recognition reduced to "love at first sight", almost no wolves for the wolfriders?



*Pixar is famous for animating the pelt of the monsters in the monster movie for this.

Sounds like a well considered and consequent analysis, Miss Gillespie.

That does sound like a bunch of nails on a coffin...

I think they could get around the inappropriateness by just embracing it and having the depiction be a bit brutal. I always liked the tone of the BoTC short stories (not the EQ novels and not the comic versions) because they did get the feeling across of the conflicted wolf-elf mixing, the instability of the early proto-Wolfriders, the animalistic nature of the Hunt and the alien-ness of the High Ones. It felt raw in the stories set early on, with a gradual evolution toward becoming more sophisticated beings in the stories set later. They could make it like that— and then the more problematic elements might end up more digestible. I mean, heck— Game of Thrones was really really inappropriate, and people ate it up.

No getting around expensive CGI though...

So, if I had to write a financially realistically movie (?), I'd make following changes:

1. Make the elves tall, so regular actors could play them. Basically like the elbes in Lord of the Rings. The wolves of the Wolfriders would be regular wolves, which could be wolf dogs.

2. Have the movie/ TV show be set in a medieval world. This works better with the expectations the audience has for a fantasy product. Actually, the Shards War would work well as a start = action, drama, conflict, emotions. It could be possible to spin a whole interconnected extended universe à la Marvel from this (Shards, Wild Hunt, Forevergreen maybe something for the Go Backs and Wavedancers as well)

3. Don't forget to change recognition!

I don't think an ElfQuest movie would work unless it was animated. But getting an adult audience to watch an animated movie...? If it's a Japanese anime of a popular franchise maybe (but even cinematic anime viewings are scarce, especially in Europe!), but I can't think of any adult western cartoon movie that wasn't comedy.

My thought is it might be a hard sell because white boy elf comes in and steals brown girl elf from brown boy elf and it might not go over well in the audience these days. I think love stories would work well with good context but the color thing might be an issue. But there's also the issue with the white savior thing with the Wolfriders being "protectors" of the brown Sunfolk . It just feels like it would hit the wrong nerve or something and might be hard to swallow, so I'm not sure. Of course I love the series especially its beginnings. But I'm just not sure how they would be able to overcome this - back when the series came out, it was considered very edgy and yes very unusual for this mixed couple thing, and the white elves being the "savages" in a way or whatever, while also being champions. Now? I am not so sure it would go over as well. but who knows! Anything is possible, I suppose, if you get a really good backer and some good CGI. Maybe they can make the Sunfolk purple and the wolfriders green

Again, I would not start with OQ but with Shards. Shards has a setting most audience expect from a fantasy movie and it hits most conventional beats.

Actually, focusing on the white barbarians and dark skinned cultured elves would probably work. Maybe even make the Sun Folk more magical (as in have them have even more magic users).
Also, since recognition is not essential to the plot, why not make it an "opposites attract each other" story?

I agree, it would be a good idea to shuffle things around a bit, going with Shards. I'd even love a little series or something, like the Widlhunt Series or stuff like that.

I'm sad that there are so many japanese manga/ japanese comics with bad drawings, often wrongly drawn anatomy and the most weird plots being turned into series or animated movies after they gained a fanbase in just within their country Japan. However Elfquest has great linearts, has a great plot and story arcs (not counting the end! ) and is highly complex but it just seems to never be animated.

What Prayer said.
There is so much crap that gets animated - but why not some high quality stuff? And it is also possible to do high quality drawn animation (Ghibli). 3D would of course - once the models are made and rigged - save a lot of work. There is also work in progress to have better hair and fur animation.

I wouldn't label / connect Recognition straightforward with rape, but yes, there is a fraction of people that will nitpick and search for something to complain about and make a huge fuss over the smallest potential fly in the soup. Still, let those haters (and that is what they are) complain.
The only gripe I see is that movie studios / publishers might be "conservative" when it comes to return of investments / shy of risks.
Besides, a good amount of money is also made with secondary things like action figures, fan merch and so on.
For EQ this might be a hen / egg problem. More movie -> more fans, but without a huge estimated fan-base no movie, so...
Still, if I had the money, I'd just fund it and stay as close as possible to OQ. And not care about ROI and nitpickers.

I resonate with your thoughts JaRf. Wendy is pro woman rights which is portrayed in her stories of Elfquest; definitely a portrayal of very strong elf females. But "haters" would still complain...I would also fund an EQ movie if I had the money ^^

With the exception of fanmade short films, ROI always matter. No one is going to produce a movie, that will not make a profit.
Animé are obviously first made for the Japanese market, or do Japanese producers already consider overseas audiences?
Are there still 2D cartoons made by Western studios?

Miss Gillespie wrote:

Are there still 2D cartoons made by Western studios?

Well. Kind of.
Drawn Together, South Park, Simpsons,... okay, those are series and usually funny and / or mirrors of current society and politics. There should be a few others, well, and then there is your usual share of Disney stuff and a few movies that are likely more addressed towards a younger audience.

Yes in German TV there are a few 2D cartoons for the youngest audience although many were replaced by computer animated cartoons. Sometimes there is a Disney movie like Tangled which is computer animated in the original movie but the Tangled series on TV is 2D. Sorry I don't know the name of other series and I can only speak for Germany...

...but this I know: I love 2D animation more because computer animated characters can look like made of play doo.