As was foretold, we've added advertisements to the forums! If you have questions, or if you encounter any bugs, please visit this thread: https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/240191/forum-advertisement-faq-and-reports-thread/

[Discworld] Who Watches The Watchmen In The Watch?

1171820222337

Posts

  • DanHibikiDanHibiki Registered User regular
    edited January 2021
    Not in reference to The Notch in particular, but I think a good adaptation of a Discworld story should involve a rarely seen narrator in black with a wide brimmed hat who cuts in now and again to cover the extra bits.*


    *You know, these bits.

    played by stunt Pratchett, Tony Robinson i hope.
    Failing that, Fred Savage reading to his son?

    DanHibiki on
  • Santa ClaustrophobiaSanta Claustrophobia Ho Ho Ho Disconnecting from Xbox LIVERegistered User regular
    The Guild runs classes in personal grooming and dance, and in Pyramids the senior Assassins are wearing the style of the time (narrow waist, broad shoulders, wide-brimmed hats), so there's definitely an emphasis on style so that their clients know that they're not being inhumed by some common thug

    I meant more like say the Klatchian ruler shows up and there's a big do and Vetinari wears some kind of ceremonial costume. And sure, it can have a ruff and probably feathered hats and whatever. But in his usual style/flair.

  • Munkus BeaverMunkus Beaver You don't have to attend every argument you are invited to. Philosophy: Stoicism. Politics: Democratic SocialistRegistered User, ClubPA regular
    Vetinari has always been depicted as being thin and wearing a simple black getup.

    Humor can be dissected as a frog can, but dies in the process.
  • Rhesus PositiveRhesus Positive GNU Terry Pratchett Registered User regular
    edited January 2021
    Thin, pale, and clad all in dusty black, the Patrician always put Ridcully in mind of a predatory flamingo, if you could find a flamingo that was black and had the patience of a rock.

    Edited to add the full quote

    Rhesus Positive on
    [Muffled sounds of gorilla violence]
  • Endless_SerpentsEndless_Serpents Registered User regular
    edited January 2021
    I always figured he was to some degree based on the portrait of don Justino de Neve.
    emung0ohxlu7.jpeg

    Endless_Serpents on
  • Rhesus PositiveRhesus Positive GNU Terry Pratchett Registered User regular
    Including the dog (RIP Wuffles)

    [Muffled sounds of gorilla violence]
  • [Expletive deleted][Expletive deleted] The mediocre doctor NorwayRegistered User regular
    The Guild runs classes in personal grooming and dance, and in Pyramids the senior Assassins are wearing the style of the time (narrow waist, broad shoulders, wide-brimmed hats), so there's definitely an emphasis on style so that their clients know that they're not being inhumed by some common thug

    The difference between an assassin and a murderer is style (and price tag).

    Sic transit gloria mundi.
  • Rhesus PositiveRhesus Positive GNU Terry Pratchett Registered User regular
    "We do not kill for a handful of silver. It's a lapful of gold or nothing."

    [Muffled sounds of gorilla violence]
  • King RiptorKing Riptor Registered User regular
    edited January 2021
    Vetinari has always been depicted as being thin and wearing a simple black getup.

    Yeah he has Vimes for pointless dress up ceremonies

    King Riptor on
    I have a podcast now. It's about video games and anime!Find it here.
  • Endless_SerpentsEndless_Serpents Registered User regular
    If I was going to glam him up for a show, and have him as a woman even, I’d go with something like this:

    w90ookqje1oj.jpeg

    It’s important to me that the patrician is only showing their head, hands (when not in gloves), and has plenty of room to hide a handful of daggers under their robes (or gown, as the case may be).*

    I do like the idea of a stylish slanted hat with feathers on though.**


    *As you might expect, they have no need for hiding daggers, but the potential of daggers are very sharp, so sharp that the idea of openly attacking them is cut in twain before it can bubble up.

    **For those particularly keen, it has been noted that the hollow bone of the Urabewese flamingo’s tail feathers, when properly treated and hewn, can indeed make formidable concealed weapons. The Patrician once commented in reply that while that was true... so could a great many things.

  • DanHibikiDanHibiki Registered User regular
    That's probably more appropriate for Adora Belle Dearheart. Vetinari, not so much.
    I Just have a hard time imagining Havelock putting in the time to do his hair and put on makeup and a fancy hat.

  • Endless_SerpentsEndless_Serpents Registered User regular
    Oh for sure, that’s my glamourised bad tv show version of Vetinari.

  • ElvenshaeElvenshae Registered User regular
    I always figured he was to some degree based on the portrait of don Justino de Neve.
    emung0ohxlu7.jpeg

    Yeah, I can practically hear that guy saying, "Don't let me detain you," with a gentle wave towards the door.

  • AridholAridhol Daddliest Catch Registered User regular
    Ventinari thoughts
    My only problem with Ventinari on the show is that the "danger! danger!" aspect seems totally absent.
    She seems very aloof and almost unconcerned with anything in the interactions so far.

    General thoughts:
    If I put my discworld bias away I don't mind the look of the show overall and things look "real"
    The plot/story is not being communicated clearly/understandably but because I'm aware of the story it's ok to follow
    Angua seems fine and is the character I like the most
    I despise what they've done to Cybil and how vimes is being portrayed

  • Santa ClaustrophobiaSanta Claustrophobia Ho Ho Ho Disconnecting from Xbox LIVERegistered User regular
    I don't know if I just missed the original description or not, but I always imagined Angua as more feminine. Statuesque. When all I had to go on was the commercials, I came to the conclusion that this was supposed to be her. I found it jarring, but not necessarily bad.

  • Rhesus PositiveRhesus Positive GNU Terry Pratchett Registered User regular
    She's definitely described as having a mane of blonde hair and a chest that makes it tricky to use a longbow

    [Muffled sounds of gorilla violence]
  • SchadenfreudeSchadenfreude Mean Mister Mustard Registered User regular
    Book Angua is basically Sandal Bergman with even better hair. Like the best hair.
    295955__86668.1398326829.380.500.jpg?c=2

    Contemplate this on the Tree of Woe
  • Santa ClaustrophobiaSanta Claustrophobia Ho Ho Ho Disconnecting from Xbox LIVERegistered User regular
    Sometime I envision a different look to a character regardless of the author's intent. Carrot is decently close. Detritus is tiny. Cherry is...large.

  • see317see317 Registered User regular
    Really, the only way to watch this show (if you've read the books) is to completely disassociate it with the books in your mind.
    It's just a horrible coincidence that these characters share names with those characters.

    Had the show creators done this for us, the same way they changed everything else, I think this'd be a much more watchable Watch.

  • Rhesus PositiveRhesus Positive GNU Terry Pratchett Registered User regular
    If I want an anarchic sort-of fantasy crime show with a drunken protagonist, I'll just watch Happy again

    [Muffled sounds of gorilla violence]
  • Santa ClaustrophobiaSanta Claustrophobia Ho Ho Ho Disconnecting from Xbox LIVERegistered User regular
    see317 wrote: »
    Really, the only way to watch this show (if you've read the books) is to completely disassociate it with the books in your mind.
    It's just a horrible coincidence that these characters share names with those characters.

    Had the show creators done this for us, the same way they changed everything else, I think this'd be a much more watchable Watch.

    Then I have to ask the question: why do it in the first place? Why take an IP people know and love for a long time and scramble it up to shit out an almost unrecognisable experience?

  • [Expletive deleted][Expletive deleted] The mediocre doctor NorwayRegistered User regular
    see317 wrote: »
    Really, the only way to watch this show (if you've read the books) is to completely disassociate it with the books in your mind.
    It's just a horrible coincidence that these characters share names with those characters.

    Had the show creators done this for us, the same way they changed everything else, I think this'd be a much more watchable Watch.

    Then I have to ask the question: why do it in the first place? Why take an IP people know and love for a long time and scramble it up to shit out an almost unrecognisable experience?

    I can only assume that Terry Pratchett once personally insulted the show-runners' mothers.

    Sic transit gloria mundi.
  • mrondeaumrondeau Montréal, CanadaRegistered User regular
    see317 wrote: »
    Really, the only way to watch this show (if you've read the books) is to completely disassociate it with the books in your mind.
    It's just a horrible coincidence that these characters share names with those characters.

    Had the show creators done this for us, the same way they changed everything else, I think this'd be a much more watchable Watch.

    Then I have to ask the question: why do it in the first place? Why take an IP people know and love for a long time and scramble it up to shit out an almost unrecognisable experience?

    Same reason all bad adaptations exist: marketing, and execs and creators wanting to seem useful.

  • King RiptorKing Riptor Registered User regular
    Sometime I envision a different look to a character regardless of the author's intent. Carrot is decently close. Detritus is tiny. Cherry is...large.

    Detritus should basically be a wall with a hat and loincloth

    I have a podcast now. It's about video games and anime!Find it here.
  • BethrynBethryn Unhappiness is Mandatory Registered User regular
    There's a miniature official(?) Detritus that looks more or less what I'd imagined him to look like.

    Detritus2.png

    ...and of course, as always, Kill Hitler.
  • klemmingklemming Registered User regular
    Detritus has already been done well, he was just done in the MCU, so for licensing issues they had to change the name:
    a0pwjvihrjsi.jpg

    Nobody remembers the singer. The song remains.
  • ChiselphaneChiselphane Registered User regular
    see317 wrote: »
    Really, the only way to watch this show (if you've read the books) is to completely disassociate it with the books in your mind.
    It's just a horrible coincidence that these characters share names with those characters.

    Had the show creators done this for us, the same way they changed everything else, I think this'd be a much more watchable Watch.

    What might have worked, or at least approached working, was take a "C team" approach. Like have the show about a Watch squad that's not very good but gradually learns to improve blah blah blah. Like how the original night watch starts off in the books, really. Gives you new characters so you dont run against head canon (or actual canon) with room for 'guest stars' of the already known cast. Maybe a little formulaic but it's a formula that works, and would be better than this "change everything for change's sake'

  • pezgenpezgen Registered User regular
    see317 wrote: »
    Really, the only way to watch this show (if you've read the books) is to completely disassociate it with the books in your mind.
    It's just a horrible coincidence that these characters share names with those characters.

    Had the show creators done this for us, the same way they changed everything else, I think this'd be a much more watchable Watch.

    What might have worked, or at least approached working, was take a "C team" approach. Like have the show about a Watch squad that's not very good but gradually learns to improve blah blah blah. Like how the original night watch starts off in the books, really. Gives you new characters so you dont run against head canon (or actual canon) with room for 'guest stars' of the already known cast. Maybe a little formulaic but it's a formula that works, and would be better than this "change everything for change's sake'

    I’m 95% sure this is what the show was described as in publicity material many many years ago. Essentially a police procedural set in Ankh-Morpork, with some characters we know and others we don’t. It was never intended as an adaptation of any specific storyline(s), it was supposed to be new plots. I’m sure this was how Rhianna Pratchett herself talked about it.

    But then the rights/control screwup happened and... this is what we get.

  • Rhesus PositiveRhesus Positive GNU Terry Pratchett Registered User regular
    Yeah, Ankh-Morpork is a city of 100,000 souls*, there's plenty of space for stories that don't involve the core squad, especially post Jingo-era where Vimes realises that he no longer knows every recruit by name

    *and ten times that many people

    [Muffled sounds of gorilla violence]
  • Endless_SerpentsEndless_Serpents Registered User regular
    edited January 2021
    Sorry some terrible part of me wants to write Watch fan-fiction, I’ll limit it thus:

    Yan Nuttson. Just passed out of training, and ready to bring justice to the streets! Brought up relatively isolated in the newest ward of the city at the outer edge (where it smells the least and the assassins are at their most polite), he’s our viewpoint character. He’s into stories about heroes with all the nasty bits cut out; they’re calling them ‘comical books’. It’s rude to ask, but for the record he’s half orc, half human, and half dwarf.

    Abigail Sherbet. Another rookie, who would have been a witch if she was born anywhere else. Refused the call from the Witch-Finder to follow her long line of copper relatives into the Watch. Has every law and procedure memorised, and gets a bit stuck when things go all Ankh-Morpork, but is ultimately in it to do good.

    Curly / Of the Fire in the Night. A goblin that was born during a ‘riot’ that was more a targeted hit back when goblins gained equal rights. Finding out the who and the why is his personal mission. A bit more of a rule bender than Abigail, and much harder on criminals, but likewise is a good egg.*

    Save Me Own Skin Dibbler, an old crook who had his leaf turned over for him quite forcibly by the Captain of the Watch. The trio’s whistler.

    Lord Samuel Vimes II, the city’s (and the Disc’s) first Precise Understander, or PU, for short. He’s figured out you can study tiny details of a crime scene to figure out what went on, and is in the process of inventing finger printing powder, and something about a telescope you point down rather than up at the sky. Son of a former Captain and wealthy in a dilapidated, dusty estate sort of way.

    Yeah, see, it’s not even hard, right? I mean, if your job is a script writer for a show based on an established world with X books about it, naturally. They should have gone that route.

    *What constitutes a good egg is a point of conjecture amongst the people, especially Trolls, who hold a good egg to be of great religious significance.

    Endless_Serpents on
  • Rhesus PositiveRhesus Positive GNU Terry Pratchett Registered User regular
    Honestly, I'd be down for City Watch: The Next Generation / Tiny Toon Adventures

    Steam power more established, the suburbs spreading out now that commuting can be a thing, and the main characters from the books either retired, dead, or not mentioned

    [Muffled sounds of gorilla violence]
  • Endless_SerpentsEndless_Serpents Registered User regular
    I made a poo joke. :)

  • MorganVMorganV Registered User regular
    Honestly, I'd be down for City Watch: The Next Generation / Tiny Toon Adventures

    Steam power more established, the suburbs spreading out now that commuting can be a thing, and the main characters from the books either retired, dead, or not mentioned

    Or, in the case of an absent, pensioned Reginald Shoe, all three.

  • Santa ClaustrophobiaSanta Claustrophobia Ho Ho Ho Disconnecting from Xbox LIVERegistered User regular
    Honestly, I'd be down for City Watch: The Next Generation / Tiny Toon Adventures

    Steam power more established, the suburbs spreading out now that commuting can be a thing, and the main characters from the books either retired, dead, or not mentioned

    This only really works if you have respect for the original source. Too many times these sorts of stories spend a non-zero amount of time tearing down the old characters to make the new ones 'better'.

    Which happens all too often now.

  • Endless_SerpentsEndless_Serpents Registered User regular
    Moist von Lipwig is of course the future Patrician, though Havelock stepped side-ways, rather than down from the position. He has not been seen since Moist’s inauguration.

  • SnicketysnickSnicketysnick The Greatest Hype Man in WesterosRegistered User regular
    Moist von Lipwig is of course the future Patrician, though Havelock stepped side-ways, rather than down from the position. He has not been seen since Moist’s inauguration.

    Moist occasionally receives notes that the clerks are not entirely sure how they got into the files

    7qmGNt5.png
    D3 Steam #TeamTangent STO
  • WotanAnubisWotanAnubis Registered User regular
    Moist von Lipwig is of course the future Patrician, though Havelock stepped side-ways, rather than down from the position. He has not been seen since Moist’s inauguration.

    Remember how the Guild of Assassins ended up not accepting any contracts on Vetinari?

    Yeah, well, they haven't done Patrician Lipwig the same courtesy. In fact, there's already an active contract out on Moist. To be fulfilled at some as-yet unknown point at the specific request of the contractor. Only to ensure that nobody else takes out a contract on Moist, of course. No other reason.

  • King RiptorKing Riptor Registered User regular
    edited January 2021
    Moist von Lipwig is of course the future Patrician, though Havelock stepped side-ways, rather than down from the position. He has not been seen since Moist’s inauguration.

    Thats not true hes just teaching camouflage at Assassins guild

    King Riptor on
    I have a podcast now. It's about video games and anime!Find it here.
  • PirateQueenPirateQueen Registered User regular
    Only to ensure that nobody else takes out a contract on Moist, of course. No other reason.
    ... but Moist isn't so sure of that & is terrified : )

    What do you guys think the plot of the next Moist von Lipwig book would've been?

    Can you cool creative people on this thread pl write another Moist book... he's my fave & I want more, Raising Steam doesn't count

  • Rhesus PositiveRhesus Positive GNU Terry Pratchett Registered User regular
    I think there were rumours that it would be about renovating the tax system

    Which would have been so wonderful - I'd have probably framed excerpts and had them on my desk

    [Muffled sounds of gorilla violence]
Sign In or Register to comment.