Since my internet keeps cutting in and out, I've gone digging through my DVD collection and found that I apparently own the BBC Narnia miniseries from the 80s. So I'm rewatching it! Here's a liveblog thread. Mute if you wanna.

Peter looks like he's about 9 years old

none of these kids can act omfg

the soundtrack is unironically great

alright the guy playing Tumnus is no James McAvoy but he's pretty good, I like him

Edmund is very well cast because everything about him radiates shithead energy

oh my GOD the White Witch actress is hamming it up so bad, I love it

I love that the universal reaction to having turkish delight of the first time is "wtf why did Edmund betray his whole family for this garbage"

I'm tempted to edit a mastercut of the White Witch cause this actress is HILARIOUSLY melodramatic

Edmund: "Can't I have just one piece of turkish delight to eat on my way home?"

White Witch: "nooooOOOOOOOOHHHHHJJSHLFDSHK"

Peter just offered Lucy a handshake to apologize, as though she's an estranged business partner and not his 8 year old sister

MAUGRIM omfg

poor Susan hasn't had anything to do at all

which in fairness is quite accurate to the book

THE FUCKING BEAVERS asdlkfjdslfjdslgjlsdjglskd

I have never appreciated the beavers in the newer films more

I also love how every Narnia adaptation I've seen has the White Witch saying "do you see those two hills?" and pointing to what is clearly mountains

because this is such a one to one adaptation of the book, it's PAINFULLY obvious the none of the kids have any real personality (with maybe the exception of Edmund), you don't really appreciate how much the new movies added to everyone until it's gone

also once everyone got to Narnia, they're like "welp guess we're fulfilling this prophecy now! Neat" even though the rational reaction is "we should uhhhhhhh we should go home now"

I completely forgot that there's a solid five minutes of Edmund splitting into two and arguing with himself on the way to the Witch's castle

Mr. Beaver is talking SO weirdly, I think he might be struggling with his facial prosthetics?? but he went for a weird accent on top of it and he just sounds so stupid

OKAY so I guess to make up for not being able to have wolves, they have Maugrim like. shapeshifting between being a horrifying wolf-man and an actual wolf, and occasionally he just YELLS to be scary and I die laughing every fucking time

Mrs. Beaver passed around a bottle of mysterious liquid to help the kids sleep

I think she just gave the kids booze lmao

I actually kinda love that the unicorns and other creatures they can't actually create are just hand drawn in, it looks way better than anything else they'd have managed

I think half of their budget went to this Aslan puppet, which honestly looks really fucking good. I wish all the animals were this well done

this sure is some greenscreen

omg this final battle has like ten people in it

I think they just told all the actors to wave their weapons around and look determined, then animated some evil looking birds in and called it a day

Alright so this honestly wasn't as bad as I remembered. But it definitely wasn't good, either. It has zero sense of pacing, it just sort of moves from plot point to plot point until suddenly it's over.

Alrighty! While I wait for work things to export, let us continue this journey with the next Narnia installment, Prince Caspian!

The producers made the interesting choice to combine Prince Caspian with Dawn Treader, and Caspian was only given two episodes so it's much shorter than the rest.

Mkay they started well, the intro on the train station is set up to lead directly into Dawn Treader's setup

Edmund's voice has changed SO MUCH

I actually love the kid playing Caspian, he's very cute

The opening is surprisingly well intercut, too. Cause the book starts only with the Pevensies and all of Caspian's stuff is a very long flashback. This works much better

it might just be because he's in darkness so far but the badger looks waaayyyy better than the beavers did in LWW

all things considered, I am genuinely impressed by this centaur, for the BBC in 1989 this is very good (even tho his arms are awkwardly held out to make the painting easier and two masks do not match up when anything is in motion)

this kid is a good kid

he is easily the best child actor of the bunch so far

I love that whenever there's a talking animal onscreen, they have to say out loud what animal it is because you might not be able to tell otherwise

REEPICHEEP

this is moving along at a much more respectable pace than LWW, condensing this book down to two episodes was an excellent idea

this is also reminding me how startled I was when the newer Prince Caspian movie came out and Caspian was a hot adult man instead of a dorky little kid

like, when you grow up with the version on the left, and then suddenly get the version on the right, tis very confusing

OH GOOD THE WHITE WITCH ACTRESS IS BACK

okay so Prince Caspian is FLYING through the plot, but is also taking care to hit every single beat of the plot. they could've stood to just cut a few things out here and there

I take that back, they did cut everything Aslan, Susan, and Lucy got up to during the battle. Which was mostly running around the countryside doing nothing, so. This was a good cut.

lmao it took me way too long to realize that Reepicheep is Warwick Davis

honestly it's no wonder Susan is the one to lose her faith Narnia, she doesn't fucking do anything in it. she's just kinda dragged along for the ride

I would just like to say that Caspian's actor has aged very, very well

THIS SPECIAL EFFECTS SHOT IS SENDING ME

THE WAY THEY JUST PLOP DOWN INTO THE OCEAN AT THE END, I'M

I often have thoughts of "if I were a video essay person, I would make a video essay about this"

and I think comparing/contrasting the Narnia books with their various adaptations would be a fascinating one

Anyway, my work stuff is still exporting and uploading, so on to Dawn Treader!

If you're following me for anything other than a Narnia deluge I am very sorry. Please mute this thread if you want to this is literally 100% for my enjoyment :D

the kid who plays Eustace is very suitably nasty, I appreciate him