Thread by @FoldableHuman

Finally reading the Shadow of the Colossus movie script. I'm 30 pages in and I hate it. I hate it so much.

I don't have reliable internet, so details will have to wait.

But I want you all to know I hate it so, so much.

I made it 8 more pages before I had to stop because the hate was coming faster than I could make notes.

Okay, so.

The script, or at least the first 38 pages (of 99) does a good job understanding the basic happenings of SotC but literally nothing else.

The opening is basically lifted straight from the game's opening cinematic, for example, and the colossi look and feel the same.

But
That's
About
It

Wander gets to the temple, makes contact with Dormin, and we're tossed into ~~FLASHBACK~~

A solid half of the first 38 pages is flashback scenes to life prior to Wander arriving in the Forbidden Land and every single one is awful.

This is hard to outline, because there's a lot of competing problems.

Let's start with the racism.

There's a lot of this, where the things that are antagonistic are all but described as "exotic AF, like super definitely not-white"

Second, you know how the punch of SotC hinges on a sort of moral unknowability? That Shaman Emon is an antagonist, but not villain?

Please allow me to introduce you to Lord Emon Ba'ad'gi Putridus the Third.

Wander's speech super bothers me. He's basically a Final Fantasy teenage protag. He talks like Tidus or Vaan. I want to bust his teeth.

Oh there's also wankery going on with languages. Mono's alcoholic pig farmer dad speaks... ugh... "an exotic, completely- unheard-of tongue"

So all his stuff is in italics, but Emon speaks "our language" (wording from screenplay) and Mono speaks broken "our language"

This is used for no other purpose than to make dickbag dad completely unsympathetic, and for godawful exchanges like this

If you haven't picked up on it yet, Mono is every "sexy savage" ever written.

Wander, in this script, is an escaped slave who happens into Mono's village and steals Agro from her dad.

Agro is a mean horse that her dad apparently keeps for no other reason than to abuse. But Wander tames him b/c they're both escaped slaves

Here's where I originally stopped to say "I hate this so much"
(She has just explained the basics of her faith's afterlife)

Alright, not to drag this on toooo long (I need to get to bed) I'll finish strong.

In the game it's implied that Mono's death is institutional in some way, that she's maybe even a sacrifice.

It pits Wander against things that are bigger and older than himself: tradition, the hierarchy, the colossi, Dormin.

Wander's actions in assaulting/aiding these Bigger Things have consequences that he *clearly* doesn't fully appreciate.

And those consequences are meant to be ambiguous b/c we're meant to consider them on a time scale of eons.

This is supposed to be deliberately contrasted against Wander's very *now* teenage concern of "hot girl is dead but I want living girl 😢"

Screenplay Mono gets Million Dollar Baby'd by her daydrunk dad.

Goodnight.