Swing and a miss

Had a nice date last night with the Mrs.  Dinner was tasty, and the service was good, and it got us back out the door in plenty of time to get to our movie, which is where things kind of went south.  Both my wife and I were...unimpressed with 'Ender's Game.' 

Both my wife and I really enjoyed the book...heck, my wife has gone on to read all 7 or 8 books in the Enderverse(she says her two favorite ones are the ones that focus on Bean), and so, we had high hopes. 

I'm willing to concede it's a tough task converting Ender's Game to a movie.  There is a reason it's taken almost 30 years to get it on screen...and it's a valiant attempt...it's just...not satisfying.  It's not the actors fault, I'm not even sure it's the directors fault.  It's entirely possible it's nobodies fault...that it was simply an impossible task.  Some books can be compressed to a 2 hour movie and still be satisfying, and some can't. 

There were just a lot of things that had to be cut out that made the book 'complete and satisfying' that were missing in the movie.  You didn't really get any of the pressure that was on Ender as a '3rd'.  They hinted at how they wanted to keep Ender isolated and from making friends, but there wasn't enough time to really drive it home.  There wasn't enough time to show him learning and teaching the Battle Room. 

Finally, they had to rush his transition from the Battle School to Command School...and in doing so, they tipped their hand too much.  When I read the book...I didn't see the ending coming.  Totally blind-sided me.  I think if I had watched the movie without reading the book...I would have picked it up.  They placed too much stress on the importance of his next step in training. 

So...yeah.  Just...I think seeing Thor 2 would have been a better date...