How Ghibli Screwed Earthsea

Studio Ghibli made an Earthsea based movie titles Tales From Earthsea. It was... not the greatest adaptation to say the least.

[gustavozottis]

Miyazaki's son directed this. The two of them had somewhat of a frustrated relationship and Miyazaki even didn't watch the whole movie in the premier, he walked right off the session, it's on youtube even. Then Miyazaki said that his son "was not ready yet" or something like that.

[DanMackison]

Studio Gibli is not known for faithful adaptations, at all. Have you read Howl's Moving Castle? It's a fine movie but has almost nothing in common with the book.

[hankfrance]

Miyazaki spent the entire process basically belittling his sons ability and straight walked out of the premier. He was not a fan of Goro being in charge to say the least

[JoshLeitzel]

You could’ve researched this subject a lot better instead of (unintentionally) spreading some disinformation. Miyazaki himself didn’t hand off the directing duties to his son. It’s well documented that the producer Toshio Suzuki chose his son Goro because he liked his storyboards. Miyazaki was against the decision from the outset due to Goro’s lack of any professional experience or education, which was a big deal for him given the conservative Japanese businessman background he grew out of. They also didn’t lie to LeGuin. She assumed “Miyazaki” directing meant Hayao, instead of his son, and allowed it to be greenlit. Maybe the issue came down to a mistranslation between exchanges or just the general language barrier, but it wasn’t dishonest proposals.

[sefalimahanti]

Really enjoyed Dominic Noble's Wizard of Earthsea Lost in adaptation

[destro]

I’m 43, jaded by a cruel and unforgiving world, and cynical of those who refuse to embrace the chaos of humanity’s slide into obscurity. My Neighbor Totoro fills me with childlike wonder and gives me hope for people, not as a species but that we as individuals can find grace and love in the world around us. 10/10 I want a giant Totoro friend.

[anaiglesias]

Still better than the syfy adaptation but yeah this was mediocrity.

[CasualShinji]

Regarding Hayao Miyazaki, I seem to remember he was actually against his son directing this movie, but it was the producer over at Ghibli that made the choice. Though I can't be sure, because I do know that Hayao Miyazaki made the choice to cast Hideaki Anno in his film The Wind Rises as the lead, when Anno has no voice acting skill at all (I don't care if you can't understand Japanese, you can hear how bad he is compared to the other cast members). And Anno is a close friend of Miyazaki. So he definitely has the potential for favoritism.

[carlwilliams]

8:33 feels like Daniel is passive aggressively showing off his sword collection.

[blake]

and like every earthsea adaptation, they take a bunch of characters explicitly described as POC and make them white.

[RKStumblingbear]

This is how I feel about Studio Ghibli’s Howl’s Moving Castle “adaptation”. It wasn’t really. They took a few characteristics from the book and then created their own story. Especially creating a villain away from the one in the book. I’m not a fan of any recent book adaptations after that. Their own stories, yes, because their visuals are stunning.

[jakesmith]

Le Guin was a genius and deserved to have her books adapted by a genius. This was a travesty. As a sidenote: I really want to hear your thoughts on the rest of the Earthsea series! Whenever a chance arises, I implore you to experience them!

[msclrhd]

The one thing I really like about this film is Teru's Song/Teru no Uta (both the Japanese and English versions). The Japanese singer really captures the emotion of the song.

[leslieg]

Hey, just noticed you hit 200K, congratulations for that! Keep doing what you´re doing as long as you´re loving it (and profit from it), I definitly do.

[CapturedInWords]

Man I was so disappointed with how Studio Ghibli handled Earthsea. I'm a huge Ghibli fan and I actually watched this adaptation before I had even read the Earthsea books, but even when I was unfamiliar with the source material I still felt like it was one of their worst movies. Now after having read Earthsea it's just terrible to see the missed potential. If Miyazaki directed this rather then his son it could have been amazing.
On a side note, I like the sword collection 8:35

[paulbrunetti]

The real wonder of ghibloli depends on the director the masterpieces are when myazaki or takahata are behind the reigns

[JohnPatrickAlexander]

Not sure if you'll see this, but it's kinda neat that I'm the one who recommended this series to you a while ago, and now you're doing this awesome video.
Ursula K. Le Guin is one of my favorite writers. The Earthsea series is truly amazing.

Again, great video, and I'm right there with you on the "Oh ..." of it all.

One quick question, have you read any of the following books as well? Cheers. :)

[wingcastlereads]

Anyone watched Dominic noble's videos on this topic?

[starfleet]

Oh you think this was a bad adaptation? Let me tell you about the Earthsea miniseries.

[StapledArt]

A difference between Hayao and Goro is that Goro based a lot of the art for Earthsea on the motifs from European oil paintings (Goro has commented on this himself). This however is hard to carry over to animation because a lot of oil paintings use light touches with bold colors. This resulted in amazing wide shots and background, but the rest of the animation stands out because of this. (I think one of the greatest examples is a shot of Arren sitting with Sparrowhawk with the city in the background) I also think the whole story surrounding Tales from Earthsea is even sadder because Hayao was in opposition to Goro going into directing, and didn’t have the greatest response to his son’s first movie.