Two Different Mediums, Two Different Stories

I love books. I love movies. I love movies/tv shows based upon books (even if those books are graphic novels). I am a huge fan of reading the books before taking the time to watch the movie or tv show. I do this because I like my mind to develop its own way of telling the story, creating the setting, and developing the characters before I see Hollywood’s depiction of these settings, the characters, the story as a whole. In terms of The Walking Dead, we’ve now examined two different mediums in which the story has been presented to us. We’ve spent a little time discussing which medium is better, and which tells the story more effectively for us, but I kind of see the argument as pointless. No form of the storytelling, to me, seems better than the other, and each of these two stories are exactly that—two different stories. Let me explain.

When I watched the show I was thrilled by everything it presented to me. I think the show picked on all of my senses. The music, the visuals, the story as a whole, intrigued me and pulled me in. It started off as a story about Rick, but even within those two first episodes it developed into a story about the whole group of human survivors left living within a universe in which a zombie apocalypse has taken place. In the tv show, Rick has been depicted as an upstanding, Western hero. He is the man who takes charge and has looked at the new situation he has been placed in and is going to live with his morals in-tact and strive to be a good and hard-working man in this new apocalyptic world.

When I read the graphic novel, I really got the story of Rick Grimes making his way in a world that has been overcome by a zombie apocalypse. In this story he has been depicted as a much more confused and struggling man who happens to be a Sheriff and is just trying to do what’s best for him, his family, and the rest of the survivors. The graphic novel grabbed my attention by presenting the story in a new and different way. It allowed my imagination to fill the scenes and characters with their own personalities that my mind developed for them. The graphic novel leaves the characters and scenes vague enough that my mind can take what has been given to me and run with them. I love that.

These two different depictions of the same general tale are alike and different in so any ways. The differences between the two texts are so large that I see them as two separate stories. Neither text tells the exact same story. One has an entire tank scene that the other does not have. One has Shane dying where the other one hasn’t gotten to that yet (even after the first season comes to a close). I can say the same thing of many of my favorite book series that have been turned into movies, movie franchises, or tv shows. The transition from text to the big screen changes so many of the elements of the story that I no longer see them as the same thing. If you want some examples you should take a look at The Vampire Diaries, Vampire Academy, The Mortal Instruments, or True Blood. This is something that as a class we are overlooking. We are looking at these two texts as if they are the exact same, and I see them as two separate texts telling two separate stories. In fact, it was extremely well-put by Craig the other day in class—the graphic novel tells the story of Rick Grimes while the show tells the story of a whole group of survivors set in the same universe.