☠☠Humans Are Completely Superfluous In The Wings Of Fire Books. Humans Are A Weak Plot Device.

what slugcat a slugcat

It’s the prettiest boy’s day!

I know I'm late to the party but I just watched Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe and I have a LOT of thoughts.

I think this was a terrible adaptation.

I think it was a beautifully produced and well acted movie, and maybe without having read the book it would have been fine, but no matter how hard I tried I couldn't separate it from its source material because some of the changes were just horrible.

I know you can't keep everything in, that's fine. You cut some things, you rearrange some stuff, you fit within your runtime. But why change some of the most crucial/beautiful moments? I have a long, long list of quotes that were either removed or just horribly altered/misplaced and it's so disappointing.

Getting rid of Mrs. Quintana grasping Ari's face and saying, "Aristotle Mendoza, I will love you forever" is so sad. Changing what Gina said, that Ari says is the "nicest thing you ever said to me" to be something totally mundane (essentially changed "you got hunkier" to "you look different") is just an odd choice. But changing the way Ari reacts to kissing Dante? That's horrible.

Ari was done horribly in this movie, I'm sorry. The actor did great and he was lovely in certain moments, but they took out what made him shine. I have a friend who said they didn't like the book because Dante deserved so much better, and I disagreed. Book Ari has moments where he's an asshole, but at his core he is a kind and loving boy who is grateful and appreciative. Film Ari is a sometimes sweet boy who is more often than not just rude.

I can understand some changes have to be made when adapting a first person POV novel, that's fair, but you can absolutely use body language and other visual cues to give insight. This is especially clear with Ari's dad, who in the book is understandably difficult for Ari to get along with. He's distant and intimidating and doesn't want to be open. But in the movie he just seems like a sad dad trying his best to talk to his teenage son, and Ari is completely rude and cold to him for no apparent reason! Film Ari does not thank or hug his parents when they give him a car. Film Ari does not say goodnight to his father or listen when his father wants to show him a painting. Idk exactly how that all plays out in the book since I forget a lot, but the important thing is that all we are shown is his father trying and Ari being rude in response. His motivation is unclear and his behavior is selfish.

Now, one of the biggest crimes is what happens in the truck after Dante and Ari kiss. First off, change of location from Dante's room to the truck ... Okay sure. But I have no idea how you can first off, totally alter this scene and omit a very important quote:

"I don’t kiss boys.” “Okay, so the first rule is: No trying to kiss Ari.”

"You have the harder rule? Buffalo shit... I, on the other hand, have to refrain from kissing the greatest guy in the universe—which is like walking barefoot on hot coals." (Pgs 256-257)

And then completely and entirely warp this scene:

So I closed my eyes.

And he kissed me. And I kissed him back.

And then he started really kissing me. And I pulled away.

"Well?" he said.

"Didn't work for me," I said.

"Nothing?"

"Nope."

"Okay. It sure worked for me."

"Yeah. I think I get that, Dante."

"So, well, that's over with then, huh?"

"Yeah."

"Are you mad at me?"

"A little."

He sat back down on his bed. He looked sad. I didn't like seeing him that way. "I'm more mad at myself," I said. "I always let you talk me into things. It's not your fault."

"Yeah," he whispered.

"Don't cry, okay?"

"Okay," he said.

"You're crying."

"I'm not."

"Okay."

"Okay." (Pgs. 263-264)

HOW do you turn that into Ari calling Dante disgusting and screaming at him to get the fuck out of his car??? That's the fucking breaking point for me, because Ari is a lot of things, but an outright aggressive homophobe is not one of them. Maybe I'm forgetting, and maybe something similar happens later and they just rearranged it. But I know for a FACT that Ari NEVER calls Dante disgusting. Never. Because the word disgusting appears once in this book and Gina says it to Ari. That's it, not a single other usage.

That's what broke it for me, even though I had a lot of issues with other parts (Ari not saying thank you about the truck, removing the shoe-throwing game, getting rid of so much important dialogue, etc.) THIS is the thing that was unacceptable because even when Ari was mad at Dante, he didn't hurt him. He didn't immediately go back on his loyalty he'd just sworn, to stay by Dante even though he's gay. He didn't scream at him or curse him.

But I also just couldn't stand how much of the beautiful writing was completely removed. I love that book because it's poetic and full of quips and oddities. Dante in the movie is cute and sweet, but the oddest thing shown about him is that he wears silly sunglasses. We're told he's weird, and get little glimpse of it, but the heart of Dante is not there. In the book he feels a little mystified and hard to fully grasp, but in the movie he's just... There. A shell, almost. He's still lovable, but he's not wholly Dante. It's like an afterimage of Dante, which is impressive because he was very personable in the movie, but that just shows how enchanting Dante is in the book. He's hard to pin down, but he's not hollow. I think a big issue was that a lot of the time, Dante seemed hurt by Ari. Genuinely disheartened, rather than laughing it off until he couldn't anymore, he was kind of just sad? I don't know. We had the bones of something beautiful with this movie, really, but they just didn't do it right.

Again, the loss of the poeticism and the changes to Ari are what hurt it the most. Movie Ari has very sweet moments where the book character shines through, but he takes himself too seriously in a way where it feels like we're supposed to as well. Ari is lame! He's an awkward teenager with a lot of angst because he's figuring things out and struggling to find his place in the universe, but movie Ari isn't that at all. He's just brooding and downright mean at times. His reactions to the things around him were so hollow and uncaring, and maybe that's how he looked from the outside, but again, this story was not told from the outside and completely loses it's effect when you can't tell what he's feeling or thinking because he just seems mad or disinterested. Not all the time, there were some incredible scenes. I loved him talking with his parents after he beat up Julian. I loved the final scene with the kiss. I think his reaction worked well when hearing about his aunt's girlfriend. But damnit that was lost to me the moment he called the most brilliant boy he'd ever met "disgusting."

Overall, I don't regret watching the movie and I loved some of the scenes and think the music and atmosphere were great. But I'm heartbroken over the fact that so much of the nuance was completely lost. Even if there was some nuance present in the movie, it was far, far less than in the book.

(Less structured bonus points because this rant was messy enough but I have more to say): Dante told him not to open the sketchbook until he was gone. In the movie Ari opened it right up and made a kind of rude comment. Next: so many important bonding moments were removed. Dante giving Ari a sponge bath and them visiting with each other every day Ari was in the hospital. The shoes were significantly played down to the point where the sentimentality of the little shoes was almost lost. Also: The letters were so entirely diminished. And: Ari's brother killed two people, not just the trans woman but also someone in jail. Bro I haven't read this book in multiple years and I'm able to recount this much, I don't even want to think about how glaringly off it all is when I've read the whole book to compare. (If any of my points were wrong, I blame this. But I'm pretty sure most of them are right.)

I loved the end of the movie tho lol I'm always a sucker for a sweet scene and Dante's actor killed it with the eye acting in that scene, the emotions were palpable.

that fucking crab that i hate

Consider!!

the gang's all here

”you can just make an oc” you dont understand anything. the character needs to mutate naturally until unrecognizable. like all evolutionary processes it takes time. you can’t force it or it doesn’t take. you must endure weird ooc thematically discordant versions of a guy until they bud off into beautiful new life. have patience

peble

I think a lot about how we as a culture have turned “forever” into the only acceptable definition of success.

Like… if you open a coffee shop and run it for a while and it makes you happy but then stuff gets too expensive and stressful and you want to do something else so you close it, it’s a “failed” business. If you write a book or two, then decide that you don’t actually want to keep doing that, you’re a “failed” writer. If you marry someone, and that marriage is good for a while, and then stops working and you get divorced, it’s a “failed” marriage.

The only acceptable “win condition” is “you keep doing that thing forever”. A friendship that lasts for a few years but then its time is done and you move on is considered less valuable or not a “real” friendship. A hobby that you do for a while and then are done with is a “phase” - or, alternatively, a “pity” that you don’t do that thing any more. A fandom is “dying” because people have had a lot of fun with it but are now moving on to other things.

I just think that something can be good, and also end, and that thing was still good. And it’s okay to be sad that it ended, too. But the idea that anything that ends is automatically less than this hypothetical eternal state of success… I don’t think that’s doing us any good at all.