238 – Why Do Story Changes Annoy Us So Much?

About this episode

The episode explores why some story adaptations are well-received while others are criticized, focusing on the importance of context and coherence in storytelling.

Why do some stories work when they play around with the race, gender, or location of a story and its characters, and why are others an annoying mess? It has to do with the basic split between how story adaptations for stage and screen are framed — either the story will be rooted in an immersive realistic setting, where every little detail matters, or it takes place in the Land of Make-Believe, where only the story and the performance matters and an immersive replication of a world and its characters isn’t needed. Too easily the people on both sides of this debate resort to name-calling, focusing on things that don’t matter like debates over race, when what this is really about is whether or not the adaptation makes overall sense and follows its own rules.

People in this episode

Host: T.Q. Townsend

Topics covered

• story adaptations
• race in storytelling
• gender in storytelling
• location in storytelling
• immersive settings
• Land of Make-Believe

Keywords

• story changes
• adaptations
• race
• gender
• location
• immersive storytelling
• narrative coherence

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