Fairy Tale Roundup: Everything Comic-Con and a Sci-Fi Snow White Movie!

Oh geeze Comic-Con. Why you gotta have all this stuff coming out right now? Quick round up of Comic-Con and other things, mostly gathered, curated and analyzed by the lovely Once Upon a Blog.



The Fairy Tale Comic-Con Line Up
First, fairy tales were well represented at Comic Con this year! Sure you had OUAT and it's spin off, and Grimm, and the CW's Beauty and the Beast, but you also had some beautiful fairy tale artists featured, the disturbing toy series Ever After High, and the sexy and gory Grimm Fairy Tales animated series which I don't know whether to squee about, or shake my fist in feminist rage. Click the link to see the rest!

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Once Upon a Time in Wonderland
OUATW..which is a weird acronym....and it's 19 minutes of footage shown at Con seems to have had a positive response from Io9. "Gorgeous, fun, and scary" is certainly more than I had hoped for! Especially with the confectionery CGI in OUAT. (Click the link for details of the footage). It now is a mash up of Alice in Wonderland and Aladdin, which are two worlds I never would have thought to put together. Naveen Andrews (Sayid from Lost, yes, but I do love him as Balraj in Bride and Prejudice: click to see him singing and dancing) is going to play Jafar. This means that, as promicing as the premise of OUATW is, diverging from the Disney Alice, we will definitely still see Disney influence in the other worlds they promise. Sadface. See more of my sadface in the next item.

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OUAT: Neverland and The Little Mermaid

In regular OUAT, our heroes and villains have all banded together to save Henry. Why? I do not know. I feel like they need to stop hanging their seasons on a character that no one really cares about. Peter Pan will be non-traditional, as we have seen bits of, which is thrilling! Way to not just tell the Disney version! Though we do have Rufio as one of the lost boys. And we have this little gem:

Why you gotta be like that, OUAT? It's still the same schizophrenic show: half dark new spins on fairy tales (shadow Peter Pan, Little Red as the Wolf) and half Disney advertisement. I wouldn't be so frustrated with it if it didn't simply reinforce that the Disney versions are the only versions of these tales. Of course the Little Mermaid is a redhead named Ariel. Isn't that how it is in the original? Grumble, grumble. 

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Robert Downey Jr's Pinocchio

Once Upon a Blog rises to the occasion yet again, and digs up some really juicy stuff about RDJ's Pinocchio: the conflicts in development and speculation on the content of the movie. Thanks for the shout out, friend! I only have the Disney version of Pinocchio for reference (hypocrite much, Megan?) and sad to say I remember not liking it very much. But looking back on simply the plot itself, there is so much to mine about what it means to be a person, father/son relationships, giving in to temptation, selflessness, all of that. Once Upon a Blog supplements the analysis with really beautiful illustrations by Roberto Innocenti that highlight a darker dimension to Pinocchio that I never new existed. 

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Jupiter Ascending: A Sci-Fi Snow White Movie

At last! An outside-the-box fairy tale movie adaptation! Here, I cannot quibble with deviation from the main story, because they are using the Snow White tale to inform a new narrative...IN SPACE! The movie is said to be "the Snow White fairytale fused with Japanese pop culture in a sci-fi and futuristic mythological masterpiece" directed by the Wachowski’s  (The Matrix and Cloud Atlas). So you know it is going to be trippy and awesome.

"Jupiter Jones (Kunis) was born under a night sky, with signs predicting that she was destined for great things. Now grown, Jupiter dreams of the stars but wakes up to the cold reality of a job cleaning toilets and an endless run of bad breaks. Only when Caine (Tatum), a genetically engineered ex-military hunter, arrives on Earth to track her down does Jupiter begin to glimpse the fate that has been waiting for her all along – her genetic signature marks her as next in line for an extraordinary inheritance that could alter the balance of the cosmos."

Channing Tatum is a...ahem... "hybrid wolf and human. And half albino." That is crazy and awesome and I love it. And Sean Bean is in it too! 50 bucks says he'll die.

The design stuff looks amazing too! "The costumes and makeup on some of the extras look like 17th century French royalty that had their clothes tailored in Southeast Asia. " They claim to be doing filmic things that have never been done before, and the stunts are all real, not CGI. Not sure I am cool with the, "I want you to have sex with me in an alley" promo images, but we shall see! Click the link for more info, pictures, and Once Upon a Blog's thoughts.

Fairy Tale Roundup: NPR's Ted Radio Hour Explores Storytelling, Vincent Cassell's Beauty and the Beast Movie, Bluebeard and Rape Culture, and a One Thousand and One Nights Adaptation

“Barbe Bleue” by Sorsha

NPR's Ted Radio Hour: Framing the Story
While this is not strictly about fairy tales, NPR's Ted Radio Hour is amazing. This one has several Ted talkers exploring what a story is, how to tell a story, and what is important for a story. Andrew Stanton (the main writer for Pixar), discusses what makes a good story. Tracy Chevalier (writer of Girl with the Pearl Earring) tells how she finds a story in an image. Chip Kidd (book cover creator - Jurassic Park and others) talks about how book covers tell their own story. Chimamanda Adichie (Nigerian author) elegantly examines the dangers of s single story (hearing one story about a place or a person and thinking it is the whole picture (my favorite!)

First Look at Christophe Gans' Beauty & the Beast: "I'll Eat You Up I Love You So"
Once Upon a Blog gives us a first glimpse of the crazy sounding Christophe Gans' Beauty and the Beast. This is the one with Vincent Cassel, not the Disney one with Emma Watson. The image and costumes look traditional, and not very revolutionary, but Gans promises to "surprise the audience by creating a completely new visual universe never experienced before and produce images of an unparalleled quality." It is adapted from the original novella written by Madame de Villeneuve in 1740, rather than the children's version published in 1760. While many novel adaptations have used the novella as inspiration (Beauty by Robin McKinley), apparently this is the first time it has been adapted for the screen. Check out the link for some insightful thoughts from Gypsy.

Of Keys & Bluebeards
Gypsy of Once Upon a Blog reflects on a blog post from by fantasy writer and fairy tale lecturer Theodora Goss, "On Bluebeard" on how men and women will often perceive situations differently. What men may perceive as an easy conversation, women may perceive as a potential threat. Gypsy examines the post in the larger cultural context, and then looks at the situation through the lens of fairy tales:

"Girls and women are taught from an early age to be cautious: "Stay on the path", "Don't talk to strangers" and, unfortunately, this is still the smart thing to do. "Wolves" are bad enough. "Bluebeards" (and Mr. Fox characters) are downright terrifying." 

Not all women may feel this way, but in our current cultural climate, I would not blame them if they did. Walking home late at night, I have often looked at the man following me from the metro as a potential threat, even if he looks like a nice guy. You never want to be wrong. It is unfortunate that fear has made women adopt a "Better Safe than Sorry" stance. Even more unfortunate that Bluebeard and Little Red Riding Hood are still very relevant today.

EDIT: Heidi at SurLaLune has added to the conversation and provided several Bluebeard resources for further reading.

Scheherazade: From Storytelling 'Slave' To 'First Feminist'
To end this on a positive note, here is an NPR interview with Hanan al-Shaykh who has written a new adaptation of One Thousand and One Nights, in which Scheherazade outwits her own Bluebeard figure, the king. The stories she chose to adapt involve women using their wits to survive.

Movies: More Fairy Tale Adaptations in the Works

Hailee Steinfield in True Grit and Saoirse Ronan in Hanna

The Telegraph recently posted an article about the fairy tale movie phenomenon, and teased us with other fairy tale and children's book adaptations in the works, an additional "Snow White," two more "Sleeping Beauties," three Peter Pans, two "Cinderellas," one "Beauty and the Beast," one "Little Mermaid," one "Jack the Giant Killer", one "Hansel and Gretel," one Oz, and one "Arabian Nights." And a partridge in a pear tree.:

"Disappointingly, it could then be another 18 months before a third film based on Snow White is released, although Disney plans to have The Order of the Seven, it own loose adaptation of the tale, in cinemas before the end of 2013. The premise should appeal to anyone who liked the Seven Dwarfs but only wished they were taller and more violent: here, they are an elite fighting unit of average height who come to the rescue of a banished English maiden in 19th-century China.

While Snow White gets three films, Sleeping Beauty, Peter Pan and Cinderella have to make to with two apiece. Hailee Steinfeld, the 15-year-old actress nominated for an Oscar for her role in True Grit, is attached to a feminist take on Sleeping Beauty in which the princess Aurora fights her own way out of the dream world rather than waiting for a handsome prince to pucker up. Meanwhile, Angelina Jolie will play the wicked queen in Maleficent, a reworked version of the Disney animation, told from the villainess’s point of view.

Then there’s Pan, which recasts JM Barrie’s boy who never grew up as a baby-faced kidnapper pursued by Detective Captain James Hook, played by Aaron Eckhart. And indeed Peter Pan Begins, which reveals that the hero and his one-handed nemesis are in fact estranged brothers, with the former fashion model Channing Tatum attached to play either Peter, or Hook, or possibly both. A third script for a Twilight-inspired take on the story called The.Never.Land is currently unoptioned, but the threat remains that it may yet be made.
A live-action version of Cinderella has been developed for Disney by Aline Brosh McKenna, the writer of The Devil Wears Prada, which itself was a modern-day Cinderella story of sorts. When news of this adaptation broke, Universal instantly announced that it too was working on its own production.

This is not The End. Emma Watson was recently cast in a new version of Beauty and the Beast. Joe Wright, whose thriller Hanna was dotted with references to Red Riding Hood, is planning a live-action Little Mermaid. Bryan Singer’s take on Jack The Giant Killer, starring Nicholas Hoult, will be released in the 2013 post-Oscar lull, which does not bode well. The Will Ferrell-produced Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters will star Jeremy Renner and Gemma Arterton, which does.

Sam Raimi’s Oz: the Great And Powerful boasts James Franco as a young version of L Frank Baum’s Wizard. Chuck Russell’s Arabian Nights boasts former wrestler Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson as Sinbad. The combinations of stars, plots and settings sound like the results of a strange Hollywood parlour game. “Liam Neeson as Rumpelstiltskin, in an action thriller! Justin Bieber as the Clever Little Tailor, in space!” (Full Article)

While I am extremely excited for all of these, who wants to sign a petition for a movie adaptation of "The Goose Girl"? Or "Wild Swans"? Or "DonkeySkin"? Or "Twelve Dancing Princesses"? Or "East of the Sun and West of the Moon"? I think the movie producers need to delve a little to come up with fairy tale movies that have not been over done.

But I am a bit giddy about the Sleeping Beauty adaptation with Hailee Steinfeld. That girl can do no wrong. And I will watch Saoirse Ronan (the lead in Order of Seven) read a phone book.

Music: Scheherazade's Playlist from Flavorwire

(From Zazzle)

Flavorwire has, yet again, given us a wonderful fictional character playlist. This is the music they think Scheherazade from The Arabian Nights would have listened to:

Listen to the Playlist.

“The Circle Game” — Joni Mitchell
Many of the stories within the One Thousand and One Nights revolve around the inevitability of fate, so we think Scheherazade would appreciate Joni Mitchell cooing that we’re all “captive on the carousel of time.”

“The Mariner’s Revenge Song” — The Decemberists
This captivating sea ballad, the story of a son avenging the wrong done to his mother by a roustabout mixed with Moby Dick, would keep us on tenterhooks if it was stopped in the middle, too.

“Holland, 1945″ — Neutral Milk Hotel
Not only would we argue that any girl who’s well-read and well-bred as well as wise and witty should be into Neutral Milk Hotel, this song is the jewel of the album Jeff Mangum wrote after reading Anne Frank’s Diary of a Young Girl and beginning every night to dream of rescuing her via time machine. Not only would that be a good story, but we think Scheherazade’s diary would be just as inspiring.

“Alice’s Restaurant” — Arlo Guthrie
This 18-minute talking song is one of the greats. It’s a lot of Arlo Guthrie talking and only a little bit of a song, but we don’t think Scheherazade would mind. After all, every minute counts.

"First Few Desperate Hours” — The Mountain Goats
The album from which this song is plucked, Tallahassee, would surely be on heavy rotation on Scheherazade’s iPod. While strains of the story of the Alpha couple ran through The Mountain Goats’ songs until this point, Tallahassee was completely devoted to them, telling the final story of their dissolution. We think, as a lover and master teller of stories herself, Scheherazade would love to pick through the lyrics and piece together the tale — and then, maybe, tell it.

“Lifter Puller vs. The End of the Evening” — Lifter Puller
Another song from a narrative concept album, this time about all the punks who hang out at the Nice, Nice. But we think Scheherazade would be most drawn to this track, just for the idea of it — after all, it’s always Scheherazade vs. the End of the Evening, when that means the end of her life.

“A Boy Named Sue” — Johnny Cash
One of the most well-known narrative songs of all time by an inarguable master, we think our girl would definitely have to give it a listen or two.

“Long-Forgotten Fairytale” — The Magnetic Fields
The Magnetic Fields are masters of the anecdote, but this song seems more like the song of Scheherazade falling in love with her captor king than a tale of others that she might tell. Or maybe it’s both at once, the colors blurring.

“Sometimes I Forget” — Loudon Wainwright III
Another one of the confessional songwriting greats, this sad song is a perfect subtle story of loss and heartbreak. After all, not all stories can be happy ones. (Full Article)