I have to agree on POA I love the back story with the marauders and all that. Azkaban is my favorite Harry Potter book, along with Goblet aof Fire, despite the movies kinda ruining both of those.
Seems like people either love or hate the Azkaban movie. I love it; I think it has great atmosphere/cinematography. I absolutely hate the ending shot, and I think the Marauders climax is rushed, but otherwise I think it's one of the better movies. Goblet of Fire feels rushed, but that book is just so long, it was impossible to pack it all in to under 2.5 hours and make it satisfying. My favorite of the movies is DH Part 2, followed by Half-Blood Prince and Azkaban.
Do you guys define a series just more than one story/book? I usually don’t really consider anything a series unless there are at least three books/stories.
I think when a book ends up being incredibly popular, there’s always a push to get the author to write either a sequel or a prequel. I’m sure when the money is dangling in front of them it’s hard to say no. I know I succumbed to pressure to write the sequels to Mizpah because of all the positive feedback I was getting and the demands for more. I wish I didn’t do it. I didn’t even get paid for it!
I’m also curious when it comes to movie adaptions. If some of these authors give creative rights to people when they see dollar signs only to have the screen writer massacre their book by changing really important plot points etc... cough...my sister’s keeper...cough .
3+ makes it feel more like a series, but I guess I consider anything with multiple books to be a series. Is there a better word for a book and its sequel?
I'm sure money is a big factor in authors' decisions to write more books in a series, just like with movie sequels. As far as movie adaptations, I think I would demand creative control if someone wanted to buy the rights to my book. I would want to be one of the producers and have a say in the script.
Interestingly, though, there are some authors who are okay with huge changes between their book and the movie - in fact, some authors even instigate those changes themselves. I love both the book and movie version of "The Ruins" by Scott Smith - I just reread it last summer, actually, and learned that the author also wrote the screenplay for the movie, which has a ton of changes from the book. The basic plot is the same, but the ending is different, and he switched up what happened to the characters, so the same events happen but to different people. It's horror, so I guess he wanted to keep people who had read the book first guessing when they watched the movie, and vice versa. "The Walking Dead" is the same way - the show follows the same basic storyline as the comic it's based on, and the author is one of the executive producers of the show, but he allows them to switch up what happens to characters to keep people who are already familiar with the comic on their toes. No character is safe, even if they made it to the end of the comic.