Age of the Geek

I Am Prepared
 
     Last weekend saw the release of one of my most anticipated films of the year. As of writing this, I’ve yet to see “Warcraft,” but my excitement has not been dampened by the 22 percent Rotten Tomatoes rating.
     Yes, a 22 percent rating. A far cry from the 90 percent that “Captain America: Civil War” received and even a smidge lower than the 27 percent of “Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice,” a movie I only watched so I could confirm with my own eyes how bad it actually was.
     So why am I so excited by a movie that’s considered worse than a movie I hate-watched?
     Because even though a lot of people aren’t too keen on the movie, all the right people are. Specifically, fans of the Warcraft video game franchise. By all accounts, Duncan Jones has made that rare gem. A video game adaptation that is actually faithful to the source material.
     It’s strange. Comic book adaptations have made incredible strides towards faithful adaptations in the last decade. No longer do we joke about “blue and yellow spandex.” Today we expect characters and costumes that look like they were lifted straight off the page.
     Hollywood has become more considerate to books as well. Sure the mega-fans out there might bemoan some of the changes made when adapting the Harry Potter or Hunger Games books, but those movies are much more faithful to their source material than anything Stephen Spielberg ever adapted, from “Jaws” to “Jurassic Park.”
     But while adaptations of comic books and novels make up a good chunk of Hollywood’s most successful movies, video game movies have yet to break into the mainstream and the demand for faithful adaptations has never been much of a priority.
      Generally speaking, there are two kinds of video game movies. There are movies that try to adapt the source material, fail and turn out to be terrible. Then there are movies that completely abandon their source material and turn out to be terrible anyway.
     “Warcraft,” as I’ve heard from friends who have already seen it, breaks this pattern with a strong reverence for the source material. Not surprising since the story was written by Chris Metzen, Blizzard’s vice-president of story and franchise development, and the man who crafted much of the game’s lore in the first place.
     Even in the trailer’s I’ve seen, the care taken to properly represent the game has been impressive. Every location shown in the trailer should be recognizable to anybody that has spent a fair amount of time playing “World of Warcraft.” From Stormwind City to the fields of Westfall to poor Lakeshire, the locations in the movie look like they were lifted directly from the game.
     This isn’t just about fan-service. Things like this signify how much care and attention went into creating the film. It would have been easy to take liberties for the sake of time, money or effort, but they didn’t. If you paid to see a Warcraft movie, that’s what you’re going to get.
     In fact, this movie may actually be more faithful to the Warcraft franchise than the game it’s based on.
     The movie depicts the events of what fans know as “The First War,” which was depicted in the 1994 game “Warcraft: Orcs & Humans.” However, as the first game in the franchise, the story wasn’t nearly as fleshed as it would one day become. Much like how Batman’s early days were spent murdering evildoers and Superman originally couldn’t fly, it took a few years for Warcraft to really solidify its story.
     So if you’re still playing “World of Warcraft,” this movie will actually be more in line with the game’s lore than the 1994 game is.
      Now, does any of this mean “Warcraft” will be a good movie? According to director Duncan Jones, about 40 minutes of character work were left on the cutting room floor, which would go a long way towards explaining the lackluster reaction from the general audience critics.
     On the other hand, while domestic critics have been less than enthusiastic, the film is making a mint overseas, so it must be doing something right.
     Is this a movie for fans only? Is there a disconnect between the critics and the general public?
     I do not know, but either way it’ll be a good one for me.
 
     Travis Fischer is a news writer for Mid-America Publishing and is still loyal to the Alliance.