Blandaptations — The Farthest Shore & Tehanu → Tales of Earthsea

At least they got the human-to-dragon scale right.

Hey! Remember a couple weeks ago when I talked about how much the old Hallmark/Sci-Fi Channel miniseries based on Earthsea? Well, now I'm gonna talk about how Studio Ghibli donked up their Earthsea adaptation! SPOILERS, of course.

The Farthest Shore (1972) & Tehanu (1990) by Ursula K. Le Guin (with a little bit of Tales of Earthsea (2001) & The Other Wind (2001) thrown in for good measure) into Tales of Earthsea (ゲド戦記 or Gedo Senki) dir. Gorō Miyazaki, written by Gorō Miyazaki and Keiko Niwa

What gives? Studio Ghibli and Ursula K. Le Guin seem like two great tastes that should taste great together. Heck, if Teto (Nausicaa's pet fox-squirrel) isn't inspired by Ged's pet otak, I'll eat my hat (Please note: I will not eat my hat).

The Original: All right, let's get this show on the road. The film borrows a good deal more from The Farthest Shore than Tehanu, so I'll focus a little more on that.

Well, it's been about twenty-five years since Ged and Tenar sailed triumphantly into Havnor Bay and restored the Rune of Peace. But there's a problem, there's still no one on the throne and political power still rests mainly in the hands of the Archmage of Roke. Who happens to be Ged, usually called Sparrowhawk. That's why Prince Arren of Enlad has shown up at the magic school. Sorcerers and wizards on Enlad and other islands are forgetting the Art Magic and the Language of Creation. People are falling into despair, dragons are going feral, chanters can't remember songs, etc. So Sparrowhawk takes Arren under his wing (I'm not sorry) and sets sail with the young prince on his boat Lookfar. Oh, also, Arren is carrying a sword that is portentously mentioned not to have been drawn from its sheath in a long time.

They sail south to Hort Town where Ged is drugged by a former wizard and Arren is sold into slavery. Don't worry, Ged rescues him from the slave ship and they now know that a wizard has been promising magic users and other skilled craftsmen immortality. Unfortunately, whatever it is he does to impart this to them also depletes their skills. The same thing's happening on Lorbanery where silk dyers find that their colors aren't as vibrant. As their search begins to seem futile, Sparrowhawk and Arren find themselves adrift at sea, farther south than any reasonable person would sail.

Arren finds himself fearful and suspicious of the archmage. In Arren's defense, Sparrowhawk is aloof and uncommunicative. Partly because they're running low on supplies. In any case, they encounter they raft people who help them and nurse them back to health. See, the raft people normal drift in the Southern Reaches in their house boats, but they've come together for an annual festival. Unfortunately, the singers can't remember their song so Arren sings in their place.

Just when it seems their quest has failed, Sparrowhawk is visited by the dragon Orm Embar who encourages him to sail west to help the dragons who, as mentioned, are going feral. So that's what they do. While they do manage to make it to the far western isle of Selidor — and Ged reveals his true name to Arren — they're too late, Orm Embar has forgotten how to speak. But they do come across the wizard who's been causing all this trouble.

Ged recognizes Cob, a wizard he'd already defeated, but it turns out that Cob's been reading up on his Pelnish Lore (you may remember that this is the very lore Ged used to summon the Shadow back in A Wizard of Earthsea), anyway, he's opened up a door between the Dry Lands and the world of the living; which, you know, could be problematic. Orm Embar attempts to kill Cob but is killed himself, and an injured Cob flees into the Dry Lands. Ged and Arren (sword drawn) chase after him. And as they reckon with how bleak the afterlife is, Ged confesses that they've come too far to go back the way they came.

Don't worry, though, they can technically return by passing over the Mountains of Pain. In the foothills of said mountains, they confront Cob, and while Ged is able to defeat him and close the portal back to the world of the living, he sacrifices all of his power to do so. Arren is able to haul himself and Ged back to the land of the living where Kalessin, the oldest dragon, is waiting to fly them back to Roke. Ged is able to summon the strength to do two things: A) proclaim Arren — whose true name is Lebannen — fit to sit on the throne in Havnor; 2) and resign as archmage (you know, cause he can't do magic anymore) before he flies off to Gont. Lebannen tries to summon Ged for his coronation, but his entreaties are unsuccessful.

"What's Tenar been up to since The Tombs of Atuan?" you might ask. "Getting into all sorts of adventures," you might hope to hear me say. No. She's been living on Gont, a stranger in a strange land, so to speak. Although she did make an attempt to learn magic from Ogion, she found herself longing for the sort of normal life she'd been deprived of at the Place. So, here she is, a farmer's widow and mother of two grown children when three things happen: 1) she adopts Therru, a young girl who's been beaten, abused, and severely burned by her family; B) Ogion summons her to witness his death and hear his true name; and then 三) Ged shows up on Kalessin's back, giving Tenar a second person to nurse back to health. This book is quite good, but it's definitely more about Tenar's internal journey than it is about external events. So, you already know most of what you need to in order to understand Tales of Earthsea. But just for fun here're a few of the things that happen: Ged returns to his boyhood occupation of goatherd; Ogion's replacement curses Tenar, Tenar makes Therru a pretty red dress, early on in the book, Ogion tells an ominous story about a woman who could change into a Dragon, Ged and Tenar discuss a star that is named Tehanu in the Kargad Empire. One of those details will be very important in the movie. I'll let you figure out which one. Anyway, I just want to say that my favorite thing about the book is the way it questions the status quo of the first three books without invalidating them. It actually makes the series stronger.

The Remake: For the first time in centuries, one dragon kills another. And it's pretty graphic for a Ghibli movie, too. Anyway, this is big news at court in Enlad, but somewhat overshadowed by the fact that Prince Arren murders his father (the king, duh!) one night and steals his sword, which has been magically sealed in its sheath.

While he's wondering the desert, he's set upon by wolves who are dispersed by an older man with a scarred face named Sparrowhawk. It turns out that he's the Archmage and he's on the way to Hort Town in order to figure out why the world's balance is out of whack, so they walk there together. In Hort Town, Arren saves a silent, scarred girl named Therru from slavers who capture him instead and throw his sword in the sea. Don't worry, Sparrowhawk saves him from slavery, and is able to buy his sword back from a merchant soon afterward.

In the meantime, Sparrowhawk thinks Arren should lay low. So, Sparrowhawk takes him to a farm kept up by a woman named Tenar. Arren is surprised to find Therru there as well. In any case, Sparrowhawk also has to lay low because the lord of Hort Town is an evil wizard named Cob who's managed to upset the balance of magic. However, he also has to go into town to do some reconnaissance.

While he's gone, Arren confesses to Therru that he's killed his father and that there's some sort of dark entity shadowing him. He runs away from this entity — which takes his physical form — and encounters Cob. Meanwhile, Cob's men capture Tenar and leave Therru behind to tell Sparrowhawk so he'll come to Cob's castle.

When Sparrowhawk confronts Cob, the dark wizard reveals two things: A) he's opened a rift between life and death in an effort to live forever, and 2) he knows Arren's true name, Lebannen, and commands him to kill Sparrowhawk. Sparrowhawk is able to free Arren from Cob's control, but is captured. Meanwhile, Therru encounter's Arren's double and follows it to Cob's castle, where the double reveals itself to be Arren's inner light.

Everyone makes their way to the castle where Cob plans to execute Sparrowhawk and Tenar. Therru gives Arren a peptalk, calls him by his true name, and reveals to him that her true name is Tehanu. Together they confront Cob. Arren is able to unsheath the sword and cut off Cob's staff hand, but Cob still tries to kill Therru, who turns into a dragon and burns him to death.

At this point the viewer might be a little confused, but Sparrowhawk and Tenar seem to be following everything just fine. In any case, Arren goes back to Enlad with Sparrowhawk to face the consequences of his crimes (which, you may recall, include both patricide and regicide), but Therru'll probably see him again (questionable, given that the crimes he'll be punished for include patricide and regicide). The movie ends with a montage of the four leads happily walking back to Tenar's farm.

Fidelity to Source Material: This is a fairly loose adaptation. Sure, the characters are all there, and Ged and Tenar are recognizably themselves. However, as far as the story goes, Ghibli mixed together elements of several Earthsea books (mostly The Farthest Shore and Tehanu  but there are some ideas from Tales from Earthsea and The Other Wind in there as well) and synthesized them into something . . . different. The results are mixed and we'll talk about that below.

Smart Changes: Umm. . . well, I guess maybe it is kind of a clever twist on A Wizard of Earthsea to have Arren followed around by the personification of his own goodness. Also, incorporating ideas from Tehanu into the story of The Farthest Shore isn't a terrible concept in and of itself.

Stupid Changes: We'll just get the big one out of the way first. So, you probably noticed that instead of sailing everywhere like in the book, Ged and Arren walk everywhere. That's right, in a movie set in a place called Earthsea the characters don't actually go anywhere by boat (well, the dragon fight at the start of the movie is witnessed by sailors). Hort Town has a harbor, but even when Arren is kidnapped into slavery, he's carted out of town on a slave wagon. This might seem like a minor issue, but the image of Arren and Ged adrift at sea is a clear metaphor for the ways in which the characters find themselves adrift within themselves. A little on the nose maybe, but the film never finds a suitable visual substitute.

In addition to this change of setting, this also makes the same big mistake we saw in the Hallmark/Sci-Fi Channel version. Everyone's really pale. Well, Ged does have a darker skin tone than other characters (except for his scar, which is a nice touch), but there's not really any major character in the movie who is visibly non-white. The only white character in the books this film adapts is Tenar (she's even called the White Lady of Gont because she's the only white person on the island). And sure, the movie mostly takes place on one (apparently not very large) landmass, which just compounds the problem introduced in the change of setting by making the world seem smaller and less diverse.

Then there's Cob. Cob isn't described much in the books, so Ghibli had pretty free reign on his appearance. Not only is he super-pale, he's also really fey and androgynous. When combined with his interest in Arren, this makes him into less of a scary evil sorcerer and more into an ugly stereotype of a predatory LGBTQ+ person. And also, if Ged has already defeated him, and he's trying to lie low and take his revenge, why is he keeping such a high profile?

Also, why did Arren kill his father? I mean, to steal the sword obviously. But Arren's story begins with a shocking act of violence that the movie just doesn't seem interested in exploring. And given that this is drastically different from the book, it seems like there should be some purpose for the change. Instead, it seems like it's mainly meant to serve as a tool to give Arren angst. But he's a teenager, he doesn't need some external source for his angst, it's already there. Also, you know, the whole magic disappearing thing already serves as a catalyst for the quest. The patri-/regicide just serves as an unnecessary plot complication.

And while there are a lot of other little things I could nitpick, I'll end this one by talking about Therru. So, they've aged Therru up to be a love interest for Arren. They've also very much scaled back the extent of her burn scars. In Tehanu and The Other Wind, it's clear that Therru's scarring (and lung damage from smoke inhalation) are debilitating: one of her eyes is completely burned out, one hand is claw-like. But in Tales from Earthsea there are just some cleanly defined pink patches of skin. And while it makes sense to make her less impaired given her more active role in the story, it also minimizes the impact of her trauma and abuse to make her visibly less deformed by what happened to her.

Why it kinda works: I'll be honest, the movie does kinda work. At the risk of damning it with faint praise, it's the best movie adaptation of the Earthsea stories. But there are some things that work in its favor.

As one would expect from a Ghibli film, the animation is well done. The fight between the dragons that opens the movie is exciting and it's cool to see the scene from the book where Ged transforms his face play out on screen. It may not be the studio's best work, but Gorō Miyazaki comes out looking at least passable as a director.

Tone is the one thing that the movie actually kinda nails. You could say that the movie's a little boring. I know I definitely would. But it's also contemplative. There are a lot of moments where Gorō Miyazaki lets the story and the characters be still so that the audience can sit and think about what they're watching. This is actually pretty in keeping with The Farthest Shore which is a seafaring adventure that also features several scenes where Ged and Arren are adrift and Arren simply thinks about his current state. Likewise, most of Tehanu sees Tenar thinking or talking through her situation, there's very little action.  While this doesn't always make for an exciting movie, it is a valid adaptational choice.

I'll also admit that the change in setting from a vast archipelago to a single island does make some sense, at least from the point of view of adaptation. Repeated scenes of Ged and Arren on a boat without access to Arren's internal monologue might not play out as well on screen as on the page.

So yeah, those are the adaptation's strengths: solid animation, an understanding of the story's tone, and a willingness to cut out material that might not play well in a movie.

Why it kinda doesn't: Unfortunately, even with its good qualities, it kinda doesn't work. There are a few reasons for this.

So, aside from the "Stupid Changes" listed above, there is another big problem. As in the miniseries, Tales from Earthsea decides that what the film really needs is an epic confrontation between hero and villain. So once Arren gets to Cob's castle, the contemplative tone of the rest of the film is out the window for a big finale. This last sequence, while admittedly pretty good on its own, doesn't quite feel of a piece with the rest of the film, and also simplifies the conflict. If Arren can defeat Cob then everything will go back to normal. Which is why it then feels a little out of place when Arren talks about going back to Enlad to face the consequences for killing his father.

Oh, and that's another thing. As I mentioned above, the movie doesn't seem to have a good answer for why Arren killed his father and what the consequences for that action will be. That side plot sort of bookends the movie without ever really impacting it in any significant way. If anything, it seems like the writers wanted to incorporate the story of Ged fleeing his shadow from A Wizard of Earthsea and so they gave it to Arren. But its inclusion here doesn't naturally mesh with the rest of the story. This means that the film's more contemplative moments can also get a little boring, because instead of thinking about the movie's themes and ideas, you're thinking about how they don't quite add up.

And while I know that I praised the film for being willing to make cuts where necessary, I do think the inclusion of Tenar and Therru makes the film a little bloated. Sure, they're both characters that I love in the books, but they aren't given much to do in the movie aside from expound on Ged's backstory and prod Arren to be a better person. The movie doesn't have time to do much more than introduce them, which is a shame because their stories are interesting.

That's probably the biggest problem with the adaptation in a nutshell. The creators seem intent on including as much of the Earthsea books as they can in a single film. So between the things they've added that don't work, the stuff that they've adapted well, and the stuff that they've adapted poorly you end up with sort of a hodgepodge: a movie that wants to be quiet and peaceful, but which ends with a big action sequence; a movie that wants to be a faithful adaptation but which also wants to drastically change characters and motivations. It's not that the filmmakers wanted Earthsea to be something different, it's that they wanted it to be Earthsea but also be something different. If that makes sense.

Links:

"What did Ursula K. Le Guin think of this adaptation?" you may ask. "This archived blog post will tell you that," I might say.

The YouTube Channel Beyond Ghibli has a video on this film which is more charitable than most takes on it, if you're into that kinda thing.

Here's an article by Tor.com's Em Nordling that discusses the ways in which the movie is a disappointment as a Ghibli adaptation. Wait! Wasn't that what this was supposed to be? Am I sending readers to better versions of my content now?

Finally, it turns out that A24 is developing a new Earthsea miniseries. Also, it turns out that the showrunner, Jennifer Fox, was given Ursula K. Le Guin's blessing before her death. So, fingers crossed.