Brandon Sanderson: "This is the year Hollywood came knocking" [Update: "Expect Announcements in Coming Months (See Threadmark)]

[VanWinkle]

This encapsulates why I am always wary of getting into Sanderson. He's been recommended to me by my best friend and I often see him recommended in general. The one that gets recommended the most- Stormlight Archive- seems like a huge time commitment.

People always talk about his worldbuilding and magic systems, but I don't care about any of that.

I care about compelling, complex, and layered characters with depth and nuance. I care about social commentary and critique, either via positive example or negative example (i.e. "here's how things could be if things were better in this aspect or that aspect" or "here's how things are and how it negatively affects people"). I care about deep themes and profound insights. I care about well-written dialogue. These are the elements that make a good story, to me.

Asking generally (this is directed at his fans ITT, not in a hostile way, just in a curious way), does his work have any of that? Because I never hear people talk about any of those things with regards to his work.

Generally speaking more to the topic, even if his worldbuilding and magic systems are good, I don't see how that's going to really capture the minds of a general audience that won't care about either of those things, especially the latter. I feel as though if his work does not have at least one of the elements above it's not going to be successful in the way that GoT or Lord of the Rings are successful. Worldbuilding I think can only get you so far.

But then again, a lot of things in the MCU (dialogue, character depth, etc.) are merely serviceable, so perhaps it could hit big and be like the MCU of the fantasy genre.

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I wouldn't say his work possesses all of that. I would put character depth and dialogue quality at that level of something like an MCU/blockbuster movie. They typically have a bit more depth than that if only because the characters can be explored so much more in these huge books, but you don't read a Sanderson novel if you want tons of depth and complex morally grey characters and deep exploration of societal themes. Stormlight has his most complex characters and themes, so if you wanted to try his work, I would recommend that one. I love his fantasy books, personally. They're legitimately great, but not for literary snobs.

 

[Regiruler]

This. Most main characters of his books are witty and have an answer for everything in every conversation and it gets old fast.

That's why Dalinar is the best.

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I just finished Dawnshard yesterday, and it's a decent contrast in that regard.

This encapsulates why I am always wary of getting into Sanderson. He's been recommended to me by my best friend and I often see him recommended in general. The one that gets recommended the most- Stormlight Archive- seems like a huge time commitment.

People always talk about his worldbuilding and magic systems, but I don't care about any of that.

I care about compelling, complex, and layered characters with depth and nuance. I care about social commentary and critique, either via positive example or negative example (i.e. "here's how things could be if things were better in this aspect or that aspect" or "here's how things are and how it negatively affects people"). I care about deep themes and profound insights. I care about well-written dialogue. These are the elements that make a good story, to me.

Asking generally (this is directed at his fans ITT, not in a hostile way, just in a curious way), does his work have any of that? Because I never hear people talk about any of those things with regards to his work.

Generally speaking more to the topic, even if his worldbuilding and magic systems are good, I don't see how that's going to really capture the minds of a general audience that won't care about either of those things, especially the latter. I feel as though if his work does not have at least one of the elements above it's not going to be successful in the way that GoT or Lord of the Rings are successful. Worldbuilding I think can only get you so far.

But then again, a lot of things in the MCU (dialogue, character depth, etc.) are merely serviceable, so perhaps it could hit big and be like the MCU of the fantasy genre.

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Asking "does his work have any of that" is both subjective and a fair bit of a loaded question. But to answer the intent of it, the third Stormlight book is the most introspective so far of what I've read.

 

[EpicanDragon94]

I just finished Dawnshard yesterday, and it's a decent contrast in that regard.

Asking "does his work have any of that" is both subjective and a fair bit of a loaded question.

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That's entirely fair! It is a very loaded and subjective question. I suppose I was just curious because I don't often hear people talk so much about characters, themes, etc. in his work, which I just find odd I suppose, as the way I see his work described reminds me more of, say, how one might describe a really, really, good top-tier DnD campaign rather than a long form story.

I wouldn't say his work possesses all of that. I would put character depth and dialogue quality at that level of something like an MCU/blockbuster movie. They typically have a bit more depth than that if only because the characters can be explored so much more in these huge books, but you don't read a Sanderson novel if you want tons of depth and complex morally grey characters and deep exploration of societal themes. Stormlight has his most complex characters and themes, so if you wanted to try his work, I would recommend that one. I love his fantasy books, personally. They're legitimately great, but not for literary snobs.

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Few works truly possess all of those things I would say, but it's nice when they do. And nothing wrong with MCU, it can be a lot of fun (and I actually dislike when it attempts to do social commentary because it often does so very poorly)! I was curious about the the subject of characters with relation to the length of the books, because I suppose from my perspective, I don't see how they could be so long and NOT have in-depth characters and such, so it makes sense what you're saying, that the length allows for characters to be explored more. Good to know about Stormlight having more complex characters and themes, I may try it.

 

[WeAreStarStuff]

Stormlight Archive as a series would be incredible! I just don't know how some of it would work. Like, even just depicting spren without it looking ridiculous......

 

[ThisIsMyDogKyle]

I always hear people talk about his books and the great systems of magic. But I never hear shit about the quality of his characters which makes me wonder. Do his characters stink, or is his magic just that good that it overshadows everything else?

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Characters are decent enough, but world building and the magic systems he creates are far and away his biggest strengths, as well as his ability to end books on incredibly high notes.

 

[werezompire]

I'm a fan and I think he's basically a better R.A. Salvator. You're basically getting tabletop campaigns in novel form, but they're really good tabletop campaigns.

He also reminds me of Asimov in that he writes like crazy and he's a better writer than people give him credit for. To hear the people here, you'd think he was Ernest Cline.

Also I watched him treat a fan who wanted him to critique his Sonic fanfiction with way more respect and dignity than I could have possibly mustered in that situation.

 

[anexanhume]

If his stuff gets adapted, it will probably push me over the edge to finally read it. It's tough for me to squeeze reading in with everything else, as it is.

 

[IlGialloMondadori]

I'm a fan and I think he's basically a better R.A. Salvator. You're basically getting tabletop campaigns in novel form, but they're really good tabletop campaigns.

He also reminds me of Asimov in that he writes like crazy and he's a better writer than people give him credit for. To hear the people here, you'd think he was Ernest Cline.

Also I watched him treat a fan who wanted him to critique his Sonic fanfiction with way more respect and dignity than I could have possibly mustered in that situation.

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Pretty good comparison: better Salvatore. That's pretty much exactly Sanderson.

 

[IlGialloMondadori]

Ackchyually guys he just isn't a good writer

My lord lol

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More like: Ackchyually guys he just is a really good writer because his magic systems are intricate and he made a lot of money on kickstarter.

 

[Vulcano's Assistant]

More like: Ackchyually guys he just is a really good writer because his magic systems are intricate and he made a lot of money on kickstarter.

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To be fair it is not the same as a movie where money by itself means little about the works being actually good, you can pay for your tickets for a mediocre movie and then only be disappointed for a mere two hours.
This guy's books are so long that if he gets people to continue coming back for more then he has certainly figured out something as a writer. People don't finish novels that are over a thousand pages long and then preorder more if they don't really love it. He's more MCU than Michael Bay.

 

[diakyu]

I feel like the criticism some have with the dialogue and some characters could be remedied in an adaption since it will never be 1:1.

 

[tekomandor]

But King is better than Sanderson, and has written some great books, and has an important place in American horror and fantasy literature.

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This is just the money argument but it makes you feel better about reading something trashy. Twilight and Fifty Shades undoubtedly have important places in the history of American fiction - being important is not the same as good. Certainly, I can't say that you must find them good because of it (nor do I consider them good).

At the end of the day, 'good' is not an objective thing. Impact, success, and the like can measure how many people found something good. Awards can measure how much a certain class of people found something good. How much their buddies rave about a book is probably about as relevant to most people.

But all the sales and awards in the world would not compel you or me to say that Fifty Shades is the greatest book of all time. Prose is just communication, and artful prose can be beautiful for its own sake - but at the end of the day, the impact a work leaves upon the reader is what matters, not the artfulness (to whatever standard you hold that) of its prose.

 

[Pluto]

The quality of his writing and world building improves pretty drastically with the Stormlight Archive, you should check it out. But I think GRRM is still the better writer and world builder, which is why From went to him first for sure.

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GRRM might be the better writer but he can't finish the story he started, so he loses points for that.

if I were to start, what's the recommended noob book? Preferably his shortest cause those bad boys are thick lol. Loading boxes in and out of trucks nearly broke my back.

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Warbreaker for a standalone novel. Mistborn if you're in the mood for a trilogy, it's short by fantasy standards (about 500 pages each).

Asking generally (this is directed at his fans ITT, not in a hostile way, just in a curious way), does his work have any of that? Because I never hear people talk about any of those things with regards to his work.

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Honestly, if you don't care for world building and magic system but want deep themes and profound insights he's probably not a writer you'd enjoy. Not that there's zero depth to his stories but that's not what draws people to them.

More like: Ackchyually guys he just is a really good writer because his magic systems are intricate and he made a lot of money on kickstarter.

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It's fine if you don't like his writing but why act like you're the arbiter of what's good writing and what isn't? Worldbuilding is a talent that not every writer has and he is very good at that, why is that worth less than great prose for example?

 

[IlGialloMondadori]

This is just the money argument but it makes you feel better about reading something trashy. Twilight and Fifty Shades undoubtedly have important places in the history of American fiction - being important is not the same as good. Certainly, I can't say that you must find them good because of it (nor do I consider them good).

At the end of the day, 'good' is not an objective thing. Impact, success, and the like can measure how many people found something good. Awards can measure how much a certain class of people found something good. How much their buddies rave about a book is probably about as relevant to most people.

But all the sales and awards in the world would not compel you or me to say that Fifty Shades is the greatest book of all time. Prose is just communication, and artful prose can be beautiful for its own sake - but at the end of the day, the impact a work leaves upon the reader is what matters, not the artfulness (to whatever standard you hold that) of its prose.

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I don't actually feel bad about reading trashy things, like I said, I read lots of trash in between other books.

I do think King has written some good books, and his influence on horror is massive. Poe - Lovecraft - Bradbury - Matheson - King pretty much. King's using of melding classic gothic horror and cosmic horror with comics, films, and Americana. I think you can claim at least a few of King's works are actually pretty good. He won the O Henry award after all for The Man in the Black Suit.

 

[IlGialloMondadori]

GRRM might be the better writer but he can't finish the story he started, so he loses points for that.


Warbreaker for a standalone novel. Mistborn if you're in the mood for a trilogy, it's short by fantasy standards (about 500 pages each).


Honestly, if you don't care for world building and magic system but want deep themes and profound insights he's probably not a writer you'd enjoy. Not that there's zero depth to his stories but that's not what draws people to them.


It's fine if you don't like his writing but why act like you're the arbiter of what's good writing and what isn't? Worldbuilding is a talent that not every writer has and he is very good at that, why is that worth less than great prose for example?

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I am just of the opinion that his worldbuilding isn't good or we'll told versus other great examples, like Wolfe. Sanderson worldbuilding is like lore dumps in games. Some people love it - it's like reading an RPG sourcebook - but I do not in fiction. I do like a good RPG sourcebook though.
Every story essentially requires worldbuilding. Sanderson just basically tells you it's worldbuilding instead of it being integrates seamlessly.

 

[H.Cornerstone]

A lot of this in this thread:

 

[IlGialloMondadori]

A lot of this in this thread:

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More like answering why I don't think Sanderson's works will make good tv or film. They're too long, too little happens, too much explanation, characters too thinly written, dialog bad, and too juvenile.
The public isn't interested in magic systems and world building on top of bland characters.

I kind of enjoyed way of kings though. Just horrible dialog and flat characters.

 

[H.Cornerstone]

More like answering why I don't think Sanderson's works will make good tv or film. They're too long, too little happens, too much explanation, characters too thinly written, dialog bad, and too juvenile.
The public isn't interested in magic systems and world building on top of bland characters.

I kind of enjoyed way of kings though. Just horrible dialog and flat characters.

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Yes.... the most popular fantasy author today who is very similar to the most popular movie franchise won't make good film/tv.


View: https://media.giphy.com/media/Fml0fgAxVx1eM/giphy.gif

 

[tekomandor]

I don't actually feel bad about reading trashy things, like I said, I read lots of trash in between other books.

I do think King has written some good books, and his influence on horror is massive. Poe - Lovecraft - Bradbury - Matheson - King pretty much. King's using of melding classic gothic horror and cosmic horror with comics, films, and Americana. I think you can claim at least a few of King's works are actually pretty good. He won the O Henry award after all for The Man in the Black Suit.

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Why should I care that King won an award once for a short story? Did it go and rearrange all the words in his books to make them better? Did his impact on fiction make his books more impactful or exciting?

Awards and sales only tell you other people liked something. I think having your own reasons to like something, to find it meaningful or enjoyable or both, is much more important. Don't you?

 

[apocat]

GRRM might be the better writer but he can't finish the story he started, so he loses points for that.

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He has finished a lot of stories. GoT isn't his only work.

 

[IlGialloMondadori]

Why should I care that King won an award once for a short story? Did it go and rearrange all the words in his books to make them better? Did his impact on fiction make his books more impactful or exciting?

Awards and sales only tell you other people liked something. I think having your own reasons to like something, to find it meaningful or enjoyable or both, is much more important. Don't you?

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The O Henry Award is one of the most prestigious in American fiction. It's just a seal of confidence that whatever story won it is high quality and, like the Booker, it's intention is to kind of canonise something in American fiction. That's why you should care. Doesn't mean they always get it right, doesn't mean you'll like it, but it's worthy of note.

 

[IlGialloMondadori]

Yes.... the most popular fantasy author today who is very similar to the most popular movie franchise won't make good film/tv.


View: https://media.giphy.com/media/Fml0fgAxVx1eM/giphy.gif

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Because it's going to be like legend of the seeker or the wheel of time book, because it's young adult rpg fiction

 

[Pluto]

I am just of the opinion that his worldbuilding isn't good or we'll told versus other great examples, like Wolfe. Sanderson worldbuilding is like lore dumps in games. Some people love it - it's like reading an RPG sourcebook - but I do not in fiction. I do like a good RPG sourcebook though.
Every story essentially requires worldbuilding. Sanderson just basically tells you it's worldbuilding instead of it being integrates seamlessly.

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That I can understand even if I don't agree, I don't mind a bit of infodumping in genre fiction, I actually enjoy it If it's not done too much.

More like answering why I don't think Sanderson's works will make good tv or film. They're too long, too little happens, too much explanation, characters too thinly written, dialog bad, and too juvenile.

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Most of that could easily be fixed during the adaptation process, dialog will be rewritten no matter what, characters get merged, arcs condensed etc., if you consider them too long with too little happening that could actually make them better movies/tv because cutting them down to an appropriate length will be much easier.

The public isn't interested in magic systems and world building on top of bland characters.

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It's not like his stories are just worldbuilding and magic systems. Mistborn is a heist story for example, focus on that. Ocean's 11 with Superpowers would probably get attention.

He has finished a lot of stories. GoT isn't his only work.

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It's his only big series though unless I'm forgetting something. He finished a ton of novellas and standalone novels but that's a given because if those weren't finished they never would have been published. But ASOIAF? It's been 11 years since A Dance with Dragons was released, it's getting a bit frustrating.

 

[IlGialloMondadori]

Most of that could easily be fixed during the adaptation process, dialog will be rewritten no matter what, characters get merged, arcs condensed etc., if you consider them too long with too little happening that could actually make them better movies/tv because cutting them down to an appropriate length will be much easier.


It's not like his stories are just worldbuilding and magic systems. Mistborn is a heist story for example, focus on that. Ocean's 11 with Superpowers would probably get attention.

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I totally agree with you it can be fixed. There's bones of something that can work well on screen, I'm just not convinced they'll hire people who care enough or are good enough to fix it/do it right cinematically. I'm of the assumption they'll dump it out to make money off the fantasy boom. But I'd like to be proven wrong. It could be great, like Jaws and Godfather are better films than books by far. Exorcist is actually pretty decent as a book, but again, the film is incredible, far better.

 

[Deleted member 14518]

He's a great guy and I wish him every success, but I'm not into his stories, probably for some of the reasons listed here.

He writes like a man possessed and he has my infinite respect.

He also hosts Writing Excuses a micropodcast about writing and if you've ever wanted to write listen to it. Its great.

 

[Vulcano's Assistant]

His stuff is very action oriented, it is like comic books, it is like manga. People saying adaptations should be animated are the ones who really get it. Something like the show Arcane is the ideal form his work could take.

When you pick up one of his novels what you picture in you head is The Last Airbender and Full Metal Alchemist more so than Peter Jackson's LOTR or HBO's GoT.

The tone, the fights, the awkward romance, the PG dialogue, this man is making American Shonen Manga without the pictures and that's exactly why adaptations make so much sense when the material is treated like what it is.

Who ever heard of a super popular shonen manga that gets no anime adaptation?

 

[lvl 99 Pixel]

I was going through the Mistborn books. They're like Attack on Titan anime+videogame logic with everyone flying around doing class based abilities.
Those would probably make a better game than movie, or maybe an animated version.

 

[Mifec]

Stormlight Archives in particular comes off like a shonen anime in written form, which could be huge if adapted properly. I still don't know how you do a story like that in live action, though. It would be ludicrously expensive.

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I hope you mean the actual end of book fights which I 100% agree on and not the whole work.

I was going through the Mistborn books. They're like Attack on Titan anime+videogame logic with everyone flying around doing class based abilities.
Those would probably make a better game than movie, or maybe an animated version.

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Yeah he's mega respected for his magic systems. I also agree that the actual action lends itself to animated stuff or games but he's against animation, not games though.

 

[Keuja]

His Mistborn series is basically perfect for a TV adaption.

 

[lvl 99 Pixel]

he's against animation

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why?

 

[Mifec]

why?

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Idk he wants actual live action for some reason. Spent all of last year or the year before writing Mistborn screenplays along with the gazillion other books he wrote.

 

[Kain]

It came to the inevitable "Sanderson is not a good writer", huh.

It's actually true, he's not a very good writer in the traditional sense but he's good at other stuff. And his works have heart, which sounds stupid but it's really not.

Not sure if he himself could adapt Mistborn (Stormlight I think it's impossible to adapt) but maybe through an experienced script writer?

 

[Shaoran Hyku]

why?

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Because he wants to reach a bigger audience with the adaptations, and sadly animation for adults is pretty niche.

 

[IlGialloMondadori]

His stuff is very action oriented, it is like comic books, it is like manga. People saying adaptations should be animated are the ones who really get it. Something like the show Arcane is the ideal form his work could take.

When you pick up one of his novels what you picture in you head is The Last Airbender and Full Metal Alchemist more so than Peter Jackson's LOTR or HBO's GoT.

The tone, the fights, the awkward romance, the PG dialogue, this man is making American Shonen Manga without the pictures and that's exactly why adaptations make so much sense when the material is treated like what it is.

Who ever heard of a super popular shonen manga that gets no anime adaptation?

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This is it 100%. If you made an over the top anime with really dumb romances and crazy fights and stuff, and condensed down the pages and pages of bland descriptions, you could get something cool.

 

[Yu Narukami]

I think Sanderson is fan of anime because some scenes in his books surely feel like it's anime.

 

[Bard]

This is it 100%. If you made an over the top anime with really dumb romances and crazy fights and stuff, and condensed down the pages and pages of bland descriptions, you could get something cool.

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Why are you still in this thread at this point? You just seem intent on continually shitting on his work but you're still here.

 

[Cruxist]

A lot of this in this thread:

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Yeah, I finally had to use the ignore button. Good lord. I try to stay open in these topics because as much as I love Brandon Sanderson books, I've had my fair share of complaints. But I guess there's no stopping the folks who are just convinced that they are the arbiters of what's good and what isn't.

I think Stormlight would be better as an animated series. I feel like it gives you the leeway to really go ham with the action and make things like the plate/blade/crab monsters really intricate and cool.

 

[IlGialloMondadori]

Why are you still in this thread at this point? You just seem intent on continually shitting on his work but you're still here.

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Because I love shitting on bad writing. Love it. I can't get enough. It's a weakness. I draw strength from it.

 

[tekomandor]

The O Henry Award is one of the most prestigious in American fiction. It's just a seal of confidence that whatever story won it is high quality and, like the Booker, it's intention is to kind of canonise something in American fiction. That's why you should care. Doesn't mean they always get it right, doesn't mean you'll like it, but it's worthy of note.

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And why should I care that some people, who may write half-decent short stories, think something should be in the canon of American fiction? Are they going to read the short stories instead of me - will my state of mind and life experiences be replaced with theirs when I read an award-winning work?

Because if that's not the case, what they think of any given short story has jack shit to do with how it will impact me. And if it has something to do with it for you, if you crave the validation of others even in so private an activity as reading, I think that's genuinely kind of sad. You don't need the permission of an award-winning author to enjoy a Stephen King book without caveats. Plenty of other people do it, and I assure you they're alright.

Nor does having won an award for a short story really have anything to do with his impact on the American canon. That, of course, came from the only place it can come - from people reading his works in huge numbers, and more specifically other writers reading them and being influenced by them. I'm sure he was very honoured by the award, but awards are recognition. The impact can only come from the writing being read.

 

[Einbroch]

It needs to be animated. I know that limits the audience a bit, but live action would be the wrong choice.

 

[H.Cornerstone]

why?

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It's because there's still an anti animation bias in the US and he wants his work to have the broadest appeal possible

 

[NHarmonic.]

Stormlight should be animated. There's no way they make justice to the world in live action. Specially all the spren and crazy creatures that appear.

 

[Midnight Lunch]

I hope Hollywood comes knocking at Joe Abercrombie's door.

 

[Speely]

I feel like the first Mistborn trilogy is the ceiling for how big they could go in live action, tbh. Anything Stormlight would have to be animated, and even then would be a huge production.

That said, I'd welcome that huge production.

Weirdly, upon seeing this I immediately wanted a Tress of the Emerald Sea animated film based off of how much I loved the first bit of that upcoming book.

 

[Yerffej]

Yeah he's mega respected for his magic systems. I also agree that the actual action lends itself to animated stuff or games but he's against animation, not games though.

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When did he say he's against animation? He gushes over quality animated movies. He was really high on Arcane.

 

[Mifec]

When did he say he's against animation? He gushes over quality animated movies. He was really high on Arcane.

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I don't have the actual line he said but 2 people above answered.

 

[Mashing]

Hopefully we do get a Mistborn trilogy of movies. I'd love to see Vin on the big screen. And it's such a cool fucking magic system.

 

[Night]

Because I love shitting on bad writing. Love it. I can't get enough. It's a weakness. I draw strength from it.

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Big pathetic vibes

 

[IlGialloMondadori]

Big pathetic vibes

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Nah bro. It's just me. I don't like bad writing. But I appreciate you thinking of me :). You don't need to get all emotional about it.
Sanderson doesn't need your defence. He's rich. Spend time big upping writers who are underappreciated and not rich.
In all fairness Sanderson has good qualities and seems like a good dude. I just get irritated he eats up all the discussion about fantasy in the room when there's lots of other great writers. It's akin to how DnD eats the entire market of pen n paper RPGs.

 

[Deleted member 24052]

GRRM might be the better writer but he can't finish the story he started, so he loses points for that.

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That doesn't take away from the quality of his existing work to me. Even if ASOFAI never has a written ending I don't regret reading the published novels, because they're top tier fantasy.

But as I said in another post, I like both GRRM and Sanderson for different reasons.