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This review was a lot of fun for me. I loved the book (and even the sequel of short stories). I have to admit my surprise that there weren't more jokes about Fiver being a more useful ESPer than Counselor Troi, though that isn't saying much.

Also, fun fact? Richard Adams actually invented a Lapine language for the rabbits to speak at times. What is it with English writers making up languages at the drop of a hat for their novels? Also, there was a three-season Watership Down cartoon in Britain. It was weeeeeird. XD

I know Chuck says this only edges into his wheelhouse because of the ESP stuff but I actually think there's more to it than that. Although the process of making the alien familiar is very much the prerogative of SF, even if only under the overly-broad label of Speculative Fiction, what has the author done that SF writers don't do for aliens? Take a perspective foreign to human beings and, through comparison, parallels, and a little fudging, make the life of something non-human seem much more human?

I loved the book, enjoyed the movie, and found the cast very tasty. Ask me about my recipe for rabbit tagine. Uh, bad joke aside...

I love the movie, although Woundwort used to give me nightmares when I was a kid. He is still the scariest movie villain in my personal opinion and I still get a shudder running through me watching this, even as an adult, during his scenes. The art I love, it is not just a watercolour brought to life, but it tickles my nostalgia sense as it reminds of the art in the children's Ladybird Books that were virtually every kid's first books when I was growing up. It is a movie I'll always be willing to set aside anything else and watch when it comes on tv.

I like how Chuck talked about all the meaning that people read into Watership Down that wasn't intended to be there. I know seeing the rabbits crowding the runs as they were being gassed to death gave me Hebrew school flashbacks; first learning about the Holocaust, reading "The Terrible Things," etc. Pure nightmare fuel.

The movie of Watership Down is actually odd in that it is more gorey and gruesome than the actual book. For instance, Blackavar, the prisoner of Efrafra? In the movie we see Woundwort tear him to pieces in the final battle at Watership Down. In the book though, that never happened. He lived through, happy and well.

Trinary wrote: ↑Sat Nov 10, 2018 4:09 pm Also, there was a three-season Watership Down cartoon in Britain. It was weeeeeird. XD

Are you thinking of Animals of Farthing Wood? That played around when I was a child (late eighties, early ninties) and had a similar tone the Watership Down (in that a lot of animals - including a lot of named characters died (with blood)[1]). I though it was awesome for that (it wasn't patronising me) - and I was always a bit of a natural history fan even then. I think I only saw the first season, maybe the second, though.

Not until... Oh, probably as late as The Clone Wars (one episode of Pantomcat aside) that I saw on-screen death like that in a (nomimally targeted) children's cartoon or animation. (And I reckon that only got away with it because it was the same tone as Star Wars and if networks had complained, Lucas probably would have gone elsewhere...)


I saw Watership down once or twice as a child, but aside from recalling Some Rabbits Got Killed (that sequence at the end there with the dog) it had little impact on me.

Watching now? I can tip my hat to the animators, because their work was not in vain; the animals really do move far more like their real-world counterparts that you usually see. Nicely done.



[1]Baby rabbits skewered on spikes by Shrikes (as they, of course, do, to store their kills) on at, what, half-three to four o'clock on a weekday? I'll have some o'that not-shrinking-from-the-consequences, ta!

Aotrs Commander wrote: ↑Sat Nov 10, 2018 6:10 pm

Trinary wrote: ↑Sat Nov 10, 2018 4:09 pm Also, there was a three-season Watership Down cartoon in Britain. It was weeeeeird. XD

Are you thinking of Animals of Farthing Wood? That played around when I was a child (late eighties, early ninties) and had a similar tone the Watership Down

Nah, there was a tv show. Ran from 1999-2001
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watership ... TV_series)

There is also an upcoming Netflix series, with Peter Capaldi. So presumably someone will tell Woundwort to get on his little fucking hoppy paws and hop the fuck off.

CrypticMirror wrote: ↑Sat Nov 10, 2018 6:13 pm

Aotrs Commander wrote: ↑Sat Nov 10, 2018 6:10 pm

Trinary wrote: ↑Sat Nov 10, 2018 4:09 pm Also, there was a three-season Watership Down cartoon in Britain. It was weeeeeird. XD

Are you thinking of Animals of Farthing Wood? That played around when I was a child (late eighties, early ninties) and had a similar tone the Watership Down

Nah, there was a tv show. Ran from 1999-2001
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watership ... TV_series)

There is also an upcoming Netflix series, with Peter Capaldi. So presumably someone will tell Woundwort to get on his little fucking hoppy paws and hop the fuck off.

Ah. No, I had not heard of that one, then; but perhaps not surprisingly, since that would be the years I was at university. (And while that never stopped me watching cartoons or anything, watching the traditional children's TV hours was no longer something I would make the effort to do unless there was something on I particularly wanted to watch. Especially as by that period I had gotten into PC games, plus we had the internet and cable TV as well.)

Aotrs Commander wrote: ↑Sat Nov 10, 2018 6:10 pm

Trinary wrote: ↑Sat Nov 10, 2018 4:09 pm Also, there was a three-season Watership Down cartoon in Britain. It was weeeeeird. XD

Are you thinking of Animals of Farthing Wood? That played around when I was a child (late eighties, early ninties) and had a similar tone the Watership Down (in that a lot of animals - including a lot of named characters died (with blood)[1]). I though it was awesome for that (it wasn't patronising me) - and I was always a bit of a natural history fan even then. I think I only saw the first season, maybe the second, though.

As was pointed out, yeah it was an actual animated series, Watership Down.

Here it is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dqp-7Cb ... za75pGzUsI

When Chuck talks of remembering Watership Down having rabbits surviving a flood at the end, I wonder if he getting confused with the ending to Adams's Plague Dogs(also animated). Rowf* and Snitter start swimming across a small inlet at low tide only to have the tide rise. The smaller dog Snitter behaves a bit like Fiver as well(for different reasons).

*I started by typing 'Rowlf', and it is a good thing it is morning, because picturing one of my favourite Muppets going through the events of Plague Dogs would keep me awake all night.

Rewatching the review and saw a missed opportunity. When Hazel's group is in Cowslip's warren and offer a story about El-ahrairah, Cowslip dismisses it on the grounds that his tricks don't mean much to them. Hazel replies, "Rabbits will always need tricks!"

Hazel: They're magically, delicious!