Xenosaga and Cinema

Started by Katimus on Temp Sibb

katimus wrote:Lately, a lot of the movies I've seen Xenosaga take influence from have been playing on television.  Most notably Terminator and Bladerunner, but other films as well.  I haven't seen a whole lot of discussion crop up around them, though.  I know I'm not the only person who sees movies like Universal Soldier and Robocop and defaults straight to OH, MONOLITH'S DEVS MUST HAVE LIKED THESE!

Adrak wrote:I sometimes wondering what Xenosaga would have been like if it were a movie series in the west. I imagine it'd be one of those Oscar-bait kinda movies, and have a lot of the kitsch removed due to not being a video game, but I wonder how it would have fared from critics, award shows, and box office.

stitchedmoon wrote:Word. :U  I think the developers put in a lot of movie references on purpose (2001: A Space Odyssey and Dr. Strangelove also come to mind), and I love finding accidental parallels with other movies too.

I've always wondered what a live-action Xenosaga movie would be like, too.  Probably whatever Hollywood studio got their hands on it would just ruin it or turn it into something completely unrecognizable, but I'd probably still get fangirl butterflies in my stomach from seeing the trailer.

Neosmith wrote:

stitchedmoon wrote:

I've always wondered what a live-action Xenosaga movie would be like, too.  Probably whatever Hollywood studio got their hands on it would just ruin it or turn it into something completely unrecognizable, but I'd probably still get fangirl butterflies in my stomach from seeing the trailer.

I've actually started writing a Xenosaga movie script for fun and experience about 6 years ago - it made me realize the premise as is is pretty unwieldy for a film adaptation.

The way I see it right now, to adapt it into a proper film series, you would need 7 parts, each 2.5-3 hours long and a severely reduced mythology, with no ES or VoA or ZEs among other things and a notably smaller cast.

I'd like to see it someday but it's highly unlikely it would ever emerge. Heck, they can't get Akira off the ground.

Adrak wrote:Yeah, the chances of a Xenosaga movie are practically nonexistent, but it's still fun to think about.

And yeah, if it ever did become a movie series, it would have to be seriously condensed, and much longer than a trilogy.

katimus wrote:Honestly, if Xenosaga itself were to be a movie, it'd have to be a series of movies or an HBO series.  There's just too much information to fit into a standard 2 and a half hour format.

Primantis wrote:What would happen with Hollywood got their hands on Xenosaga;

Shion would turn even more angsty and slightly/totally emo.

KOS-MOS would be nothing but a sex symbol to get teenage boys to watch the movie. They would flaunt her and Shion's relationship to complete lezbo status.

chaos would turn into a white dude.

Virgil would be completely re-written to be a main character and embody the "Good-guy US Navy Seal" character

Ziggy would be made into a stereotypical Cold War-era vRussian, in charge of the Nuclear Wessels.

Any religious or regional reference would be taken out, in fear of offending somebody.

And more coming, after 8!

stitchedmoon wrote:

katimus wrote:Honestly, if Xenosaga itself were to be a movie, it'd have to be a series of movies or an HBO series.  There's just too much information to fit into a standard 2 and a half hour format.

Agreed.  :U  I mean, considering they cut out pretty much all the good stuff from the first game when they made the anime version, I think it would have to be even longer than that (or at least not waste so much screen time on fan service like the animu did in order to do the story and characters any justice.

Primantis wrote:Ziggy would be made into a stereotypical Cold War-era vRussian, in charge of the Nuclear Wessels.

LOL, I could actually see Cherenkov getting shoehorned into that role.    Ziggy would be like every Hollywood action movie cyborg ever, and MOMO would probably be aged up to legal status so they could make her more sexy-looking.  And the Gnosis would just be generic evil aliens or something.  Or vampires.  SPACE VAMPIRES.

Omega wrote:

Primantis wrote:What would happen with Hollywood got their hands on Xenosaga;

Shion would turn even more angsty and slightly/totally emo.

KOS-MOS would be nothing but a sex symbol to get teenage boys to watch the movie. They would flaunt her and Shion's relationship to complete lezbo status.

chaos would turn into a white dude.

Virgil would be completely re-written to be a main character and embody the "Good-guy US Navy Seal" character

Ziggy would be made into a stereotypical Cold War-era vRussian, in charge of the Nuclear Wessels.

Any religious or regional reference would be taken out, in fear of offending somebody.


And more coming, after 8!

In my opnion:

I think some soldiers are already a bit russian looking,and for me Ziggy wouldn't be the best pick,Dimitri Yurievand his soldiers would do better (because of the name that is already a russian reference mostly).

Religious or regional references wouldn't be taken out,they need to do the cultural ads,mostly based in USA obviously.

But I agree with Shion and KOS-MOS.

And depends of chaos behavior,but since he's mostly very quiet and spirited it's a big chance of he turning into a white dude, but not so sure.

Primantis wrote:lol well those were all tongue-in-cheek, not meant to be taken seriously.

Just showing my lack of faith in Hollywood..

Omega wrote:Haha I know dude,just saying my own opnion basing on them,not anything harsh xD

Xernie8D wrote:

Primantis wrote:KOS-MOS would be nothing but a sex symbol to get teenage boys to watch the movie.

That's not very different from her role in the game then. I've seen enough guys drooling over KOS-MOS without even knowing what Xenosaga is about.  

chaos would be played by Halle Berry. She'd be dressed up like a male Storm (X-men).
[They'd need a stunt double for the beach scene for obvious reasons (i.e. cannot hide true gender when shirtless!)].
After all, how many bishounen-character cosplayers are actually male? Not many, from what I've seen. Might as well do it in the movie too then! Perhaps they'd need a dubbed voice over for chaos, but it's all doable. Yush!

(But if there's a guy hot enough to play chaos, by all means, they should use him instead! Sure, he'd probably have zero acting skills, but still...)

Totally NOT a serious post

katimus wrote:Trying to think of younger/bishounen-looking actors that I don't want to punch in the face...
Crit fail.  XD

Primantis wrote:Casting characters like chaos and Junior would probably be pretty rough.

chaos for obvious reasons, and Junior because it would be hard to find a 13 year old kid who could act like a badass, and not come off as a little punk who needs his ass whooped.

Neosmith wrote:

Primantis wrote:Casting characters like chaos and Junior would probably be pretty rough.

chaos for obvious reasons, and Junior because it would be hard to find a 13 year old kid who could act like a badass, and not come off as a little punk who needs his ass whooped.

The kid in Looper was pretty good.

Who know, I've always kind of assumed a Xenosaga movie would be a live casted movie..

But what if they made it a high-profile Pixar-esque film? Then they could go for a similar Xenosaga art style, and even hire back all the original voice talent.

Or heck, an anime series which actually followed the plot of the games would be nice too. Not that weird anime series we already got that kind of did its own thing.

Primantis wrote:Who know, I've always kind of assumed a Xenosaga movie would be a live casted movie..

But what if they made it a high-profile Pixar-esque film? Then they could go for a similar Xenosaga art style, and even hire back all the original voice talent.

Or heck, an anime series which actually followed the plot of the games would be nice too. Not that weird anime series we already got that kind of did its own thing.

Both of those sound absolutely awesome!  And like, don't get me wrong, sometimes I like it when adaptations of stuff get artsy, but I always felt that the XS anime was one long commercial that missed the whole point and fanserviced up all the wrong places.

Seeing the newest Tron cartoon makes me think that a high budget pixar film could be treated with the seriousness the subject matter deserves.  As much as I am afraid of Disney being a gigantic pearl clutching monster corporation that only wants to cater to kids, they also did Gargoyles, so I wouldn't push that off my lap.

It'd be interesting to see Disney Princess KOS-MOS, tho.

katimus wrote:And like, don't get me wrong, sometimes I like it when adaptations of stuff get artsy, but I always felt that the XS anime was one long commercial that missed the whole point and fanserviced up all the wrong places.

This exactly. D:  (With that in mind, I suppose a Hollywoodified film adaptation could hardly be more disappointing than the animu?  Or maybe it could.  DUN DUN DUNNN.)

It'd be interesting to see Disney Princess KOS-MOS, tho.

Ermahgerd, seconded.  I think this needs to be drawn.  owo

Yeah, the anime seems more like a poor fan adaptation than it does an official adaptation.

I personally think an animated Xeno series would sustain 40-52 hour-long episodes over the course of 3-4 seasons.

Neosmith wrote:I personally think an animated Xeno series would sustain 40-52 hour-long episodes over the course of 3-4 seasons.

I agree. There's really no way you could faithfully adapt the series into a television program without giving it at at least 4 seasons. A major issue with the anime was that it was way too short.

I also see a movie series as being interesting, but it would have to be a very long movie series in order to be faithful, and it would probably have to be really slow.

I also wonder what a manga or novelization of the series would be like. I think it'd be good, but the stories were very much written to be more cinematic, so a lot of the atmosphere probably wouldn't translate into that.

Actually, there is a manga adaptation of Xenosaga I. It's much better than the anime, but it was never officially translated, tho. Once we get the Official Materials section up, we can show it off.

RPGs and movies are so different in approach, it would be very difficult. RPGs are built to be like a ball of yarn you can unravel, and the more you explore, the more you'll find out. They give you a diverse cast of multiple characters, and a bunch of stories that don't always connect. It gives you more to explore and find out about. An RPG can have dramatically shifting tone as well, because you go in and out of battles and have free control over where you go. Random monster attacks in an RPG don't break the forth wall because you are there to find and fight monsters, essentially. The battles create the tension and conflict, and that is the fun part in itself. But when these things combine into a passive experience, it's just not good.

I think a single movie would be good if they chose a central element to focus on, and edited out the other plot events and characters who are unrelated. For example, I think the URTVs storyline would stand by itself without characters like Shion and KOS-MOS, because both Albedo and Yuriev were very compelling as antagonists. Likewise, you could do a story about Shion awakening KOS-MOS and finding out her secrets without involving any of the URTVs or Ziggy and MOMO. Maybe chaos and Jin would be involved in it. Or a space military setting thing about how Jin and Pellegri were separated wth Margulis and company covered, or Pied Piper movie done in crime drama style. Something like that. But to do a movie involving all of these characters together would be a total mess.

I think Xenosaga as a whole would make a pretty cool TV series in the vein of The Walking Dead or Game of Thrones, but they would have to seriously rework it to streamline the story and characters from all the areas where they ran into production hell.

I know this will never happen, I just like to think of how I'd do it.