Arguably the greatest book ever written, it doesn' t translate that well to the screeen.

There's just too much that Gabriel Garcia Marquez leaves up to the imagination to allow a fair comparison but the fact that the last 50% of the book was conde nsed into the last 10% of the series should tell you how much of the series to take into consideration when measuring this great work.

Probably my favourite literary work of all time but a very average TV series.

Edit: Not that different to my second favourite literary work of all time . . . Catch 22 . . . which was also a disappointing TV translation, even if the great Alan Arkin was a major feature.

Ozark, Breaking Bad and The Gentlemen remain the best TV series I've ever seen.

Special mention also to Fargo Series 2 which is a Coen Brothers classic but I made a huge mistake . . . I ignored the TV series Fargo for many years because I'd seen the brilliant movie and didn't think they could improve on it. Very late in the day I watched Fargo season 1 and I loved it but realised it wasn't the same story at all but a new story based on the same characters and place . . . and then watched Fargo season 2 which remains one of the great TV series of all time only for the series to be expired on Netfix so I never got to watch seasons 3 and 4.

Something I will rectify in 2025 through pirate streaming but season 2 is right up there with the best TV series of all time.

The levels of production in shows like Ozark, Game of Thrones and many others, make old fashioned movies seem like the old fashioned movies they are.

That’s remarkable….Peeper claims the last 50% of the book was condensed into the last 10% of the show. But the second half of the series hasn’t been shot yet, let alone released. Hahaha….how did you do it Peeper? How did you see the unfilmed last 50%?

In the meantime let’s get a more informed opinion on Season 1.

I’ve read “One Hundred Years of Solitude,” the Nobel Prize-winning novel by Gabriel García Márquez, six times: three in Spanish and three in English. It’s the book that made me want to be a writer. It will always connect me to the Latin American Caribbean and, as someone who identifies with a cultural legacy beyond the borders of the United States, made me feel seen.

So, when I heard about the “One Hundred Years of Solitude” seriespremiering on Netflix on Wednesday, Dec. 11, I was skeptical. "Cien Años de Soledad" is sacred. It’s sacred to so many people, and I wasn’t sure Netflix would understand that. 

“I don’t want Netflix to tell me what Colonel Aureliano Buendía looks like. I’ve always imagined he looks like my grandfather. As every Colombian has,” literature professor Gustavo Arango told Vanity Fair.

The thought of attempting to adapt its brilliance to the screen immediately gave me pause. With good reason — this is one of the most significant literary works ever written. Its layers, themes and worlds are not easily translated into visual works. Even Gabo himself, as García Márquez was lovingly known, believed that no adaptation could truly capture the novel’s essence. It would take 100 hours to tell the story properly, he said

But the decision wasn’t his to make. After Gabo’s passing in 2014 and that of his wife, Mercedes Barcha, in 2020, the fate of an adaptation fell to their sons, Rodrigo and Gonzalo. Ultimately, they gave their blessing.

Remarkably, the first eight episodes of the 16-episode series succeed. Netflix and production company Dynamo must have known that the stakes were high and that adapting this cherished novel into a series was a task they couldn’t afford to get wrong. Imagine the reaction if this adaptation hadn’t delivered. It would have been a disaster for Netflix, and for those of us who consider Gabo’s work sacred, it would have felt like a betrayal.

The adaptation isn’t a page-for-page interpretation of the novel, and it was never meant to be. While some will always bring up this critique as proof that the novel should have just been left alone, the Netflix series offers something else entirely: countless moments of brilliance that prove creating art from other works of art is still possible

Have you read the book, Moffie?

If so, who is your favourite character and why?

Apparently you haven’t read the book or seen the series given you thought the last 50% was in the last 10% of the series….but in fact the whole last half hasn’t been shot.

So is that a no, you haven't read the book?

There is a tiny percentage of people on this earth who know the story of 100 Years of Solitude as well as I do. You are not in the 99th percentile.

If you're righ t and the series stops half way, I'm glad. At least they're respecting the full story.

I'm busy watching 8 in the series and they're clearly leaving it open for the second half of the book.

Again I ask you, did you ever read the book and if so, who was your favourite character and why?

So how come you thought the last 50% of the book was in the last 10% of the series, when the last 50% hasn’t been shot yet?

What?

Have you read the book Moffie . . . Or are you just relying on Google and/or Cha t GPT?

It's a yes or no answer that is required here.

Just finsished watching season 1 and am glad they're leaving space for the second half of the story . . . that Moff ie has clearly never read!

Admittedly you have nt read classics like Wsr and Peace - the best novel ever written - based on the life of people  210 years ago and did  understand what Tolstoy wrote about,    When you read about people living 200 or more years ago - you look around and see people with the same characterristics and approach than was found in people living at he time of Napoleon - but you also recognize how insignificant the beliefs of people are when compsred with nature and the universe we live in/       .  

Ou Maaik, I'm one of the very few people I know who's actu ally read War and Peace. Go on and question me on the characters and the plot.

Have you read it?

Ou Maaik, are you still there?

Do you understand the question I'm asking you? Have you read the novel War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy?

It's a yes or no answer I'm looking for.

Sure and  I understand what the book is about - there is no single plot in te book  - since it deals with the real life of people and whatt hey did at the time and what they still do today.   Young people then love parties an celebrations - they still do today.   Culture was important then - despite the Woke lot - people still believe in culture.

nless you undestannd that War and Peace often refer to documents discovered years after Napoleon's invssion of Russia - it reflects a clse historical account of waht happend in Rusia from 1805 to 1820.    Tolstoy refered to the  Decembrists and also refe to the death of Alexander 1 of Russia - bt he  inted that A lexader nevee died in 1825 and lived as a monk in a Siberian monatry and actually died in 1866 - that was in fat confirmed by te fact that when A lexander's coffin was pen in 1927 it was found to be empty.    But back to the Decembrists he referred to in the lachapters in War and Peace?  Some of the leaders that was sent as Prisoners to Irkutsk were cousins of his mother Princess Mary Bolkonskaya.    After they were released from imprisonment they actualy built hat is today the historic part of that city.   So there as no single plot - but many diferent family issues coming from his family,   So who is Countess Pelagaya  Nikolavitz Gorchakov in the novel? 

       .                   

Ou Maaik, if you had actually read War and Peace you'd know that it has more characters than just about any other novel ever written . . . Countess Pelagaya Gorchakov is one that I cannot recall . . . and neither does Wikipedia so it seems like you're trying to sound knowledgable when you're actually just ign orant.

So I was rigjt(sic) and by the way it’s you’re not you;re…..hahaha. What a calamitous mistake after going on for ages about your.

Sopranos

Breaking Bad

Ozark

Band of Brothers - Pacific - Masters of the Air  ............trilogy

The Americans*

available on Disney

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2149175/

At the height of the Cold War, married KGB spies pose as Americans in Washington, D.C.