Alex Rider (TV) - Baby's first spy thriller

[TheImportantFart]

Recently, a TV show's come out adapting Point Blanc, the second book in the Alex Rider series by Anthony Horowitz. If you don't know, the books are a series of young adult novels following the adventures of Alex Rider (duh), a teenager unwillingly roped into working as a spy by MI6.

I was a huge fan of the books growing up, and the series is still going now, although I haven't read anything past Scorpia Rising. I was very disappointed by the film adaptation of Stormbreaker in 2006, so when I heard they were making a TV series that looked a lot closer to Anthony Horowitz's vision of what he wanted an Alex Rider adaptation to be, I was very excited.

The show's now out, although I didn't realise at first because it released with so little fanfare. I watched the first two episodes and I'm enjoying it so far. I like that they skipped Stormbreaker and went straight for Point Blanc, which is a more exciting novel. Otto Farrant's a much better Alex than Alex Pettyfer was (I honestly just wanted to punch him most of the time he was on screen), Brenock O'Connor is perfect casting as Tom and most of the other characters seem pretty in line with the books. It's also surprisingly gritty, but then again, the books had some fairly near the knuckle stuff which is partly why the more kid-oriented adaptation of Stormbreaker was so embarrassing.

Like I say, I've only just started watching, but I didn't see a thread for this, so I thought I'd start one. Has anyone else seen this? What are your thoughts?

 

[Cactuar King]

Haven't seen it yet (I had no idea it was out yet), but I will say Stephen Dillane does seem like an excellent choice for Alan Blunt.

 

[Judge Holden]

I repeat what I said last time this series was mentioned about how while I enjoyed the books as a kid, in hindsight they are the most hilariously nigthtmarishly grimdark shit imaginable when you actually think about it

Ah I remember the alex rider series. Brettygud for a preteen's first spy series, though now I look back the whole lore of the setting is actually hilariously bleak and miserable on a lovecraftian level now I think of it.

Seriously Alex is forced to remain an eternal virgin 14 year old even as the world around him rapidly advances from the late 90s to the late 2010s, with him playing on a new N64 console in the first book and getting an iphone halfway through the series and is probably getting a PS5 in the upcoming book, all while he remains completely static and ageless, and he has to spend literally every waking moment getting the physical, mental, and emotional shit kicked out of him by a world that is steadily revealed to be inhabited almost entirely by sadistic bond villains with literally dozens of apocalyptic evil schemes overlapping and set to come to fruition every freakin month, and literally the only thing capable of stopping millions/billions of people dying horribly, including everyone he loves, is him suffering through agonizing shit that would make Jason Bourne wince, and without the comfort of getting some ass afterwards in his five minutes of cooling off before he is blackmailed into another assignment.

Eventually, after nearly twenty years of this nightmarish existence and losing the last family he had left...who was literally just his old babysitter at this point.... and being literally enslaved to protect none other than Hillary Clinton...yes really.... from assassins sent to frame the UK for murdering her in revenge for her speechfiying about how evil Britain is...again yes really... he finally got a break with the seeming final novel and was able to finally turn 15 and leave the country with his girlfriend...only for the author to decide "nah I want to buy a new house" and resurrect the series, having his girlfriend, whose life he saved repeatedly, randomly dump him and kick him out of her house and his babysitter resurrected by black plot magic despite literally exploding in the previous book, and him being forced back into a perpetual nightmare of "MI6's pet bitch" where he is forced on pain of global genocide to do the job of the entire international intelligence community once again.

I mean hell, you could easily turn this concept into a black comedy parody of the bond genre without changing much. Just the idea of some random asshole being forced to do bond shit every week knowing that if he makes a mistake its gonna cause some absurdly contrived yet horribly nasty apocalypse while the worlds intelligence agencies just munch popcorn and watch him suffer while doing fuck all to help.

Either way im glad to hear the series is apparently not terrible.

 

[TheImportantFart]

I repeat what I said last time this series was mentioned about how while I enjoyed the books as a kid, in hindsight they are the most hilariously nigthtmarishly grimdark shit imaginable when you actually think about it

You get another poz from me for this hilarious post.

Haven't seen it yet (I had no idea it was out yet), but I will say Stephen Dillane does seem like an excellent choice for Alan Blunt.

He's a huge improvement on Bill Nighy's cartoon character from the film.

 

[Judge Holden]

You get another poz from me for this hilarious post.

The funny part is I wasnt even really trying to be funny. The setting is genuinely like a more depressing spin on Evangelion with terrified child forced against his will to save the world every week solely because nobody else gives a shit, except atleast shinji had the promise of eventual coochie from his babysitter to keep him going, wheras poor old alex rider cant even be checked into a fucking hospital to recover from being murdered the previous book without being forcibly shot up into space to stop some russian oligarch dropping a satellite on his babysitter's house

 

[CivilianOfTheFandomWars]

I probably won’t watch it, but the books were actually pretty kino. It’s just adults turning this poor kid into Rambo and fucking his life up at every opportunity and I think it was done well.
Sure, there’s some dumb shit, but that comes with the territory of “kid spy”.

 

[TheImportantFart]

It’s just adults turning this poor kid into Rambo and fucking his life up at every opportunity and I think it was done well.

The reluctant spy was an interesting angle, and made it more realistic. Most other children's books would treat it like a dream come true, but the reality of such a situation would be horrifying.

 

[CivilianOfTheFandomWars]

The reluctant spy was an interesting angle, and made it more realistic. Most other children's books would treat it like a dream come true, but the reality of such a situation would be horrifying.

I think that’s what it captured really well.

 

[Notgoodwithusernames]

Looking up the plot summary it seems to be primarily an adaptation of point blank with some elements taken from Stormbreaker (mainly Ian’s death, Alex investigating said death which leads to him recruited and MI6, his training with the SAS, and the Yasssen subplot). Also SCORPIA is name dropped earlier than it was in the OG series and the ending of the book is drastically changed which without spoiling what happens in the book and the series thing will change things quite a bit if They ever get to Scorpia Rising

 

[ProgKing of the North]

Ooh, loved these books as a young un, thanks for the heads up

 

[FaramirG]

I repeat what I said last time this series was mentioned about how while I enjoyed the books as a kid, in hindsight they are the most hilariously nigthtmarishly grimdark shit imaginable when you actually think about it


Either way im glad to hear the series is apparently not terrible.

The one where an ex-Soviet general kidnaps him and tries to brainwash him into seeing him as a father because Alex bears a passing resemblance to the general's dead son was way more disturbing than anything I saw in a Bond movie.

 

[TheImportantFart]

I've just finished watching it. Really good series and really good adaptation, especially after watching Artemis Fowl, which reminded me just how bad book adaptations can get. They changed some things around, but I think they worked for the purposes of a TV show.

I hope they get to make another series, although given the lackluster marketing (I only found out the series existed because I randomly googled the books), I'm not sure how many people will actually watch this. I would love to see them to do Skeleton Key and the other books

Looking up the plot summary it seems to be primarily an adaptation of point blank with some elements taken from Stormbreaker (mainly Ian’s death, Alex investigating said death which leads to him recruited and MI6, his training with the SAS, and the Yasssen subplot). Also SCORPIA is name dropped earlier than it was in the OG series and the ending of the book is drastically changed which without spoiling what happens in the book and the series thing will change things quite a bit if They ever get to Scorpia Rising

Yes, as they've skipped Stormbreaker, elements are condensed into the first couple of episodes. Rather than getting his cover blown because there were cameras in the cells like in the books, Alex's cover gets blown because of a subplot involving an investigation into Ian Rider's death (a double agent is involved this time). Yassen is a lot more heavily involved than he even was in Stormbreaker too. Tom also didn't show up in the books until Scorpia. They also reveal a lot sooner that Alex's father was a spy, but only to the audience.

In terms of changing things for Scorpia Rising I assume you mean

Spoiler

the Alex clone being killed a lot more definitively than he was in the books

but considering in the books

Spoiler

he fell into a burning inferno and still survived

I don't think it's out of the question it could happen again here, although it has been a while since I read Scorpia Rising.

 

[Lonely Grave]

I just finished watching this, it strikes a nice blend between the Sherlock-style "British" atmosphere and some of the more modern US spy procedurals. I especially liked how they've skipped redoing Stormbreaker to bury that failure even lower. It is mostly faithful to*Point Blanc* as I remember it and it's done a very good job of giving enough emotion and feeling to Alex and the other main cast.

By far my favourite change was Smithers. Book Smithers seemed far too odd-duck within Blunt's organisation and I like how the TV series has made the Blunt team more cohesive and believable as a whole. That whole scene with Smithers asking Roscoe for his "motorbikes" in order to calibrate his text-to-speech program and Blunt remarking "should have been a writer" as a compliment highlights this change, and for me it's a very enjoyable change.

Season 2 is already in the works and I can't wait to see what they do with the Skeleton Key plot. If they go all the way to Scorpia Rising with this kind of team it could well be a TV series to remember.

 

[Megaroad 2012]

I just want to share that Araki did Alex Rider artwork for the books in Japan.

 

[MrJokerRager]

I remember reading those books a long ass time ago. Those books are from the early 2000s era lol.

Alex Rider gets trained by SAS operators and there was in one of the books where they show the CIA as inept.

 

[Xerxes IX]

where they show the CIA as inept.

Do they depict melanated members of the CIA getting run over by a schizophrenic programmer?

 

[MrJokerRager]

Do they depict melanated members of the CIA getting run over by a schizophrenic programmer?

Some white man and woman team larping as husband and wife get murdered by sharks or some crazy shit while scuba diving to infiltrate an island. And they were arrogant to Alex Rider a while before they try to infiltrate the island.

 

[Super Sad Smile]

Personally, I thought a lot of the changes felt rather weird and unnecessary. Turning Point Blanc into a coed school didn't really make much sense, the other students were less interesting, and it got rid of the gadgets Alex used. Also the "diversity" seems too obvious to be coincidental (making the housekeeper black, real subtle lol).

On a positive note, I thought the extra scenes with Roscoe and Alex's hs friend were a decent addition.

 

[Gaymead]

I repeat what I said last time this series was mentioned about how while I enjoyed the books as a kid, in hindsight they are the most hilariously nigthtmarishly grimdark shit imaginable when you actually think about it

Ah I remember the alex rider series. Brettygud for a preteen's first spy series, though now I look back the whole lore of the setting is actually hilariously bleak and miserable on a lovecraftian level now I think of it.

Seriously Alex is forced to remain an eternal virgin 14 year old even as the world around him rapidly advances from the late 90s to the late 2010s, with him playing on a new N64 console in the first book and getting an iphone halfway through the series and is probably getting a PS5 in the upcoming book, all while he remains completely static and ageless, and he has to spend literally every waking moment getting the physical, mental, and emotional shit kicked out of him by a world that is steadily revealed to be inhabited almost entirely by sadistic bond villains with literally dozens of apocalyptic evil schemes overlapping and set to come to fruition every freakin month, and literally the only thing capable of stopping millions/billions of people dying horribly, including everyone he loves, is him suffering through agonizing shit that would make Jason Bourne wince, and without the comfort of getting some ass afterwards in his five minutes of cooling off before he is blackmailed into another assignment.

Eventually, after nearly twenty years of this nightmarish existence and losing the last family he had left...who was literally just his old babysitter at this point.... and being literally enslaved to protect none other than Hillary Clinton...yes really.... from assassins sent to frame the UK for murdering her in revenge for her speechfiying about how evil Britain is...again yes really... he finally got a break with the seeming final novel and was able to finally turn 15 and leave the country with his girlfriend...only for the author to decide "nah I want to buy a new house" and resurrect the series, having his girlfriend, whose life he saved repeatedly, randomly dump him and kick him out of her house and his babysitter resurrected by black plot magic despite literally exploding in the previous book, and him being forced back into a perpetual nightmare of "MI6's pet bitch" where he is forced on pain of global genocide to do the job of the entire international intelligence community once again.

I mean hell, you could easily turn this concept into a black comedy parody of the bond genre without changing much. Just the idea of some random asshole being forced to do bond shit every week knowing that if he makes a mistake its gonna cause some absurdly contrived yet horribly nasty apocalypse while the worlds intelligence agencies just munch popcorn and watch him suffer while doing fuck all to help.

It's also worthy to note that Anthony Horowitz later wrote two Bond Novels: Trigger Mortis, in 2015, set after the events of Goldfinger and features Pussy Galore, and Forever and a Day, in 2018, which is a prequel to Casino Royale.
here are links to the books: http://www.ianfleming.com/products/trigger-mortis/profile, http://www.ianfleming.com/products/forever-and-a-day/profile/

 

[TheImportantFart]

Interesting. Apparently with season 2 they're skipping Skeleton Key and going straight for Eagle Strike.

I guess since they brought SCORPIA in much earlier than the books it would seem like they were dragging their feet if the story went on too long without them showing up to do something big, but it's a bit of a shame because Skeleton Key is one of my favourite books in the series. Oh well, Eagle Strike's pretty good too.