Dumbing it down

[Evisse the Blue]

Originally Posted by TPotSS

When you are reading a book there's never a time when you turn the page and something jumps out at you (unless it's a pop-up book ) and there is never a time where an unexpected loud noise scares you. A book cannot shock and surprise in the same way a movie can. A movie can shock and surprise in many ways (and shocks and surprises always get a reaction from the audience, which is what directors are shooting for) therefore movie people are more obsessed with shocking people. It's in their nature.

Still, a book can shock , as well. Not resorting to basic tricks like 'eerie music', a sudden noise, but to choice of wording, building an expectation over the course of many pages, then tearing it down with a carefully placed word or two. Take Harry Potter for instance. Granted, it's much more difficult to achieve such a thing in books than in movies for obvious reasons.
But this is a little beside the point.

But I guess it's probably super frustrating to have something that's really good when, in their minds, it could've/should've been "perfect".

This applies very well to me. Not perfect as in 'the Bible is perfect', but perfect as a world where everything falls into place. Yeah, I do believe Tolkien was a genius.