Ender's Game Deconstructed

Click here to read my thoughts on the movie. 

In my voracious appetite for movie books, I quickly acquired the companion book for Ender's Game after seeing the movie. Going through Jed Alger's Ender's Game: Inside the World of an Epic Adventure reminded me of my early days delving into movie companions. This was back before I was willing or able to go see a movie more than once in theaters, so sifting through the companion book was a way of reliving the movie experience. 

While average movie companions are slim, paperback beings, this volume is hefty and hardcover. That's all good and well, but it does come with a higher price tag. It's hard, though, to complain when you hold this book in your hands. The design of it is almost seamless. There are movie stills, behind the scenes pictures, and a large amount of concept art; the images are all arranged well with the text so that you can read page by page without having to flip back and forth. The text is also arranged in small enough sections that you can move easily through it. As the book advertises, it has two little fold-out posters, an I.D. badge, and stickers with the team/army logos. Although all that made me feel like I was twelve years old (who ever said this was a children's book or movie?), I was tempted to peel off those stickers--but don't worry, I kept them safely unused for preservation purposes.

The content of this book deals primarily with the themes, settings, imagery, and overall look of the film. This includes things like the sets, the uniforms, the battle rooms, and various props. Unlike some companions, it isn't heavy on what it was like to be on set; it's more about the craftsmanship, whether physical or digital, involved and the philosophy behind this work. In describing everyone's interpretations of things in the book, there ends up being quite a bit of talk about plot. It all starts to get a little too plot heavy (most people reading this companion will have already watched the movie and read the book it's based on). However, Alger doesn't simply retell the plot; he is providing interpretations of it. And since this is a book for which you can form many interpretations, this plot-heavy approach does make a certain sense. I mean, I've come to love this story enough that I don't mind reading more about it. But for me, the real value in this book is in the images it provides (particularly the concept art and the images of sets, things being built, or mechanisms that were used) and the quotes from the cast and crew (these are all woven straight into the text instead of being isolated). This book was well worth reliving the movie and learning more about how this story was brought to a new medium, the screen. 

Ender Succeeds, in Multiple Ways

I went to see Ender's Game today, and it was one of those movies that did make me feel the same way as I did when reading the book. I was absorbed while watching, and I couldn't get the ending out of my mind all day. Just like with the book. (Click here to read my thoughts on the book after reading it for the first time this summer.)

Now, I didn't even know there was a controversy going on; I just went to watch a movie. So that's all I'm addressing here. You know, I find myself feeling similar to how I did after watching The Host earlier this year (click for Parts 1 and 2 of my thoughts on that movie). It's gladness for enjoying the adaptation as a whole, but also contentment with my reaction to what is in the story.

Ender's Game, to me, is heartbreaking. It's the story of someone who so desperately wants peace but so easily can commit violence. I suppose, on different symbolic levels, we can all be that way: we want to do right, but there is just so much going on in the world to react to. War and conflict, representing the exterior and the interior, will always exist.

As soon as I read the book, I knew Asa Butterfield as the perfect casting choice for Ender. He has that ability to transmit both innocence and power through his face--even just through his eyes. One of the things that makes this book so good is the way that it shows Ender's thoughts; with a movie, you can't show thoughts in the same way. But with a tad of voiceover and close-ups of Ender's very expressive-yet-also-unwavering eyes, we could still follow along and understand what he was feeling at different points. Granted, I know that not everyone read the book; I went to see the movie with someone who hadn't. I think there must be more gaps or less emotional weight if the movie is your first introduction to the story. But I kind of like the idea of the book and movie coming as a pair: sometimes it was hard to visualize things in the book, so the movie helped with that. And if it's hard to understand the emotional or symbolic weight of everything in the movie, the book helps with that.

A word on those visuals. They looked great, and it wouldn't really have been worth it to make this movie if the studio hadn't invested enough to make everything look right. If I had no familiarity with the story, maybe I would have thought it was just about effects. But I'm not sure. The effects, whether in the battle simulations or the mind game, are all about what is going on with this one character.

One of the odd points is one that we all knew was coming. The book presents us with Ender at six years old, allowing him to grow up across the pages. That's hard to do in a movie without getting bogged down by all those years or having an unconvincing combination of actors playing one character. So while I definitely missed seeing Ender so young in the beginning and even wished we could have seen him a little older at the end, I think they did the best they could with making the smaller timeframe work. And, as I said, Asa Butterfield was perfect in the role. If I'm repeating myself, it's because Ender is the most important thing about this story: if he's right, then everything else sort of follows along. Oh, Ender, you still make me want to cry--and get up and live my life with awareness and intention.

The Density of Xenocide

Click for my thoughts on the first two books: Ender's Game and Speaker for the Dead.

I really enjoyed the first book in this set and really liked the second. The third, however, became a little bit much. Xenocide is much longer than they were and I found it even more dense than Speaker for the Dead. If I'm honest, I'm a little disappointed that I didn't like it the way I liked the first two books. But let me explain why.

It was dense. Wonderfully so at times--I still found lines that I could have underlined, concepts that were well-worded, conversations and ponderings about ethics and life. Nothing is, at its center, simple; yet everything is so complex that, in the end, it is rather simple. Much more philosophical questions are in this book and also much more of a sci-fi feel--at least I thought so. The first books were about anti-gravity, space, and aliens, but this book included the long-winded descriptions of such things as philotes and computer communication and viruses and interplanetary travel. Not that any of this is bad; I certainly don't mean to say that.

I'm just pointing out that, after enjoying my foray into sci-fi for the first two books, I'm getting a little bogged down by the setting now. This is more the type of thing I would have expected, in some ways. So now that I've finally gotten through its pages, I think I'll give it a longer wait before I read the last book in this set (not the entire series, I know). You can tell how I felt about this book from the fact that I have so little to say on it: neither much praise nor much criticism. Maybe I'll finally get to the new Tolkien poem and some others that have been lying in wait. There is always much to read.

The Speaker Finds a Home

Oh, Ender. One of the most wonderful fictional characters I have met. How was I to know I was missing out so much by not reading Ender's Game earlier?

Reading it was enough of an impact that I had to wait a few days before beginning the sequel, Speaker for the Dead. If there be any need, let it be known that I don't know how to talk about this book without going into slight plot details.

At first, I was resentful of the new setting and characters, until I realized that Ender was on his way back into the center of the plot. But by not starting with him in the center, the format builds up the importance of other people and relationships in his life--a full life cannot be focused solely on itself. To think of Ender nearly alone, hiding his past for so many years breaks my heart. Then to see him finally finding a place to call home, that was heartbreakingly sweet.

This book had so much to take in, both emotionally and philosophically. Or socially and politically. The format, combining elements of mystery, allows the reader to go through the questioning process. You question who the different characters are and who the different groups of characters are, as well as how they might best interact. You question the impact the past has on the present and the responsibility of the individual. It's the story of life and death, war and peace, aloneness and community.

I found myself quickly making comparisons as I read to things like C.S. Lewis's The Space Trilogy, The Host, and Star Wars (isn't Ender a bit like a Jedi?). But as generalizations, these are of course useless. My point is that elements in this book reminded me of elements, whether having to do with setting or characters, that I have enjoyed in other stories. The Ender's Game series is dressed up in the sci-fi packaging I don't usually reach for, which is one thing that kept me from reading it for so long. But at its heart, it isn't so very foreign to me, after all. I may need a few more days to finish taking in this book before I move on to the next one.

I match the book to Michelle Chamuel's cover of "Somewhere Only We Know."

A Deadly Oliver Twist

He's like a cross between Oliver Twist and Wolverine, with a little of Shasta from The Chronicles of Narnia. So many readers are already familiar with him, but despite having grown up hearing about Ender's Game, I didn't meet Ender until just a few days ago. And what a wonderful character he is.

In fact, in a roundabout way, it was because of Ender that I finally read the book. Summaries of it never interested me, whether because they used the words "battles" or "video games." But Asa Butterfield was perfect in Hugo, so when I heard that he'd been cast as Ender, I started to get curious. Ender and Hugo (who might be called a mix between Oliver Twist and the Artful Dodger) have certain things in common, except that Ender has a greater sense of (or need to cling onto) morality and also is deadly. 

A deadly Oliver Twist. Who'd have thought he could keep the reader's support just as much as an innocent Oliver Twist? This plot revolves around us backing up Ender. While much of the content is about mock battles (which, you know, I have very little interest in), it's what happens in Ender's mind that matters. I can see why this book has such a following. It's one of those books that, if it grabs your interest at all, it's because you connect with it in some way. And there are so many themes, messages, and conflicts that you can pull out of the pages.

War and what it means to be a soldier. Patriotism, even. Corruption. Authority. Video games, if you like, although I didn't really think of them that way. Logic versus emotion. Kindness versus efficiency. Compromises and sacrifices. Friendship and isolation. Role models. Teachers. Teaching. Bullies. Rebellion.

But one thing I got from the "twist" at the end was the importance of always taking life as reality. All our actions, no matter how they seem, have meaning--even if we don't know it at the time. I also particularly enjoyed the dream sequences and how they built up around Ender's desire not to be a killer. His complete dislike of hurting others, despite how well he can defend himself, made for a compelling conflict. There were a few times that I just wanted to weep for Ender.

So the movie comes out in November. Do you think I'll have finished all the (available) books in the series by then? The next three are already here waiting for me.