So, a few days ago I saw Word War Z with a few friends of mine. I was pretty hesitant to go because I've never been big into the whole zombie thing but I ended up liking it (despite the fact that I was scared out of my wits). The friend who convinced me to go wanted to see it because he had read the book so, naturally, after the movie was done I asked him how it compared.

His answer: "It was nothing like it."

It's no secret that I'm super critical when it comes to book-to-movie adaptations. I mean, I grew up in the Harry Potter generation and as a fan of both the movies and books, I held them both very close to each other. Through the years, I've toned down my criticisms, taking the books and movies for what they really are - two adaptations of the same story. And if these two adaptations were pretty much the same, both being faithful to what the story's intent really was, I was fine with it. Ergo, Phantom of the Opera, Les Miserables, and, in the case of TV, Game of Thrones and The Vampire Diaries.

But then there are the movies that don't have any similarities to the book whatsoever except the title. World War Z is an example of this. Having never read the book myself, I can't vouch for much more than what my friend told me but the gist of it was that it was completely different. I won't give away anything major for those who haven't seen the movie, read the book, or any combination of the two. The point of the matter is that the only thing similar about the two things is the title. And that is simply not okay. For example, the movie is like "OH MY GOD RUN FOR YO LIVES THERE ARE ZOMBIES ERRYWHERE HIDE YO KIDS HIDE YO WIFE," which is fine in itself because, well, zombies. But the book actually focuses in on an all out war between the humans and the undead with actual war themes being tossed around. 

I went on to ask my friend what the major differences were and to sum it up, he said: "If the title wasn't World War Z, I wouldn't have guessed it was based on the book."

And that's when I got annoyed. If there are so many differences between a book and a movie that they are completely unrecognizable as equals what is the point of connecting them at all? The answer: money. Movie producers used the title to draw in fans of the book to generate more revenue. Without the title, it would have been just another zombie movie. A really good one, to its credit, but still another one all the same. Did they really have that little faith that the movie would make a profit?

Although they did credit Max Brooks in the opening credits (Based on the novel by Max Brooks, yada yada) I still think all they did was take his title. Originally, the movie was planned to be the first in a trilogy but its up in the air whether or not it will still happen. If that's the case, I hope they take Brooks' story more seriously and not just use him for his title because that's not only unfair to him and his story but to his fans as well.

As a disclaimer, I'm not saying that the movie was terrible. I would actually recommend it. This is more of a note to movie makers in general when they are "basing" a movie off of a book. The message is: At lease stick to the damn plot. It was a best seller for a reason.