Cleander, that’s a fantastic idea!

It would be like that ‘Life of Pi’ movie adaptation, where the book is written like an author was interviewing the main character, but the movie puts those interviews on-screen, almost like a making-of-story while the actual story is being shown.

I agree it’s not an easily likable story device; It would be difficult to adapt well; but I’ve thought that it would give more context to the Narnia stories themselves, even more so than the books.

The only problem is how to deal with The Last Battle, where no one who knew Narnia is around for Lewis to interview - except for Susan, and she’s done with Narnia by that point in the book series. Do I sense a change in her character? Maybe a dream she had about where her family went after... (spoilers...). I don’t know, but Susan is the only main character to go back to an ordinary life, so, maybe Aslan gives her a sign of hope in the form of a story she tells Lewis. Only she thinks it’s all in her head, but he knows it really happened. How’s that?

Back to basics, C.S. Lewis was a using an old tried-and-worked 3rd-person narration for his books, but the movies got rid of that point of view for a more conventional film approach, which didn’t feel Narnian or Lewisian enough for me (Is Lewisian even a word?...).

That's an interesting idea, Cleander. One thing about the Narnia books that is hard to translate into film is Lewis's personality as a story-teller. He isn't an omniscient narrator, but is almost a character in the story. Having him be an actual character/narrator in the movies could imitate that aspect of the books at least a little bit. It would be cool if whoever played him tried to imitate his voice from the surviving recordings we have of him.

I agree that including the Narrator in some form would be wonderful in a new adaptation. That familiar voice is so absent in the Walden Trilogy, and it was one of the details from the surviving fragments of the 1960s ITV serial that I liked the best.

The only problem is how to deal with The Last Battle, where no one who knew Narnia is around for Lewis to interview - except for Susan, and she’s done with Narnia by that point in the book series. Do I sense a change in her character? Maybe a dream she had about where her family went after... (spoilers...). I don’t know, but Susan is the only main character to go back to an ordinary life, so, maybe Aslan gives her a sign of hope in the form of a story she tells Lewis. Only she thinks it’s all in her head, but he knows it really happened. How’s that?

That's an interesting idea. (I'm reminded a bit of The Great Divorce.) Maybe the interviewer is a relative of Polly, seeking to compile tales of Narnia from stories she told him and manuscripts she left behind, and so he meets with Susan to see what she may know about these "childhood games" that were the inspiration for what would become renowned author Polly Plummer's posthumous book series... and then Susan tells him the dream in startling detail and they both get an eerie feeling that the stories are more than just stories.

Something that makes the Narrator's identity a challenge for me, though, is I've always gotten the sense that they've been to Narnia — tasted the food, smelled the scents, seen the sights — and that they've somehow travelled through many eras of Narnia's history. This is largely due to the richness of Lewis's inner world, but every time I read the last lines of The Silver Chair, I get a little thrill and can't help but wonder (no matter how old I get) if Lewis was more widely-travelled then his biographers realize.

So in that sense, if the Narrator had an identity that was not actually Lewis... then I tend to think only a Friend of Narnia would fit. And among them: Digory Kirke, or possibly Polly Plummer. (Think of her writing stories in her attic, described at the beginning of MN.) That said, since the Narrator is essentially Lewis to me, and since Professor Kirke is the closest to Lewis in the stories, I think I would prefer that the Chronicles be collaboration between all the Friends of Narnia but especially the older two members, with Digory acting as oral historian and Polly threading everything together.

If the adaptation portrayed grown-up Polly as a children's author (and I do expect for them to develop her character as an adult) then I can imagine someone (Susan?) finding the manuscripts to the Chronicles mysteriously tucked away in her writing desk after the train accident. Whether the completed stories had somehow come back to our world from Aslan's Country, or gone on writing themselves "by magic" after the train accident before arriving at The End — the viewer would be left to wonder.

Honestly, I'm not sure I like the idea of having a narrator.

Personally I'm not the biggest fan of narration in filmtv. Obviously it can work in some cases, but in general I think it's too often used as a crutch to lazily explain the story to the audience. I'd probably prefer that the Netflix adaptations just don't use a narrator. In my opinion, it's a perfect example of something that works great in a book, but doesn't necessarily work on screen.

If they where to include a narrator, I'd want it to be used as sparingly as possible. And I definitely wouldn't want to actually have Lewis appear in the story, or have the characters telling him their stories, or anything like that. That'd be a little too meta for my liking. I know something like that is sort of hinted at in the books once or twice. But frankly, I'm not entirely sure I like it much there ether.

When the conversation about Narnia on Netflix got rolling, one of the first things I saw fans speculating about was whether or not a television adaptation would add a lot of filler.

My gut reaction is that blowing up the source material isn't a good idea, but thinking back to the Walden Trilogy, there are actually a number of expansions or additions that I liked: the big battle scene in LWW, for instance, which got very few lines in the book. I don't have a problem with additions like General Oreius; on the contrary I think he adds to the movie. But I also hate the idea of expanding so much on what Lewis wrote that it feels like every nook and cranny of the story is stuffed with fan fiction. So where do you draw the line?

Keeping that Netflix will let someone or someone's headline the books that certainly wants to do them proper and make a wonderful adaptations full of the values of CS Lewis, then color me excited.

I think a big Netflix series is the perfect place for Narnia and I'm surprised it wasn't picked up sooner by a big company. I think there are things you can do in a series that you can't in a big one-off film. And don't get me wrong I love those films.

I think that you actually have the opportunity to have less ( fan Fiction ) type of material to appeal or fill in a big screen movie and just focus and the book materials and characters in a more bit by bit fashion.

I definitely think the only reason they do MN first is to make a grand arc for the stories. Maybe try to keep the white witch around popping up through all the stories as the foil of Aslan and I am not a fan of that. There is no grand evil that sits opposite Aslan. That is just completely against the integrity of the story and the truth that it is leaning against, so that just does not work for me.

Also, i think the best thing about them doing tv episodes is that they can have episodes that are more about one character. Like this is an Edmund episode. This is a Caspian episode. This is a Lucy episode. This is a Shasta episode. This is a Peter episode. This is an Avaris episode. This is a Susan episode. I actually think they can do a lot by having episodes without characters in them. If it is a movie, they have to pop back in to see what the other characters are doing every twenty minutes, instead of taking the time to focus on one character at a time.

I think if they have a final narrator of the story it should be Susan and she should be old and then at the end we see her die and end up at the door with Aslan and be reunited with her siblings, turning young as she goes through it.

I've actually talked about this in a discussion about Narnia Stories Left Untold That Netflix Could Do.

I have some ideas what Netflix could expand on-

For Voyage of the Dawn Treader-

I would like to see what happened at the beginning, even before Edmund, Lucy, and Eustace arrive. I think it would be great to see Caspian and his crew learning about shipping and navigation, since Telmarines were afraid of the sea. We might also be able to see what they were doing in Galma, how Terenbithia was under a pandemic, how the Dawn Treader was harassed by pirates, what they were doing on the Seven Isles.

I have two things in The Last Battle-

I think it would be great if they actually show what happened between the first two chapters. The first chapter is more like a prologue, then the second chapter jumps into "three weeks later." Maybe a way to do that is to show the Tisroc bestowing blessings of Tash on Rishda as Rishda and his men are getting ready to head towards Narnia.

Another, as @rose said, is to expand on Emeth, who is actually my favorite character in the series. I think a way to do that is to make him more sympathetic. Even have where Rishda is giving orders to cut down trees and kill Narnians at Cair Paravel, give Emeth a conscious look, like this doesn't seem right. He could even realize how murderous and manipulative Rishda really is, not that I know if he was actually aware of it.

Posted by: @rose

 

I really hope they don't add any romances either. If they feel like there aren't enough relationships in Narnia, I hope they just spend a little more time on the ones that are canon: Frank and Helen, Mr. and Mrs. Beaver, Caspian and Ramandu's Daughter. Or even Fair Olvin and Lady Liln of Archenland.

I think it would be great if they could expand a bit more on Caspian and Ramandu's daughter's relationship, and I much rather have that with the non-canon Caspian and Susan romance (cringes). I think I would prefer if Caspian and Susan have a more of a sibling like relationship. Maybe when Caspian offers the horn back to Susan, she tells him, "Please, keep it. Who knows when you need to call for help?" (In the Walden, when she said, "Why don't you hold on to it? You might need to call me again", I raised my brow. I kind had the same reaction as Lucy, "You might need to call 'me' again?")

It would also be great if they could explore on the deep friendship of Tirian and Jewel. They love each other like brothers, which is a very crucial part of the plot. Though I am kind of worried that they might go in the direction of a love triangle with Tirian, Eustace and Jill. It was a trend about 10 years ago, but who knows? Maybe trends have changed between now and then. Perhaps if the marketing biz could take example from Sherlock, a commercially successful show that explores on deep friendship between Sherlock Holmes and Dr. John Watson, for The Last Battle, I think that will count for something.

I think a way to expand on Emeth is to where Poggin is listening to the conversation between Rishda and Ginger, perhaps have Emeth listen in as well. Emeth could learn that Rishda does not believe in Tash. "How could he dare to mock him?" It can create a dynamic of his longing to see Tash. I also like the idea of Emeth being portrayed as sympathetic as well, being horrified of how his own captain was treating the Narnians.