I agree with you that Prince Caspian has an adventurous feel. We will have to see if it is any “darker” than the previous :o)

In terms of this episode, though: what’s up with you guys saying Prince Caspian is going to be “darker” than the first one? Honestly, I haven’t gotten that impression from the trailers at all. I really enjoyed the first movie, and was pleasantly surprised at how dark it is. People getting turned to stone, a creepy witch, the kids constantly running from wolves and dark, scary things… And the last battle sequence actually had some pretty intense violence in it, at least for a PG movie.

And let’s not forget: in the first movie, they killed Jesus. Or rather, Aslan. I remember being surprised at how creepy and gruesome that whole ritual was, especially for something that was marketed as a family-friendly kids’ movie. Honestly, that seemed like PG-13 material to me… then again, it seems you can get away with a lot more gore if your movie has religious themes (*cough*The Passion of the Christ*cough*)…

I suppose the first one was “lighter” in the sense that there was a lot of snow, and talking beavers, and Santa showed up, and the final battle occurred in broad daylight. But I think it had some pretty dark moments in it for what it was, and honestly I don’t get the impression from the trailers that Prince Caspian is going to surpass that. Prince Caspian seems to be going for a more light-hearted adventurous tone to me, with some cool creatures and more daylight battle scenes. Just my two cents.

-Andrew

-Joe

As to the design decisions in the first Narnia film my guess with the White Witch is that they purposely kept her look minimal so that Edmund, the cynical kid, would believe her more and be more easily brought under her spell… his character would buy a slightly creepy older woman more than a fawn (oh sorry a Pan). As for Father Christmas the producers had to have been in a no-win situation there- had they removed the character and just had the kids find the weapons themselves or whatever the fans of the book would have complained horribly. Leaving it in as they did we’re just left with a bit of a kid-oriented non sequitur… and c’mon! What kid wouldn’t want Santa to bring some bad-ass weapons for Christmas?!?! *Sigh* In fact where I grew up the most exciting Christmas gift Santa ever brought was a railroad tie.

I actually only recently read the complete Chronicles of Narnia and like the direction they seem to be taking the series. The ’second’ book (why the quotes? Ask Greg), ‘A Horse, His Boy, The Thief and His Lover’ or whatever (I kid, I kid) was to my quasi-adult mind a boring book and can easily be glossed over in the film series. After Caspian the cast won’t be a problem as the kids that we’ve seen already are out of the picture. It will also be interesting, if the series continues, to see how they handle the not-quite-as-subtle-as-Aslan-dying-and-being-reborn theological elements. The later books really thunk you over the head with Aslan as Divine in case you had missed it before.