Ten of the Worst Adaptations of All Time

Super Mario Bros was
just bad, but it didn't make
list.

Some of the greatest films of all time have been adapted from smaller stories. Whether it's from something like a book, novella or short story, to TV series and video games in recent times, movies have taken ideas and expanded or condensed them to make compelling motion pictures. After all thirteen of IMDb's top fifteen movies are based off books, plays or short stories with Inception and Pulp Fiction being the notable originals. The fact is that a great story can translate to a great film, or a bad one if not handled properly. The greatest franchise in movie history (James Bond) was adapted from Ian Fleming's series of novels, but imagine if the first was a bomb. Would it been a successful series? Of course not, it would crumble. In spite of that reasoning, one of the films on this list will defy explanation, however the rest tried to either expand their franchise with a new vision or just let it lie. This list is based upon popularity, risk, reception, the quality of the adaptation itself and the franchise's potential (if applicable).

Moneyball is a good film
until facts come into play.

10) Moneyball (2011) - If you've read this blog for Worst Movies of 2011, Moneyball was the loser as worst movie. Now, that isn't saying that Moneyball was a bad movie, but it didn't represent the facts well. The film excluded all mention of pitchers Mark Mulder, Tim Hudson, Barry Zito, Corey Lidle and AL MVP Migel Tejada and All Star Eric Chavez to focus on Scott Hatteberg, Chad Bradford and David Justice. The film depicts an acquisition of a situational left-handed reliever as the big moment in a sports movie. However, it wraps up well, citing that Billy Beane is still trying to win the final game of the season and got nominated for Best Picture by film critics who likely did not know the facts excluded by the film.

Too a whole week to make you realize,
you're not getting 10 hours back.

9) Stephen King's The Stand (1994) - One of Stephen King's best books was reduced to a PG-style horror film that could be tame enough for middle America to watch it in front of kids. The cast featured many names Gary Sinise, Molly Ringwald, Jamey Sheridan, Corin Nemic, Laura San Giacomo, Ruby Dee, Ozzie Davis, Miguel Ferrer, Ray Walston and Rob Lowe, but they weren't fleshed out by director Mick Garris. Originally the studio wanted George Romero, which was out as soon as ABC wanted it for a miniseries. The full week event boiled down to a nuke exploding in Vegas detonated by the "hand of God". Is there any worse way to end a series than this? Like video games, there hasn't been many good King adaptations, which is hard to explain from America's best selling author.  

Great anime deserves an awful
American live action feature.

8) The Fist of the North Star (1995) - Adapted from a popular anime series, Fist of the North Star took a lot of liberties with the original story and tamed down the action in comparison to the anime series. It's so forgettable that I can't point out much that went wrong, but it's so far down on the list because the cult status of the series and no attempt to reprise or recreate this awful piece. It had a 3.8 rating on IMDb and had Downtown Julie Brown in the supporting cast. Enough said.

Low Budget, poorly written,
The Guyver didn't have
a chance.

7) The Guyver (1991) - Another popular anime series from Japan was depicted on film with Star Wars Mark Hamill headlining in a supporting role. Released during a time where action and comedy were blending together, this film never took itself seriously. Directed by a special effects artist, an overly cartoony style and terribly placed homages to other films, The Guyver never was able to tell it's story with any type of decorum or even satire. The series attempted a sequel in 1994 with Steve Wang directing it alone and a dark tone, but the series was done.

Transformers was more about
Shia LaBeouf wise cracks than
anything.

6) Transformers (2007) - When Michael Bay adapted Transformers to the big screen, most fans asked "Why" before saying "how". From the instant Transformers premiered, it was obvious that the Transformers themselves would be secondary to feature the humans. Unbelievably a huge mistake as Optimus Prime would say, "My Bad," as the film continued to just get dumber. As the series evolved ("evolved" is used liberally), it would steal lines from Star Trek and become a slow motion film when Megan Fox or the other chick appeared on screen. The key point of the Transformers was lost as the fight to steal Earth's power resources was replaced by "the Cube" or the something else. Couple that with the "replicon" from the second movie and the horribly racist robots, you wonder how this series was able to go three movies.

Shouldn't an adaptation
be about the thing your
adapting?

5) Resident Evil (2002) - I've written how about Resident Evil is (and the rest of the series for that matter several times) an abomination. One more won't hurt. It's a bizarre retelling of Alice in Wonderland and completely disregards the series it was adapting to tell a completely irrelevant story with a character that doesn't exist in the series. Most fans of the series have turned away, where somehow it picked up an audience and that blindly sees the sequels. It's actually pretty insulting to the current series of games that desperately are trying to stay relevant to the populous. The fact that this film is still churning out terrible money-making sequels prevents it from being the top of the list. 

Don't worry, Jim Carrey will
do something funny to save us...

4) How The Grinch Stole Christmas (2000) - Ron Howard won an Oscar for a Beautiful Mind and is one of Hollywood's top directors with Splash, The Da Vinci Code, Frost/Nixon, Ransom, Backdraft and Willow to name a few. That said, this is probably Howard's worst film. Adapted from the 22 minute short film (already adapted from the Dr. Seuss short story), Jim Carrey took the role of the Grinch and the spoke freely without rhyme for the most part. The Grinch was given one of the worst backstories of all time- as he was shunned for giving himself a terrible haircut in an attempt to impress Martha May Whovier (Christine Baranski) and while Augustus Maywho (Jeffrey Tambor) taunts him. This film reeked of "Jim Carrey's comedic style will save us", but sadly the movie was not funny or entertaining, yet is considered a holiday classic. Still don't know how, but how did Twilight make 5 movies? Don't know how that happened either.

Almost everyone's career
was ruined by Street Fighter.

3) Street Fighter (1994) - Video games have not been adapted well to the screen (see Why Video Game Movies Haven't Worked) and Street Fighter is the quintessential example of this. With Belgian Jean-Claude Van Damme as America's William F. Guile and Raul Julia as General M. Bison, this film couldn't have been saved if Ming-Na and Kylie Minogue started going at it in the middle of the movie...as in the entire SECOND ACT! It received a rating of 3.7 on IMDb and was so poorly received that no sequel was attempted and the equally awful arcade game was shelved before it made it to consoles. This movie was so weak that it wasn't even mentioned in Raul Julia's epitaph a few months later. Perhaps he died just to get away from the reviews of the film. 

Paul WS Anderson kills three franchises
with this remarkably bad 2004 piece
of dreck.

2) Alien vs. Predator (2004) - Paul W.S. Anderson makes the list again! How this guy continues to make movies baffles Michael Bay. Anderson's hack job on Resident Evil was awful, but RE looks Oscar worthy compared to this piece of crap. Set in Antarctica, AVP (the more stylish title) had humans exploring an ancient temple where the Predators trained their young ones by sacrificing humans to become aliens as right of passage. This goes against the Predator's code that they don't kill unarmed people, but that's another story... I guess. Eventually the spanish archeologist with a terrible accent (get used to that as a reference) deduced that the humans worshiped the Predators to keep the evil inside the temple that the Predators put there. Also, this film makes you root for one of the hated/beloved creatures and gives the audience a "stalemate" ending which is just... well stale. Eventually, AVPR (Aliens vs Predator Requiem) was released a few years later. The film did better with it's tone, but as a sequel to this sad adaptation produced a lackluster sequel. Though left open for another segment, there are no plans for another addition. It even was ignored in a prequel sense. Lance Hendrickson starred as Charles Bishop Weyland, intended to connect the dots to the Weyland company that produced the Bishop android in Aliens. In 2012's Prometheus, Guy Pierce played the owner of the Weyland company, Peter Weyland. The two roles had one thing in common: they both were over-zealous and met their demise from an alien creature.     

So bad that no one wants,
the sequel to come out.

1) G I Joe (2009) - Hasbro established themselves as a production company after Transformers was a success, but G.I. Joe was to solidify their budding company. Starring Channing Tatum (yes, he's awful), Sienna Miller, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Rachel Nicholos and Marlon Wayans, the film (helmed by the Mummy director Stephen Sommers) was putrid to say the least. The military strongholds of both sides were penetrated faster than a date with a Jersey Shore girl. Also, it's story was as weak as the Scottish accent of Christopher Eccelston's Destro (which may be real and even scarier). This film end quickly, poorly with a twist that no cared about. It was so bad that Channing Tatum's Duke is rumored to be killed in the sequel G.I. Joe: Retaliation that has already been pushed back TWICE to March of 2013. The film's stars are nowhere to be found in the sequel (ditto for Sommers) with only Snake Eyes Ray Park returning. Not to say this film series had potential post-9/11, but whatever it had is all but gone and Hasbro finds themselves desperately asking Bruce Willis, Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson and Ray Stevenson to save it.

There's my list I couple compile. If I left anything out, let me know in the comments.