As someone who follows a lot of different franchises, I have noticed a recent influx of on-screen adaptations and reboots of books, shows, video games and other media.

What can be deemed as a good adaptation can vary a lot depending on the person you’re asking, but for me, I like an adaptation that isn’t scared to make changes while keeping the heart of the story and property.

A common problem is a lack of effort in making them stand on their own alongside the original property. As well as going right into adapting new properties instead of giving time for them to sit and establish the original first.

An adaptation shouldn’t be a copy and paste of the original property it is working off of, it makes the project look lazy. That’s one of the biggest problems with the majority of the live-action remakes Disney has been making as of late.

The audience will normally know the story of the original property going into it, so without implementing something new, the adaptation is going to feel boring.

Without something new to enjoy, they could just go reread or replay the original property and save their money on the movie ticket.

For example, two of my favorites of Disney’s long list of remakes were “Aladdin” from 2019 and “Maleficent” from 2014, and that’s because of the changes made to them.

Both of these movies still felt like the original in spirit, themes and imagery, but they weren’t afraid to have differences.

“Aladdin” added a lot to Jasmine’s character compared to the original movie, while “Maleficent” twisted the original story of Sleeping Beauty on its head and centered the villain of the story.

Stepping away from Disney, another great adaptation was 2012’s “The Hunger Games,” with the best change coming from the movie, not being in Katniss’ point of view.

Differences can help an adaptation stand out a bit from the original material. However, there is a limit to how many changes can be made. I have noticed this more with book-to-video adaptations.

One that comes to mind is the 2013 movie, “Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters,” which only vaguely followed the original novel, along with introducing and defeating the overarching villain of the series way too early.

That movie and the first film from 2010, “Percy Jackson: The Lightning Thief,” felt like a completely different story than the one in the novels due to aging up the characters and inaccurate depictions of the characters.

Adaptations can be done successfully, but it’s a balancing act that I have seen very few directors do right.

Respecting the original piece of media should always be at the heart of the new story, but as the world changes and older properties get revisited, they should change and adapt as well.