Dalziel and Pascoe (Or How I Wish People Adapting Books Would Stop Doing Stupid Things)
I managed to catch an old Dalziel and Pascoe while I was at home, and I remembered how annoyed I was at how they'd done the later ones, in between writing out Wieldy*, Ivor (who is a woman, despite the nickname) and Hat, screwing up Peter Pascoe in trying to turn him into a cynical lone wolf which he isn't**, and making Dalziel all-knowing and infallible, which he really isn't, and that's sort of the point of the books.
It's most vexing when they take a series of books that most deliberately and determinedly plays with the conventions of the detective story, and then they make adaptations of them that then break that and try to force the characters into conventional roles (Wieldy, Ivor and Hat were replaced by identikit characters straight from dour cop show 101, it was annoying).
*Wieldy, incorruptible, kind, efficient Wieldy is everyone in the family's favourite.
** although I do adore how the writer of the original novels tried to stop them from doing that, by making Ellie Pascoe (the wife of Peter Pascoe) intrinsic to the plot of the rest of the novels so they couldn't write her out.
It's most vexing when they take a series of books that most deliberately and determinedly plays with the conventions of the detective story, and then they make adaptations of them that then break that and try to force the characters into conventional roles (Wieldy, Ivor and Hat were replaced by identikit characters straight from dour cop show 101, it was annoying).
*Wieldy, incorruptible, kind, efficient Wieldy is everyone in the family's favourite.
** although I do adore how the writer of the original novels tried to stop them from doing that, by making Ellie Pascoe (the wife of Peter Pascoe) intrinsic to the plot of the rest of the novels so they couldn't write her out.