I'm surprised there has yet to be a discussion on Eoin Colfer's addition to the Hitchhiker's series.
I'm slowing making my way through the copy I picked up in Ireland last month. Slowing because life keeps getting in the way, and also because, well it isn't holding my attention as well as the others. Having said that it was a long time ago that I read the others, so they may not hold my attention now - though I do enjoy listening to them.

I was initially very sceptical about it, but that hardened into extremely sceptical after an interview in which he appears to be saying that he jollied it up a bit by sticking in cameos by the characters from his Artemis Fowl books.

Right now I've got it filed in the same category as the Matrix sequels, the Star Wars prequels, post-Goscinny Asterix, Heroes after the first series, the third Gormenghast book, Foundation books after the first three, and Dune books after the first one. But I'd be very pleased to hear whether it should come out of that box.

Peter

I didn't think it was out yet. I'm with Peter in terms of being skeptical, but I think I'm willing to give it a try, since I don't have any other works of fiction lining up at the moment for a read.

The "Mel Brooks" comment is what made me close the page. If he thinks he's more like Mel Brooks than Python, he's not getting the point of what Douglas' work was about. Spaceballs was just awful.

Clearly the producers and writers of the last Hitchhiker's movie didn't understand that either and that's why the movie completely and utterly sucked. Though I do recall most people here didn't think it was that bad when it premiered.

Has anyone changed their minds about it? I still think it's ultra-terrible and was badly cast to boot.

Adams' Hitchhikers series are my favorite books of all time. Period.

I was one of the people who liked the film.

It was nothing like Spaceballs.

You might want to look and see who the writer of the H2G2 movie was before you say that.

I know who the writer was. Well, who the writer was supposed to be. Instead we got Karey Kirkpatrick, who I was referring to, who wasn't able to pull off another Chicken Run and certainly not maintain the spirit of the books, IMO. Adams was long dead by the time the movie went into production and the screenplay received a lot of rework. Maybe it would have been worse without the rework, I don't know. But I do know that I felt totally ripped off after having seen it. The casting and direction didn't do much to help either.

It wasn't as good as Spaceballs, IMO. All in all I'd say that the movie would appeal more to someone who wasn't a fan of the books. This makes sense for obvious reasons, such as selling movie tickets to a wide audience. Though it's obvious many fans did also like it, I just wasn't one of them. Oh, and I do like all the actors in other roles - very much so in fact.