# Watership Down - spoilers **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [July 31, 2006, 12:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/watership-down-spoilers/366690 "2006-07-31T12:05:24Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![ddgryphon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/8c91f0/32.png) [@ddgryphon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ddgryphon)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/watership-down-spoilers/366690/21 "2006-07-31T16:06:25Z")
[QUOTE=ddgryphon] I actually saw the movie first (yes, in a theatre) and was inspired to read the book. The movie lacks the resonance of the book – and a LOT of what makes the book so worthy of rereading. I own the movie. I watch it every now and again. But it is merely okay and not nearly the treat the movie is. While we’re here, I’ll post this link to “The Real Watership Down” [http://www.mayfieldiow.freewire.co.uk/watershp/index.htm](http://www.mayfieldiow.freewire.co.uk/watershp/index.htm) [/QUOTE] “Not nearly the treat the BOOK is” embleer Frith. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/watership-down-spoilers/366690/22 "2006-07-31T16:40:26Z")
_Watership Down_ is my all time favorite novel. Just a brilliantly realized work of fantasy, even better than LOTR in my opinion. I agree with the OP that the ending is so bittersweet it’s almost confusing. It makes you feel mournful and elated at the same time (and some of the sadness comes simply from the fact that you know the story is over and you will be leaving these characters forever). The movie doesn’t really hold a candle. It changes too much, collapses too much and dispenses with too much of the mythology that gives the book so much resonance (I’ve always found the story of El-ahrairah and the Black Rabbit of Inle to be almost unreasonably moving for a story about rabbits). The movie also kind of rushes through the basics of the story and the characters aren’t drawn with the same amount of depth as in the in the book. I’ve read (or tried to read) some of Richard Adams books and for the most part haven’t really been able to get into them. I did enjoy _Traveller_ but nowhere near to the same degree as WD. I also enjoyed the book of short stories but they’re really just kind of light and fluffy. I don’t think there will ever be another _Watership Down_. ---
**Author:** ![Autumn\_Almanac](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d26b3c/32.png) [@Autumn\_Almanac](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Autumn_Almanac)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/watership-down-spoilers/366690/23 "2006-07-31T16:53:54Z")
Wow. I read _Watership_ back in college and I liked it, but I guess it didn’t make that much of a permanent impression. Hearing the praise in this thread makes me want to read it again! ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/watership-down-spoilers/366690/24 "2006-07-31T17:21:48Z")
In my opinion, _The Plague Dogs_ was good, but not nearly as good as _Watership Down_. It’s too corrupted by humans, I think: To the rabbits, humans were basically just an incidental part of the background, but any story about dogs must inherently be a story about humans, as well, which takes away some of the fantasy, I think. ---
**Author:** ![mnemosyne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c4cdca/32.png) [@mnemosyne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mnemosyne)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/watership-down-spoilers/366690/25 "2006-07-31T18:12:48Z")
I love this book. I first read it in fourth grade (or, rather, the teacher began reading it to the class, but I liked the beginning so much, I then went and finished it long before we did in class!) I have since reread it many more times, coming second on my list of most-reads after _Le Petit Prince_. I once leant the book to my sister, and she kept it for the majority of a school year, and when she finally cleaned out her locker and gave it back to me, both covers (paperback) had been torn off, along with some of the front pages, but the whole story was still complete. It is still the only copy I have. I was so mad at her for destroying my favourite book, I actually cried (at that point, I hadn’t yet read _Prince_.) I’ve always wanted to go to England and visit Watership Down. That website was really cool! I should read the book again…! ---
**Author:** ![Marlitharn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/779978/32.png) [@Marlitharn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marlitharn)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/watership-down-spoilers/366690/26 "2006-07-31T19:13:56Z")
One of my favorite books! The movie was okay; I saw the movie before I read the book, lo these many years ago, and was entranced by the tale of the creation of the rabbits: “If they catch you, they will kill you. But first, they must catch you.” Plus it was possibly the first time I saw swearing in a cartoon (Kehaar: “Piss off!”). I read it as an adult; I don’t know what caused me to skip it as a kid, I guess I thought a book about bunnies would be just too twee for my tastes. :smack: Geez, was I a dork. It’s a mythological epic in 5 miles! I wish I’d read it before my final paper was due in World Mythologies class; that could have been one heck of a report. _Tales From Watership Down_ is pretty decent; it fills in a lot of the mythology of the bunnies, and adds a little more to what happened after the defeat of General Woundwort. But it’s not the great epic story that the original is. ---
**Author:** ![rabbit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/919ad9/32.png) [@rabbit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rabbit)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 7:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/watership-down-spoilers/366690/27 "2006-07-31T19:50:03Z")
I didn’t like the movie at all. Saw it with my sister while we were kids and got the book as a gift not long afterwards. Took me years to be willing to read the book and have yet to be able to convince my sister that the book is not the same. (She refuses to read it, the movie depressed her so). Shame, since the book is really very good. ---
**Author:** ![Greywolf73](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/d9b06d/32.png) [@Greywolf73](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Greywolf73)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/watership-down-spoilers/366690/28 "2006-07-31T19:57:33Z")
[QUOTE=WhyNot] I wasn’t impressed with _Plague Dogs_, **Struan**. _Tales from Watership Down_ is good, but it’s not the same. Honestly, you’re gong to spend the next 10 years (at least) looking for another _Watership Down_, and you won’t find it. [/QUOTE] I would put _Heavenly Horse from the Outermost West_ and _Piper at the Gate_ right up there at the top of the list. My list, anyway. It’s the Watership Down of horses written for kids but it’s really of a more adult bent, I think. It has an extensive mythology of horses which isn’t as detailed as Watership Down but is still just as fascinating. Unfortunately, Heavenly Horse is out of print but I’ve seen some copies over on eBay. ---
**Author:** ![Greywolf73](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/d9b06d/32.png) [@Greywolf73](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Greywolf73)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/watership-down-spoilers/366690/29 "2006-07-31T19:58:39Z")
Perhaps I should include a link while I’m at it? :smack: [Heavenly Horse](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0450490602/sr=1-1/qid=1154375740/ref=sr_1_1/103-6679385-2921461?ie=UTF8&s=books) ---
**Author:** ![Schuyler](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/54ee81/32.png) [@Schuyler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Schuyler)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 9:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/watership-down-spoilers/366690/30 "2006-07-31T21:12:34Z")
[QUOTE=Anaamika] Hmm. I thought this was about the book, so in I wandered. I haven’t seen the movie. The book was truly one of the greats, though, IMO. I never thought rabbits could be so interesting. One of my favorite parts is at the end…Bigwig has come all the way back up the run, and is looking General Woundwort in the eye. General Woundwort says something like “Give it up, Thyali. I can have this warren down around you in seconds.” And Bigwig responds, “My Chief Rabbit has told me to stay here and until he tells me otherwise here is where I stay.” And all the Efrafan rabbits are left wondering - who is this great chief Rabbit? Why has he not appeared? If Bigwig has a Chief Rabbit who must this mighty Chief Rabbit be? Great, great book. My copy is worn down and rather battered-looking, it’s been read so many times. [/QUOTE] I got chills just remembering that scene - my favorite from the book! Thanks. ---
**Author:** ![Cheez\_Whia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/d26b3c/32.png) [@Cheez\_Whia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheez_Whia)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2006, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/watership-down-spoilers/366690/31 "2006-08-01T01:39:23Z")
I need to give a shout-out to **The Sausage Creature** to return my copies of _Watership Down_ and the sequel (nowhere near as good), if she’s done reading them. I could re-read WD again sometime soon. ---
**Author:** ![Kilvert\_s\_Pagan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c37758/32.png) [@Kilvert\_s\_Pagan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kilvert_s_Pagan)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2006, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/watership-down-spoilers/366690/32 "2006-08-01T02:00:18Z")
My “Man of the 50’s father”, an engineer, of all people, recommended _Watership Down_ to me, and I loved it. (Thanks, Dad!) I don’t think any movie version could capture the essence of the book. I only vaguely remember the movie at this point, so it must not have made much of an impression. I liked _The Plague Dogs_ as well, especially when Adams gets so full of emotion that he starts writing directly in rhyming prose. But it’s not _Watership Down_/ My first wife used to call me **El-hraka-rah**. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Sevastopol](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cdc98d/32.png) [@Sevastopol](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sevastopol)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2006, 7:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/watership-down-spoilers/366690/33 "2006-08-01T07:57:42Z")
I thought _Shardik_ was OK, although not the equal of WD. That said I recall thinking back in the day, that WD does indulgence the myth and mystic a bit, faltering when it moves from the precarious and the innovative that really drive the narrative. The movie and music I also thought were worth seeing, after the reading. It added a bit of texture. Whereas the LOTR film trilogy surpasses the books and stands alone for that. ---
**Author:** ![KGS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/90ced4/32.png) [@KGS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KGS)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2006, 8:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/watership-down-spoilers/366690/34 "2006-08-01T08:14:16Z")
The movie’s okay, it just suffers from all the problems of adapting a 500-page novel to a 90-minute film. It’s also quite violent. Much of what made the novel so endearing (the mythology, etc.) doesn’t translate to film, period. However, it’s nowhere near as dismal as the [animated TV series](http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0211882/), which aired in the UK, and chopped into a trio of movies for DVD release. Now _that’s_ a true bowdlerization, with cute cartoon bunny voices, and many “politically correct” revisions to the story…for example, Blackberry’s changed into a doe! :eek: ---
**Author:** ![Fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bc8723/32.png) [@Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fish)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2006, 8:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/watership-down-spoilers/366690/35 "2006-08-01T08:46:23Z")
I too was disappointed by _Tales of Watership Down_. Inevitably so, I suppose. The symbolism of the stories of El-ahrairah in the sequel were too blatantly ripoffs of existing mythico-religious symbolism. Nothing really happened that was worth the read, and… I kinda wish I hadn’t read it — naw, I kinda wish he hadn’t _written_ it. That’s not a glowing recommendation. But what could possibly have lived up to the original? ---
**Author:** ![Baron\_Greenback](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baron_greenback/32/48_2.png) [@Baron\_Greenback](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baron_Greenback)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2006, 9:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/watership-down-spoilers/366690/36 "2006-08-01T09:45:44Z")
Thanks everyone. I think I’ll just bask in the happy afterglow of what was a very unexpected delight. I’m off for a week to the (really remote) countryside, and when I see the rabbits there, I will have a new appreciation of just how tough a life they have. Which may well have been one of Richard Adams intentions. ---
**Author:** ![Malacandra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Malacandra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malacandra)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2006, 10:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/watership-down-spoilers/366690/37 "2006-08-01T10:10:45Z")
[QUOTE=KGS] The movie’s okay, it just suffers from all the problems of adapting a 500-page novel to a 90-minute film. It’s also quite violent. Much of what made the novel so endearing (the mythology, etc.) doesn’t translate to film, period. However, it’s nowhere near as dismal as the [animated TV series](http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0211882/), which aired in the UK, and chopped into a trio of movies for DVD release. Now _that’s_ a true bowdlerization, with cute cartoon bunny voices, and many “politically correct” revisions to the story…for example, Blackberry’s changed into a doe! :eek: [/QUOTE] Ack! I’ve seen a book-ization of some of these and I’d almost managed to purge my brain of the experience until you mentioned it. Looks like they managed to do for Richard Adams what Disney’s take on _The Jungle Book_ did for Kipling. ::barf:: > [@JThunder](#): > > Oh embleer frith. If you’re going to use language like that you can go and _silflay hraka_, dude. ---
**Author:** ![Not\_A\_Tame\_Lion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/e36b37/32.png) [@Not\_A\_Tame\_Lion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Not_A_Tame_Lion)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2006, 11:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/watership-down-spoilers/366690/38 "2006-08-01T23:58:01Z")
[QUOTE=KGS] The movie’s okay, it just suffers from all the problems of adapting a 500-page novel to a 90-minute film. It’s also quite violent. Much of what made the novel so endearing (the mythology, etc.) doesn’t translate to film, period. However, it’s nowhere near as dismal as the [animated TV series](http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0211882/), which aired in the UK, and chopped into a trio of movies for DVD release. Now _that’s_ a true bowdlerization, with cute cartoon bunny voices, and many “politically correct” revisions to the story…for example, Blackberry’s changed into a doe! :eek: [/QUOTE] Funny you should mention that. I recently re-read _WD_ (for about the eighth time in my life) and was inspired to poke around the net for more information on the book. No words can express my outrage when I learned about that TV version, with Blackberry being changed into a doe. I mean, HELLO? The very reason the Watership rabbits had to raid Efrafa _was because they had no does with them!_ They undermined the very reason for the plot of the last half of the book, for cryin’ out loud! Stupid, stupid, stupid. (And I know, they had the hutch does, after the raid on Nuthanger Farm, but the Watership rabbits weren’t sure the farm rabbits would survive in the wild. They still needed wild does. So don’t nitpick me.) As for the cartoon movie, meh. Not great, not awful. But what’s been in my mind ever since I re-read WD is, with the advancements in digital filmmaking technology, now someone could make a movie of that book and _really_ do it right. Live action CGI rabbits, exquisitely modeled, expressive, lifelike–it could be beautiful! Finally, _Tales from Watership Down:_ an atrocious book, obviously culled together from a number of half done first drafts. I posted a full review of it [here](http://www.geocities.com/malchats/recreadc.html) on my website, if anyone wants an in-depth look. I won’t say more beyond this: if you must read it, simply to spend a few more minutes with your favorite rabbits, be prepared for major disappointment. Oh, yeah, and I too can’t read those last few pages without crying my eyes out. Hazel-rah forever! ---
**Author:** ![Glory](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/7cd45c/32.png) [@Glory](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Glory)\ **Post date:** [August 2, 2006, 12:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/watership-down-spoilers/366690/39 "2006-08-02T00:08:22Z")
Hmm, nobody mentioned [Maia?](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0451168119/sr=8-1/qid=1154477041/ref=pd_bbs_1/104-2522832-6101561?ie=UTF8) I read this book for the first time in high school and really enjoyed it, particularly the character of Occula. A little over the time in sex and violence at times and Maia suffered from “Ayla perfection syndrome” at times. Liked the bits and pieces of new language/lore that Adams used to great effect in Watership Down. ---
**Author:** ![GythaOgg](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/49beb7/32.png) [@GythaOgg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GythaOgg)\ **Post date:** [August 2, 2006, 3:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/watership-down-spoilers/366690/40 "2006-08-02T03:42:09Z")
It’s not on the same level as ‘Watership Down’, but [The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents](http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0060012358/sr=8-1/qid=1154489809/ref=pd_bbs_1/104-4765275-2405508?ie=UTF8) by Terry Pratchett does capture some of the same feel. It’s a very good read. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/watership-down-spoilers/366690.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/watership-down-spoilers/366690.md?page=3)