Pandragon Dan

Hi guys. As it's Easter weekend I'm taking a break from my Top Five Tips posts to wish you all a very Happy Easter! I hope you all have fun!

Have a great weekend folks!

(The above image was something I found on google and is copyright of it's respective creator. I claim no ownership of the above and purely use it for the purpose of wishing everyone a great Easter).

Pandragon

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(Authors note: Due to the content of this blog, I would like to say that the following is based purely on personal opinion and is not intended to offend or be inflammatory. Take it with a pinch of salt).

In the world of films, there are a number of directors I have a huge respect for and admire (such as Chris Nolan, Steven Spielberg, Stanley Kubrick and Francis Ford Coppela to name a few), directors that I’m indifferent to, but still think can do some pretty good films (like Zach Snyder, Edgar Wright and Sam Rami) and also directors that I don’t especially like (Catherine Hardwick, Joel Schumacer, Eli Roth and Uwe Boll). But Michael Bay is a rare type of director for me. He is a director that I LOATHE with a passion!

(Note: I couldn't get any good pics of Mr Bay - But found this pretty good one from Wikipedia, which I think the above sums up my feelings on him).

I hate Michael Bay and everything he stands for! He is, in my eyes, the epitome of everything wrong with Hollywood. His movies might be big on budget and have some pretty cool CGI, but they contain bland, overly stereotypical (and sometimes downright racist and sexist) characters, terrible clichéd dialogue, snail-paced story and vomit inducing camera angles. Everything about a Michael Bay movie just screams “plastic,” pandering to every single cliché or pop culture with the only intention of bringing in money for the studios. Ok, maybe The Rock and Bad Boys were ok, but he hasn’t made a good one since in my eyes!

But the MAIN reason why I hate him? Because he makes a habit of destroying previous franchises when he makes a film of them. Rather than staying true to the source material, he always has to change every single thing about them and transform them into a bastardised version of what they used to be, whether he directs or produces them. Transformers, Friday the 13th, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Nightmare on Elm Street – I could go into detail as to how these versions were totally butchered versions of their original counterparts but I’d be here all day. And don’t even get me STARTED on how he plans to do the next Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles film (long story short, the turtles will be aliens as opposed to mutants – like I say, don’t me started).

In view of this, I decided to create my own game called “The Michael Bay Makeover”. In this game (inspired by an idea by Youtube sensation LittleKuriboh), Michael Bay has decided to make a movie of Trapped on Draconica. Using what I’ve seen in previous Michael Bay movies, I’ve decided to use my own ideas of how I think my book will be adapted – or mutilated! It’s just for fun, but I don’t think what I’ve done here is too far off!

Now, this does require some of you to know the story of Trapped on Draconica so if you haven’t read it yet, you might want to do that first (don’t you love shameless self promotion?). Ok, here we go.

1) Ben will probably be made into an American. This I don’t have a problem with by any means I would actually accept this change. But knowing Mr Bay he will probably make Ben spill out “gangsta slang” every five seconds and become annoying and (possibly) more of a racial stereotype than Jar Jar Binks. (Yes I know Ben does talk modern slang in the book – but with Michael Bay he would probably ram this down our throats).

2) Daniar will probably be changed from a strong heroine to a bitchy, whiny damsel in distress that’s only job is to look pretty from the sidelines. Characters like Rana will probably be omitted completely. After all, we can’t have a strong female lead in a Michael Bay film, can we?

3) By contrast, Kalak will probably be made more heroic – rather than the dark anti-hero that he is.

4) Zarracka will probably be Gothon’s daughter and wear less clothing than she does already purely for the sake of getting more males to drool over her.

5) Emperor Gothon will just be an evil emperor and Mr Bay will remove his motives in the book so that he’s just your standard movie villain. What? Villains that are just more than your standard villain in a Michael Bay movie? Perish the thought!

6) The move will be about 3 hours long and 2 hours of that will just be Kalak and Daniar trying to get laid – and Ben being an annoying prat. The story will actually not really move along until about 40 minutes left, whereby they will try and cramp in too much crap at once.

7) It’ll probably turn out that the dragons of Draconica are actually aliens – and no, the dragons are NOT aliens in Trapped on Draconica.

8) The fight scenes will be close up camera shots with quick changes and lots of slow down and speed up.

9) He’ll probably get Linkin Park to do a song in it. Actually, I kinda like Linkin Park so this is one change I’m happy with. Although personally I think Dream Theater would be more suited to this movie.

10) He’ll probably work in something whereby the Baalarian Empire will arrive on Earth and start messing crap up – just for the excuse to have the military come in and have countless explosions. By this point the story will have probably gone on such a tangent that the audience doesn’t care anymore.

11) It will be filmed in 3D to show off the special effects – as will my tears be in 3D as I watch my story being butchered horribly and wondering why I ever sold the rights of my book to Mr Bay.

So those are just MY ideas of what I think Michael Bay would do. And in view of that, I will NOT be selling my book rights to Michael Bay - if he ever asks me that is, which I doubt he will.

How do you think that Michael Bay will turn YOUR book into a film? Please let me know if you have your own Michael Bay makeover ideas. Maybe we can get a little game going!

Thanks for reading guys and have a Happy Easter! For those interested there is still time to take part in the Read2Review Easter competition.

Kinest

Pandragon

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Hi guys. With Easter just around the corner, I'm just letting you guys know that there is still time to take part in the specail Read2Review Easter Treasure Hunt for your chance to win the grand prize AND a special Trapped on Draconica T-shirt (pictured below. T-shirt may vary from one pictured).

To check out the full details, click to the previous post. Link is below.

Read2Review Easter Egg Treasure Hunt

Happy hunting guys!

Pandragon

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Hey guys and welcome to Day 25 of the Read2Review Easter Treasure Hunt. For those of you who have been following the treasure hunt will know the score by now. But for those of you who have only just seen this and are coming into it not sure, please check out the previous Easter Treasure Hunt posts and full details of the massive giveaway that we currently have going on!

READ2REVIEW TREASURE HUNT DAYS 1-24

As part of the Grand Prize Giveaway, I have donated a paperback copy of my book Trapped on Draconica, along with a 1 page Omake (bonus mini comic) and a signed piece of artwork from Alexis M Centeno – the artist of the novel.

To be in with a chance to enter, check out the previous posts (linked above) and collect 39 letters hidden from the various sites during the tour. Those of you who have been following the treasure hunt will probably have found many of the letters already, but if you’re starting from scratch then you’ve still got time to catch up.

For this part of the competition, click on the egg below and search the website to locate the secret letter, written in RED.

But wait, I hear you cry, MOST of the writing on the website is done in red! Well, you didn’t think I was going to make this easy for you, did you? Lol! You’ll have to browse through the pages to locate the letter, but don’t worry – as I’m a generous soul, I’ve left an “eggecellent” clue as to where it’s located.

In addition to that, I am also offering a very special min-giveaway on this very site – a Trapped on Draconica T-shirt! (Picture below is just for reference – actual colour of T-shirt may vary).

To be in with a chance to win this T- riffic prize (that joke sounded SO much better in my head!)  then please browse the website (by following the egg link) and then answer the following questions:

1) How many characters (not including the face in the background) are there on the cover of Trapped on Draconica.

2) On The Wandering Valkyr cover, what colour are Selena’s eyes? (She’s the one with the purple hair).

3)    (You’ll need to go to the Artist’s Dan Has Worked With link to answer this one). In the picture in Alexis M Centeno’s profile page, what is she dressed as?

Send your answers to pandragonpublishing@gmail.com (or send an email from the Contact page on the website) posting Easter Giveaway in the subject heading. DO NOT post your answers in the comments below. Winners will be selected at random after the date of 8th April, whereby winners will be contacted by Email to request address and sizes. ONE T-shirt per entry.

Thanks for taking part guys and hope you will take an opportunity to check out the other posts for this great competition. Be sure to follow all the future posts. Thanks to Kate at Read2Review for this amazing opportunity.

Kindest

Pandragon

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