I reviewed two Foster books for the Fall 2007 issue of Prometheus, the quarterly newsletter of the Libertarian Futurist Society. The other is of his Sagramanda, a techno-thriller set in near-future India.Here is an excerpt of my review of Transformers; visit my review site Prometheus Unbound for the movie portion of the review:I found Foster’s novel to be far inferior to the movie for a number of reasons. First, it lacks the energy, wit and charm of the movie. Perhaps my disappointment in the book was inevitable given that I read it after watching the movie. However, it is not simply that the fantastic special effects and compelling performances by the movie’s actors were able to breathe more life into the story than mere words could. I think I would have been disappointed in Foster’s novel even if I had read it before watching the movie or never watched the movie at all. Foster doesn’t simply flesh out the screen play as one might expect. He takes many liberties with it, leaving some scenes out, adding others in, changing dialogue, and so forth. None of the changes add much, if anything, of value to the story in comparison with the screen play. Quite the contrary. Foster’s novel is lacking in physical character and scene description. This is perhaps a necessary evil when writing the novelization of a movie prior to the latter’s completion and release. Yet Foster also delves very little into the deeper psychology of the characters that we don’t get to see on the big screen but expect in a novelization. Perhaps worst of all, his novel is more plagued by Hollywood stereotypes than the Hollywood movie itself! Two of the main characters, Sam and his love interest Mikaela, both come off as far weaker, less likeable and admirable, persons than they do in the movie, a testament both to the screen play and to the actors.From a libertarian perspective, Foster’s novel is also disappointing. It either lacks or significantly mutes all of the aforementioned libertarian elements of the movie. Indeed, the only mention of freedom in the novel appears midway through it and is only a sadly corrupted version of a key phrase uttered by Optimus Prime. In the movie, Prime states that “Freedom is the right of all sentient beings.” Foster turns this into the New Deal-esque “Freedom from fear and all else is the right of all sentient beings.”I highly recommend the movie on both aesthetic and political grounds. Save your money though and don’t bother with the novel. For those diehard fans who absolutely must see or read all things Transformers, Foster has also written a prequel novel, titled Transformers: Ghosts of Yesterday, that may add something of value to the backstory of the movie.
I was a little surprised by the lack of depth to this book. Most books based on movies give you more insight into character and thought, etc, but this did very little of that. There were some changes from the movie that I thought was good. It did expound on the friendship between Sam and Miles more but not by much. It give a significant look into Maggie's life that the movie doesn't give you and I found that interesting. But amazingly, the movie actually provided more insight and background into the Transformers than the book provided. I don't know if he expected you to already know who these "bots" are or not, but there was very little into character development of the actual transformers. All-in-all, it was a good book and I would recommend it for the slight variations from the movie adaptation, but it doesn't fill any very many holes of the movie which I found disappointing.
