{"id":137,"date":"2018-07-08T15:30:03","date_gmt":"2018-07-08T22:30:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ceruleanchameleon.com\/?p=137"},"modified":"2022-09-26T13:00:08","modified_gmt":"2022-09-26T20:00:08","slug":"thematic-shortcomings-of-smekdays-adaptation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ceruleanchameleon.com\/index.php\/2018\/07\/08\/thematic-shortcomings-of-smekdays-adaptation\/","title":{"rendered":"Thematic Shortcomings of Smekday<\/em>\u2019s Adaptation"},"content":{"rendered":"

On its own, the DreamWorks movie <\/span>Home<\/span><\/i> is a cute and heartwarming\u2014if a little bit strange\u2014narrative about family and friendship. If you haven\u2019t seen it, the basic premise is that aliens called the Boov take over Earth and send all the humans to Australia. The protagonist, a girl named Tip, avoids forced relocation and travels to Australia with a friendly Boov named Oh to find her mother.<\/span><\/p>\n

What many people don\u2019t know is that it\u2019s an adaptation of a (really good) book called <\/span>The True Meaning of Smekday<\/span><\/i> by Adam Rex, which does involve family and friendship but also centers themes addressing imperialism. I\u2019m not nitpicky when a film adaptation doesn\u2019t follow its book precisely, but I think it\u2019s great to capture the depth and complexity of its original themes. Unfortunately, the seemingly surface-level changes in <\/span>Home<\/span><\/i> really detract from the anti-imperialist and anti-racist ideas that make <\/span>Smekday<\/span><\/i> so special, wasting amazing potential in favor of more generic messages.<\/span>
\n<\/p>\n

Most consequentially, <\/span>Home<\/span><\/i> removes one of <\/span>Smekday<\/span><\/i>\u2019s main characters: Frank, an Indigenous Din\u00e9 man who accompanies Tip on the journey. Out of everything in the movie, this change is especially harmful. The idea behind <\/span>The True Meaning of Smekday<\/span><\/i> is that when the Boov invade Earth, send the humans to designated areas, and take over human homes to call their own, they recreate colonial histories\u2014and particularly echo European colonialism in North America. Cutting the story\u2019s only Indigenous character minimizes real-life connections and important historical commentary. While the movie occasionally alludes to imperialist perspectives through scenes that reveal how the Boov view humans, it ultimately falls flat. Without Indigenous representation, a powerful metaphor for the problems with colonialism becomes mostly just another alien invasion movie. <\/span><\/p>\n

When it comes to viewpoint characters, <\/span>Home<\/span><\/i> makes another major shift: <\/span>Smekday<\/span><\/i> takes place from Tip\u2019s perspective and is clearly about her, while <\/span>Home<\/span><\/i> takes place from Oh\u2019s perspective to the point where I\u2019m not actually sure who\u2019s the protagonist. This is significant because Tip is a multiracial Black girl who provides important representation, and sidelining her in favor of telling the alien\u2019s story abandons a valuable opportunity to center a Black female character. Why can\u2019t a young woman of color lead her own story without sharing and even giving up the spotlight? When we consider that these aliens parallel European colonizers, it\u2019s even more unfortunate.<\/span><\/p>\n

There\u2019s also the whole issue with the holiday called Smekday, which I think is worth mentioning since, you know, the book is called <\/span>The True Meaning of Smekday<\/span><\/i>. Changing the name to <\/span>Home<\/span><\/i> really reflects thematic changes in the story, showing the shift in focus from anti-imperialist themes to themes of friendship and familial love. When the Boov arrive, they make a new holiday named Smekday after their captain Smek, replacing Christmas. Having a holiday for Smek parallels how several U.S. holidays center imperialists and colonizers. What\u2019s the true meaning of Columbus Day? Contrary to what many elementary school classrooms still teach, it\u2019s not good. More broadly, Smekday reflects beyond the idea of holidays how imperialists and colonizers continue to be celebrated and revered, forcing readers to question who we consider our heroes. <\/span><\/p>\n

Finally, the movie completely diverges in its ending. (Spoiler warning for <\/span>Home<\/span><\/i> and <\/span>Smekday<\/span><\/i> until the end of this paragraph. But they\u2019re still good even if you know what happens.) In both stories, the Boov are chased by a worse species of alien called the Gorg coming to invade Earth. At the end of the movie, the Gorg turn out to be one friendly individual here to reunite with their children, providing a heartwarming message about family meant to parallel Tip and her mom. At the end of the book, the Gorg are as bad as they seem. They\u2019re all clones of one individual\u2014the most powerful and bloodthirsty of the species\u2014who won the \u201csurvival of the fittest\u201d game when everyone killed each other. The extreme homogeneity in which everyone is the \u201cideal\u201d powerful person without diversity further comments on racial issues with its resemblance to eugenics. Additionally, although the Gorg might seem to justify or mitigate the Boov\u2019s colonization of Earth since the Boov are seeking refuge, the book thematically shows that this isn\u2019t the case\u2014just as desperate times don\u2019t justify or mitigate real-life colonization. The movie makes another unfortunate change: Oh saves the world in the end, while in the book, Tip saves the world. <\/span>Home<\/span><\/i> therefore alters the original storyline to have the (male) alien take the lead rather than letting a Black girl be the hero. <\/span><\/p>\n

Aside from these major thematic points, <\/span>Smekday<\/span><\/i> includes other interesting details that contribute to its racial commentary. There\u2019s minor character Dan Landry, the politician who deals with the alien stuff and tells Tip to stay out of things\u2014but also takes Tip\u2019s glory in an accurate representation of the all-too-common case of white men getting credit for Black women\u2019s accomplishments. There\u2019s discussion of Tip\u2019s biracial heritage (she\u2019s Black and Italian) and all the microaggressions that she encounters. If you\u2019re interested in reading <\/span>Smekday<\/span><\/i>, you\u2019ll also be able to enjoy other fun elements from comics, newspaper clippings, and other media to Happy Mouse Kingdom to a variety of side characters that contribute to a unique and interesting world\u2014and it\u2019s a hilarious work,\u00a0<\/span>succeeding in humor where <\/span>Home<\/span><\/i> occasionally falls flat.<\/span><\/p>\n

Ultimately, Home<\/i> is a decent movie about friendship and family with inklings of anti-colonialist criticism. The True Meaning of Smekday<\/i> is an amazing book about friendship and family with overarching themes centering anti-colonialist criticism. Although the movie evidently intends to take this different route, I believe that tackling colonialism head-on would have been much more effective and allowed this work to truly stand out. I also feel that some changes, like removing Indigenous representation and sidelining a Black female lead to center a male alien, are wrong and worthy of indignation regardless of what the movie chooses to focus on. While both works have their own value, Home<\/i> doesn\u2019t really meet its potential; too many people are ignorant when it comes to America\u2019s unfortunate past, and directly addressing these issues would have been truly valuable.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On its own, the DreamWorks movie Home is a cute and heartwarming\u2014if a little bit strange\u2014narrative about family and friendship. If you haven\u2019t seen it, the basic premise is that aliens called the Boov take over Earth and send all the humans to Australia. The protagonist, a girl named Tip, avoids forced relocation and travels […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":138,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-137","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-media"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ceruleanchameleon.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ceruleanchameleon.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ceruleanchameleon.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ceruleanchameleon.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ceruleanchameleon.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=137"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/ceruleanchameleon.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":238,"href":"https:\/\/ceruleanchameleon.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137\/revisions\/238"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ceruleanchameleon.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/138"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ceruleanchameleon.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=137"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ceruleanchameleon.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=137"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ceruleanchameleon.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=137"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}