The Colour Of Magic finishes airing; early reviews good

25 March 2008 (8:10) The Colour of Magic Terry Pratchett's Hogfather Films News News Archives

As you all know, The Colour Of Magic, the TV adaptation of the first two books in the Discworld series, finished airing for the first time March 24 in the U.K. The reaction fans so far has been excellent, and the early reviews so far have been similarly good. To quote a TimesOnline.co.uk article on The Colour Of Magic:

The two-parter was better than Sky’s previous Discworld adaptation, the story more clearly told (I could understand it) and David Jason happier as the hopeless wizard Rincewind than as Albert in The Hogfather [sic]. It also benefited from an excellent villain in Tim Curry. It looked good, in an over-glossy, Hallmark Productions kind of way …

Another article, from The Scotsman, said, “this was a good-looking production that proper fans probably appreciated.” However, criticisms were also evident in both articles:

Every now and again the budget (tight, it was implied, by the accompanying “Making of” documentary) looked stretched. If it could show characters falling off the edge of the world, make a trunk walk and blow up the Broken Drum Inn, why is it impossible for the skeleton Death to open its mouth when it speaks?

And:

The opening instalment, based on Pratchett’s first and possibly worst Discworld book, was far too long, dragging out its attempts at satire with leaden direction and script.

The Guardian.co.uk some preliminary viewing figures for the adaptation:

• The second part concluded with almost 1 million viewers last night, with an average of 967,000 viewers and a multichannel share of 4.7%. The viewer numbers peaked at 1.1 million viewers at 7:15.
• The first part (which aired Sunday March 23) attracted 1.5 million viewers and an 8% multichannel share.

Compare these numbers to Hogfather’s: 2.4 million for the first part (a record-breaking number) and 1.5 million for the second.

Update: Another highly enthusiastic review.